On their very first day of shooting, driving to the Gobi Desert at 4:30 am to arrive at dawn, the vehicles sank into the sand. Fifty vehicles were stuck in the dark. The crew climbed out and began collecting small stones. Without a word of complaint, and working in sub-zero temperatures, the crew collected rocks and stones for two hours until a road had been built.
"I cannot think of a crew from anywhere else who would have accomplished this," says Roger Spottiswoode, former Bond film director, who works with ChowYun-fat and Michelle Yeoh to present The Children of Huangshi (Huangshi De Haizi), a tale of a British philanthropist's adventure in 1940s China.
A scene from The Forbidden Kingdom, starring Jackie Chan and Michael Angarano. (file photo: China Daily)
The spotlight is again on China, with international studios rushing in to grab a piece of the lucrative movie pie.
Starring Jackie Chan and Jet Li, The Forbidden Kingdom (Gongfu Zhi Wang), directed by Rob Minkoff of Lion King and Stuart Little, held its world premiere in China on April 16; Universal's US$160 million sequel The Mummy: The Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, starring Li, revolves around the story of China's first emperor Qin Shihuang. China, with its 5,000-year history, has never lacked a good story. As early as 1986, Bernardo Bertolucci knocked at the gates of the Forbidden City to shoot The Last Emperor. In 2007, Disney made its first co-production with China The Secret of the Magic Gourd (Baohulu De Mimi) based on a Chinese fairy tale. Minkoff's The Forbidden Kingdom is a fusion of Chinese mythology and martial arts fiction.
China itself is a good story, with its rapid economic growth and the approaching Olympics. The world is interested in China, Spottiswoode tells China Daily. "A China-related story tends to grab attention."
The story of China is popular in Western countries, he says. "It is very difficult not to read something about China when one picks up the newspaper."
But as important as a good story is, it is money that really matters in this industry.