Liu Ye with Meryl Streep. (Sina.com)

Sina.com reports Chinese actor Liu Ye has visit the States again to prepare for his role in the American indie project Dark Matter, which would also star Meryl Streep and Val Kilmer. Inspired by a true story, Dark Matter tells a tragic story of Liu Xing (first name: Xing, last name: Liu), a young Chinese studying in America who reacted violently after his chance of winning the Nobel Prize was ruined by the campus politics. To prepare for his role, Liu Ye has taken a series of English lessons and has acquired director Zhang Yimou’s permission to temporarily leave the production of The City of Golden Armor if Liu was ever wanted for Dark Matter on the other side of the Pacific.

 

Related stories:

Liu Ye Said He Is Still Attached to DARK MATTER (MonkeyPeaches Exclusive) April 18, 2006

More On Liu Ye and Meryl Streep's DARK MATTER (Variety / AFP) June 26, 2004

Liu Ye, Meryl Streep and Robert Redford In LIU XING (MonkeyPeaches Exclusive) June 14, 2004

Donnie Yen in Dragon Tiger Gate. (Mandarin Films)

Someone from Donnie Yen’s agent company, Hong Kong-based Mandarin Films, has been talking to the local press lately about a remake of late Japanese master Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurais pushed by The Weinsteins Co. During the recently closed Cannes Film Festival, Donnie Yen had a series discussion with Harvey Weinstein, who asked Yen to star in the remake. In addition, the Weinsteins would also invite Zhang Ziyi and George Clooney to join the cast. A Hong Kong newspaper has speculated that Clooney’s role would be Kambei, the leader of the seven samurais and Zhang Ziyi’s role would be Shino the village girl. Reportedly, the remake would tell a somewhat updated version of the original story featuring some CG-enhanced fight scenes and would cost approximately US$100 million to make. Two most well-known Hollywood moguls remaking a Japanese classic is already interestingly odd and how would George Clooney fit into the picture? It may not be a faithful remake of the original, but I still want to say - go ahead to make it and stay away from the classic.

Related story:

Hong Kong action star set to lead in Japanese classic remake, AFP

RottenTomatoes.com just posted a photography of a teaser poster of Jet Li's upcoming Hollywood project Way of the Rat, displayed in Cannes. It is described as "an East-meets-West 'Lord of the Rings' adventure with CGI creatures and set in the olden times." A big name Hollywood star" is expected to star with Li in the movie. Part of an ancient Chinese coin engraved with Chinese zodiac animals and the characters representing these animals. It may or may not be related to the story of the movie.

Click here for the original report by RottenTomatoes.com.

(AFP)

According to several mainland Chinese newspapers, a casting team has visited Beijing and Shanghai to search for the right actress to play the female leading role, a young college student recruited as a secret agent. Reportedly, Ang Lee prefers casting someone with a fresh face and only a handful of relatively well known actresses have been contacted. Another report suggests this role will belong to someone from Taiwan. As for the male leading role, a high ranking puppet government official and the target of an assassination plot, mainland Chinese actor Ge You is currently in talk for the role. Ge You is best known for starring in comedies, especially films by director Feng Xiaogang. His performance in Zhang Yimou's To Live made him the best actor of 1994's Cannes International Film Festival. Most recently, he played an emperor in Feng Xiaogang's The Banquet, a Hamlet inspired drama.

Update: Ge You's manager Zhang Kui told Sina.com that Ge was very interested in starring in a n Ang Lee movie but so far he had not heard anything from Ang Lee.

On the stage designed like the lobby of Oriental Hotel from Jury president Wong Kar-Wai's In the Mood for Love and 2046, winners of the 59th Cannes Film Festival are announced tonight.

The complete winners' list

(AFP)

Mainland Chinese director Wang Chao's Luxury Car (Chinese literal title: Summer Days of a River City) became the winner of the category "Un Certain Regard" last night in Cannes. Luxury Car tells a country schoolteacher traveling to the city of Wuhan to look for his only son. He teams up with an old policeman, who also lost his own son. But the schoolteacher does not that his son is already dead during a carjack and the man being responsible for his death is the boyfriend of the schoolteacher's daughter. Wang said he decided to make the film after feeling sorry for spending too much time on his work and too little time with his family. As the the final installment of Wang's trilogy about life in modern China, Luxury Car has yet been scheduled for a release in Chinas. The first two installments of the trilogy, The Orphan of Anyan (2001) and Night and Day (2006) have never been released in Chinese theaters due to the country's overly small market for artistic films. Chinese filmmakers who are obsessed with making artistic films usually cover the production cost by selling their works in the overseas market.

(Thanks to "Maria")

Page by Cannes Film Festival.

Celluloid Dreams (The French production studio)

Clips from Cannes: Cocktail party  Cocktail party - director Wang Chao

Cocktail party - actress Tian Yuan  The blue carpet

Photos from Cannes

Review:

By Derek Elley (Variety)

By Duane Byrge (The Hollywood Reporter)

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Two Hong Kong films, Election 2 and Re-Cycle, premièred today in Cannes. Johnnie To directed Election 2: Harmony Is Virtue is a more violent follow-up to his violent gang drama Election, premièred at last  year's Cannes Film Festival. Re-Cycle is latest horror flick by the Pang Brothers, Oxide Pang and Danny Pang.

Election 2: Harmony Is Virtue:

Official page by Cannes Film Festival

Interview in Cannes: Clips (click the numbers below the screen to select.)   Photos

Re-Cycle:

Official page by Cannes Film Festival.

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(AFP)

Shanghai Youth Daily just had a short conversation with Ang Lee's personal assistant, Lee Liang-Shan about Lust, Caution. He said Ang Lee liked  the original story very much and had been working on the adaptation for many years. The cast would be filled largely with Chinese actors and actresses and it would be Ang Lee's first Chinese language film since Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. The cast list has not been finalized yet but they have already begun talking to many Chinese actresses and actors. Lee Liang-Shan said they would not rule out casting anyone, including anyone, who had already worked in Ang Lee previous films, for example Zhang Ziyi.  He said much of the film would feature the old Shanghai during the 1920s and 1930s. They have planned to start the production by November this year and Ang Lee have considered to shoot it in Shanghai. The original short story, inspired by a true event, is about a young woman agent seducing a high ranking puppet government official for assassinating him in a trap in the Japanese-occupied Shanghai sometime between 1941 and 1945.

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Chinese director Gu Changwei is getting ready to wrap up the shooting of Li Chun (loosely means "The First Day of Spring"). As a follow-up to his directorial début  Peacock, The First Day of Spring is about three mini-stories in the less developed small northern Chinese city during the whole 1990s. Gu's wife, Jiang Wenli plays an  instructor at a local music academy, who dreams about touring around the world as a famous soprano; Dong Xuan plays a neighbor of the soprano, a young housewife whose rich husband run away with everything she is proud of; and Zhang Yao plays a student of the soprano, who shaves her head to support his boyfriend undergoing cancer treatment and becomes a favorite at singing contest after claiming she herself is a cancer patient.

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Silk (Chinese literal title: "Eerie Silk"), the latest from Taiwan, is premiered today in Cannes Grand Théâtre Lumière. In the horror drama, a scientist, who attempts to achieve immortality through the research of the dead, finds the spirit of a 13 year old boy. His new discovery soon draws the attention of many people, including a police officer, the police officer's girlfriend, and the scientist's three assistants. After the police officer discovers a thread of silk, things begin to get out of control. Claimed to be the most expensive film ever made in Taiwan, Silk cost about 200 million Taiwanese dollars (US$6.2 millions) to make.

Title image: (L to R) Barbie Hsu, director Su Chao-Pin, Chang Chen and Lin Chia-Hsin (Karena Lam).

Page by Cannes Film Festival.

Photos from Cannes More photos from Cannes (updated)

Official site  Stills  Photos from a press conference in Taipei (June 16, 2005)  CMC Entertainment 

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(L to R) Summer Palace poster, Dragon Tiger Gate poster design, Re-Cycle still.
(Laurel Films, Mandarin Films, Universe Films)

CANNES: "Red Road" Is Tense, Fascinating; "Dusk" A Dry Comic Gem; "Palace" Much to Admire; "Princess" Has Agonizing Power, by Tim Ryan

Cannes: Promo Reels for Tony Jaa's "Ong Bak 2" and Donnie Yen "Dragon Tiger Gate" Showcase Hard-Hitting Martial Arts Mayhem, by Senh Duong

Cannes: Pang Brothers' "Re-Cycle" Imaginative, But Exhausting, by Senh Duong

(Thanks to Senh Duong of IGN Entertainment and Rotten Tomatoes.)

(AFP)

Focus Features just announced yesterday that director Ang Lee's next project will Lust, Caution, adapted from the same name short story written by Chinese woman writer Eileen Chang (1921 - 1995) in 1978. Set in the post-1941 Shanghai which was under the Japanese occupation, the story is about a young secret agent affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist government, who seduced a high-ranking official worked for the puppet government and tricked him to an assassination trap. Then she realized the relationship with her target had started growing out of control. The film is produced by Bill Kong, who produced Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Zhang Yimou's Hero and House of Flying Daggers, as well as Ronny Yu's Fearless. Focus Features CEO James Schamus,  who has produced every film Ang Lee directed, returns as the executive producer. The screenplay is penned by Wang Hui-Ling, who wrote the scripts of Eat Drink Man Woman and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon for Ang Lee. Schamus said, "Ang Lee is going to be making a very exciting film that's unlike anything he's done before" and " 'Lust, Caution' is a uniquely Asian story which, in Ang's hands, will surprise and attract audiences around the world." Shooting is expected to begin this fall at an unannounced location.

Related stories:

Ang Lee spies WWII China pic, by Gregg Goldstein, The Hollywood Reporter

Two Chinese titles are included on the list of films competition for the Jin Jue Award - Qi Jian's The Forest Ranger (Chinese literal title: Heavenly Dog), about a lone forest ranger, named Heavenly Dog, show takes the last stand against three brother tree poachers; and the painter Chen Yifei's The Music Box (Chinese literal title: The Barber), has already been widely released in China since last month, which  is about a young barber's courage for love and survival through wars and turmoil. It is very common for released domestic titles showing up at film festivals held in the country. Other Asian films in the category include South Korean director Park Jin-Pyo's You Are My Sunshine and Iranian director Saman Moghadam's Cafe Setareh.

Ten titles are selected for bidding the Asian New Talent Award, including I'll Call You (Chinese literal title: Have a Cup of Tea If You Got Time) by Lam Tze-Chung, International Military Tribunal (for the) Far East (Chinese literal title: Judgment in Tokyo) by Gao Qunshu, The Silent Holly Stones by Wanma-Caidan, and Trouble Makers (Chinese literal title: Anger of Glory) by Cao Baoping.

Shanghai International Film Festival has been running for nine years but has yet built much reputation internationally, which could be blamed on the country's very small market size. Domestic productions are restricted on subjects and contents, which greatly diminishes people's interest on domestic titles. Annually, the Chinese government only allows up to twenty foreign films to be released in China under the format of revenue-sharing and a small number of foreign films, often straight-to-video titles imported from the US, to be released  with purchased distribution rights. Last year, there were less than a hundred movies received the treatment of full nation-wide release in China. Not satisfied by the highly restricted movie market, the Chinese are regularly accessing mostly foreign films through pirated DVDs and illegal download from the Internet.

Mainland Chinese director Wang Chao's new drama Luxury Car (Chinese literal title: Summer Days of a River City) premièred yesterday in Cannes under the category of Un Certain Regard. Luxury Car tells a country schoolteacher traveling to the city of Wuhan to look for his only son. He teams up with an old policeman, who also lost his own son. But the schoolteacher does not that his son is already dead during a carjack and the man being responsible for his death is the boyfriend of the schoolteacher's daughter.

Page by Cannes Film Festival.

Celluloid Dreams (The French production studio)

Clips from Cannes: Cocktail party  Cocktail party - director Wang Chao

Cocktail party - actress Tian Yuan  The blue carpet

Photos from Cannes (updated)

Review:

By Derek Elley (Variety)

By Duane Byrge (The Hollywood Reporter)

Related stories:

Jeffrey Wells of Hollywood-Elsewhere.com took a snapshot of a billboard of Wong Kar-Wai's upcoming My Blueberry Nights displayed in front of Cannes' Majestic Hotel. Norah Jones will make her silver screen debut as the female lead in the film described by Wong as about "the story of a woman who takes the long route instead of the short one to meet up with the man she loves."  The cast may  also includes Rachel Weisz and Jude Law. Looks like Wong's Nicole Kidman project, The Lady from Shanghai, is definitely postponed.  The past Cannes winner and the jury president of this year's Cannes Film Festival, Wong Kar-Wai was inducted into the French Legion of Honour yesterday, for inventing a new language of cinema.

Update:

Variety has confirmed that the cast of the romantic comedy My Blueberry Nights includes Norah Jones, Jude Law, Natalie Portman and Rachel Weisz. The story is about a young woman, played by Noah Jones, who is traveling across America to find he meaning of love while meeting unusual people en route. Shooting of this Wong Kar-Wai's first English language film, produced by Studio Canal, will begin shortly after the Cannes Film Festival wraps up.

(Thanks to Daniel Zelter.)

Related stories:

France honors film director Wong Kar-Wai, AP

Hong Kong director Wong Kar-Wai to film movie starring Norah Jones, AP

Wong Kar-Wai Gives Update on MY BLUEBERRY NIGHT (MonkeyPeaches Exclusive) March 22, 2006

Update on Wong Kar-Wai's THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI AND the Katrina Project (MonkeyPeaches Exclusive) February 14, 2006

During an interview with Hong Kong's Oriental Daily and The Sun, director Stanley Tong said he would direct an ambitious Nanjing (Nanking) Massacre project titled The Diary (literal) with his China International Media Group Corp. He said the mainland Chinese authority had approved the US$40 million project, which would be backed by investors from Germany, the US, Japan and the mainland China. The story of The Diary focuses on a group of foreign nationals documenting the massacre on photos, diaries and films. The proposed cast includes Chow Yun-Fat, Maggie Cheung, Andy Lau and Japanese actress Norika Fujiwara, who worked in Tong's China Strike Force few years ago. Stanley Tong would like Maggie Cheung to play Principal Wu of of Jinling Women's Middle School, a hiding place for thousands of refugees during the massacre and Norika Fujiwara to play a nurse served in the Japanese army. Tong said he had been preparing for the project for five years and intended to release it by December 13, 2007, the 70th anniversary of the beginning of the massacre, during which tens thousands of Chinese slaughtered by the invading Japanese troops. Stanley Tong has also been pushing for a Hua Mulan project for many years and no one else has made commitment to the project. Also according to IMDB, Tong is currently negotiating for the director's seat of Fear Effect, based on the same name PlayStation game.

The is another Nanjing Massacre project now in preproduction pushed Viridian Entertainment and Nanjing-based Nanjing Culture Industry Group. Writer producer William J. MacDonald's cast wish list contains the names of  Clint Eastwood, Meryl Streep, Michelle Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi.

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A new copy of Summer Palace was submitted to the Chinese censorship authority and was rejected again. According to producer Nai An, they had tried all available technical means to "fix" the film, including brightening the image, but the Chinese Film Bureau still refused to accept the new copy because it was not a "magnetic Beta tape transferred from celluloid." Several officials from the bureau have told  the Chinese media, that showing the film at Cannes was illegal according to Chinese regulation and had to be punished. Reportedly, director Lou Ye, now at the forefront of the whole controversy, has returned to Beijing from Cannes to handle the damage control. However, no matter what he would do, even to cut any scene or content as required, the hope for getting a release certificate is very slim. And even a butchered Summer Palace was allowed for release, it would not do well at the box-office.

At Cannes, the Summer Palace has been promoted as a film set in the backdrop of the civil protest in 1989's Beijing. Neither director Lou Ye nor the Chinese production companies have admitted that the film makes any reference to that event. Another focal point is several sex and nude scenes featured in the film. Such scenes, especially female nude scenes, were occasionally available on the film and TV screens in China from the 1980s to 1990s but are banned now. There has yet been any film rating system adopted in China and movies must be made suitable for people of all ages before being allowed for public release. Films and TV shows containing female nudities are all been labeled as pornographic materials, which are restrictively prohibited in China. On the other hand, movies with violent and scary scenes are regularly shown on the big screen in China and children have rarely been restricted from entering movie theaters. Such scenes have never been too extreme but are still not suitable for the under-aged. For years the public has been crying for a rating system and the censorship authority has promised to look at the possibility of introducing a system of such but has never given any timetable.   

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Several Chinese newspapers report that a committee in charge of movie censorship has refused to watch a submitted beta version of Summer Palace, after it concluded the film was a defect. According to an officer from the Chinese Film Bureau, the film was unable to see and hear clearly, and they had demanded another copy of the film, with "brighter visual and clearer audio." Director Lou Ye was shocked by the result, because the visual and audio "problems" are exactly what he he intends to show to the audiences. Producer Nai An, who has been questioning the professional credibility of the members of the committee, said the quality of the version submitted to Cannes Film Festival was even worse but it did not stop the film being selected for competition.  Summer Palace has been scheduled for the world première tomorrow in Cannes and so far, neither Lou Ye nor the Chinese authority are loosening their positions. Screening the film without the official approval from the Chinese government would lead to banning the film in China and severe punishment on its makers. Giving in to the censors would be a big blow to China's independent filmmakers and would definitely damage Lou Ye's reputation as one of the most stylish directors in today's China.

Related stories:

'Palace' in China's doghouse - Country's censors wont review competition film, by Winnie Chung and Joanthan Landreth, The Hollywood Reporter

Cannes to go ahead with Summer Palace premiere, by Liz Shackleton, Screen Daily

According to Hong Kong's Oriental Daily and The Sun, Jackie Chan and Jet Li have agreed to star in the same movie now only known as The J & J Project, which will be announced officially with a teaser trailer during the coming Cannes Film Festival. An unidentified studio initialed the project, which has been in development for three months already. Jackie Chan will start working on the project after finishing Rush Hour 3. Chan's other projects, like The Shinjuku Incident, with director Yee Tung-Shing and the untitled project with Zhang Yimou may have to be postponed for The J & J Project. Jet Li reportedly has turned down several Hollywood offers to make time for the project with Jackie Chan. Jackie Chan and Jet Li have been exploring the possibility of working together for many years. Will The J & J Project finally make the dream come true?

The complete schedule for Cannes Film Festival has been made available at the official website of The 59th Cannes Film Festival. Summer Palace, Silk and Election 2 are arranged for being screened at Grand Théâtre Lumière, the single most important place for Cannes Film Festival. Summer Palace is scheduled for the world première two days from today, but it is not guaranteed whether it will arrive at Cannes on time because it was only submitted to Chinese Film Bureau for censorship yesterday. Director Lou Ye and several major cast members have postponed their trip to Cannes and they have been getting ready for pulling the film out of the festival at any moment. Summer Palace was selected for competition based on a video of a rough cut of the film, submitted by the film's overseas co-producer.

According to several Shanghai newspaper, someone from Chinese Film Bureau just said because of some "cultural difference", a few dialogues in Mission: Impossible 3 had to be edited out if Paramount still wanted to release it in China. One of the dialogue is from the scene, in which Tom Cruise makes preparation for that impossible jump. In others scenes, all Shanghai residents are speaking Mandarin with distinctive Cantonese accent rather than Shanghai accent. This movie has been screened several times "internally" and the final decision about the fate of the actioner, which was partially shot in China, is expected to be made this week. The release, if approved, will probably be aimed at some day after July 10. The second half of May will belong to The Da Vinci Code; in early June, Poseidon, Ice Age: The Meltdown and The White Countess will occupy every theater in the country; and from June 10 to July 10, no release of foreign titles will be allowed. In fact, July might be the best time for this  latest Tom Cruise movie, because the summer vacation for Chinese students will not begin until the second half of July.

(Thanks to "Marla" of AdmiringGongLi.com.)

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