China tops global box office

Marking Party's centenary

As last year marked the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, a number of movies and TV series were released to offer a retrospective of the CPC's glorious past and provide an opportunity to celebrate revolutionary heroes.

Two front-runners in this category are 1921, an epic that revisits the chaotic year in which the Party was founded in Shanghai, and The Pioneer, a poetic biography of Li Dazhao, one of the founders of the CPC.Respectively grossing 504 million yuan and 137 million yuan, the two films have provided a good referential model for domestic filmmakers to seek a more publicly appealing narration for such features.

More examples, exemplifying the endeavors of Chinese filmmakers to highlight ordinary people's heroic deeds, vary from National Day holiday blockbuster My Country, My Parents to summer vacation hit Chinese Doctors, respectively starring A-list actress Zhang Ziyi as a dedicated aerospace industry worker and paying tribute to the efforts of medical workers in Wuhan, Hubei province, the Chinese city hardest hit by COVID-19 in early 2020.

It is interesting to note the different approaches of China's top directors. They have used their distinctive methods to eulogize CPC heroes. One of the most critically acclaimed films is iconic auteur Zhang Yimou's Cliff Walkers, his first spy movie, which follows a team of CPC agents on their mission to expose the crimes of Japanese invaders in northeastern China during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931-45). In December, the film won three Golden Rooster Awards, the top honor for Chinese films.

Wang Yichuan, deputy chairman of China Literature and Art Critics Association, says Chinese filmmakers have made great strides in producing revolutionary stories in recent years, especially in terms of character development.