Cinema in China can be traced back to  1896, when a Spanish entre- preneur by the name of Galen Bocca showed a series of one-reel films to astonished crowds at an entertainment plaza in Shanghai. Bocca's films drew large audiences, who packed the plaza nightly to witness the marvellous new medium. Soon after, permanent film-only theatres were being built in Beijing and Shanghai and the Chinese film craze had of- ficially begun.

The first films shown in China were largely Western, with shots of European cities and Westerners picnicking and frolicking on the beach. As film took hold in China, there grew a demand for films that echoed Chinese tastes. By the 1920s three of the most important genres in Chi- nese cinema were established: historical dramas, costume dramas set in classical China and most importantly, 'swordsmen films' which would evolve into the modern martial arts film.

In 1931, the Nationalist Party in Nanjing placed restrictions on film that were seen as promoting dissent or immorality. The Lianhua Film Company had close connections with the Nationalist Party, and with funding and government support created some of the most important films and film stars of what has been dubbed China's 'Golden Age of Cinema. This age came to a standstill with the invasion of Shanghai by Japan in 1937, when many filmmakers tied to Hong Kong or went into hiding.

Civil war and the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949 was a setback for the film industry which was forced to follow rigid political  guidelines.  Heroic   tales  of the  revolutionary struggle  (geming pian) made filmmaking into a kind of communist comic strip of beatific peasants and peerless harvests. The Cultural Revolution added its own extremist vision to this surreal cinematography. .

After the death of Mao, Chinese  filmmakers  began to break free from years of political repression.  The  major  turning  point  took place  with the graduation of the first intake of students since the end of the Cul- tural Revolution   from  the  Beijing  Film  Academy in  1982. This group of directors, the best known being Zhang Yimou, Chen Kaige and Tian Zhuangzhuang, became known collectively as the 'Fifth Generation.

The first film to create an international stir was Chen Kaige's  Yellow Earth (1984), a beautifully shot film about a communist cadre who visits a remote village to collect folk songs and inspires a young woman to flee the village and join the communists. The film held little interest to Chinese audiences and the government disparaged the film as too pes- simistic. However, Western audiences loved the film and it spurred a taste in the West for Chinese cinema. Chen's later film Farewell My Concubine (1993) also received critical acclaim in Western countries.

Zhang Yimou followed Chen's success with Red Sorghum (1987), set in a northern Chinese village during the Japanese invasion. Red Sorghum won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival and also introduced to the Western world the actress Gong Li, who became the poster-girl of Chinese cinema in the 1990s. She also appeared in Zhang Yimou's To Live(1994), Ju Dou (1990), The Story of Qiu Ju (1991), Raise the Red Lantern (1991) and Shanghai Triad (1995), all popular in the West. These films generated a great deal of criticism in China, particularly for their candid approach to politically sensitive issues. Tian Zhuangzhuang's The Blue Kite (1993), a brilliant but heartbreaking movie that chronicles the events of the Cultural Revolution, was considered so controversial the filmmaker was banned from filmmaking for years.

In the 1990s, China's 'Sixth Generation' of Chinese filmmakers began to create films that were a reaction against the Fifth Generation's need to please Western audiences. In 1990, Beijing Film graduate Zhang Yuan cre- ated Mama, a beautiful but disturbing film about a mother and her autistic child.  This small film, created without government sponsorship, started a trend in independent films that continues today. Some of these indie filmmakers include Wang Xiaoshuai, Beijing Bicycle (2000), Jia Zhangke. Unknown Pleasure (2002), Jiang Wen, Devils on the Doorstep (1999) and Lu Xuechang, The Making of Steel (1996). Their films are far grittier, more urban observations than their Fifth Generation precursors. As a  result, many Sixth-Generation directors are blacklisted by the authorities and are not allowed to travel outside of China to attend film festivals.

China's contemporary film industry faces great challenges. Filmmakers are continually dealing with a shortage of funds, small audiences and high ticket prices. Except for a few directors who are able to attract domestic and overseas investments, such as Chen Kaige and Zhang Yimou, most directors  have  very small  budgets and because of limited  box-office appeal, see few profits.  Many Chinese prefer Hollywood blockbusters to local movies, with the exception of Hong Kong martial arts movies. Rises in ticket prices, putting many movies out of reach for the average Chinese, also contribute to dwindling audiences. Still, the movie indus- try carries on, producing often surprisingly high-quality movies on tiny budgets that few Westerners, or even Chinese, get to see.

HONG KONG & BEYOND

Hong Kong cinema has always been uniquely Chinese - a ramshackle, violent, slapstick, chaotic, vivid and superstitious world. Money, vendet- tas, ghosts, gambling and romance are endlessly recycled themes. John Woo's gun-toting films are probably the most celebrated of the action films (dongzuo pian). The master of slow motion and ultra violence (Hard Boiled; City On Fire) has been seduced by Hollywood and now works on gargantuan budget spectaculars (Face/Off; Mission Impossible 2).

Taiwan director Ang Lee's Oscar-winning epic tale Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) caused quite a stir among Western audiences. The Chinese, a public with loftier expectations of cinematic kung fu and death-defying stunts, panned it. Northern Chinese viewers squirmed in their seats at fellow southerners Chow Yun-fat's and Michelle Yeoh's spoken Mandarin. The Western taste was enticed by the film's combina- tion of epic story telling and novel fighting moves but Chinese suspicions were that Ang Lee had shrewdly milked the Western market.

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