Kung Fu Panda

1. Warrior monks go global in fight to market their brand [49%]

   Sixty Shaolin monks will arrive in Taiwan later this month to teach kung fu at summer schools across the island. The three-week tour by the legendary fighting monks, featured i- 14/08/2005, Asia

周五的《獨立報》就最新好萊塢動畫大片《功夫熊貓》在中國引起爭議刊登述評。文章的標題是："功夫加熊貓，好萊塢擊中中國"。

文章說，《功夫熊貓》在中國的票房收入周三超過一億人民幣，這在好萊塢電影經常引起爭議的功夫故鄉中國是個了不起的成就。文章說，北京觀眾尤其興致盎然，考慮到中國人一向為功夫而自豪，熊貓又是中國的象征，看來"夢工場動畫"對這兩種元素的處理都還恰到好處。

不過文章也提到經常帶著個玩具熊貓到處走的行為藝朮家趙半狄呼吁抵制這部電影。他認為，這部電影品味低劣，對四川地震受害者有失尊重。

文章說，可能是考慮到了抵制的聲音，中國電影管理當局推遲了影片在四川的上映，但此舉又引來了網民的反彈和新的爭議，上海一家報紙也發表評論說，電影的主題激勵人心，這也正是地震災區人民需要的。

Hollywood's mix of kung fu and giant pandas is a hit in China

By Clifford Coonan in Beijing
Friday, 4 July 2008

AP

The giant panda Po, voiced by Jack Black, and Master Shifu, voiced by Dustin Hoffman, in Kung Fu Panda

Getting Kung Fu Panda to the silver screen in China took the patience of a martial arts master, but the animated Hollywood take on Shaolin high jinks has got everybody kung-fu fighting in the ancestral home of the giant panda.

Kung Fu Panda , which opned on 20 June, passed the 100-million-yuan (£7.4m) threshold in the box offices at Chinese cinemas this week, a major milestone for a Hollywood film that was always going to be controversial in the home of kung fu. By Wednesday, the amusing tale about an overweight panda-cum-noodle chef who aspires to be a kung fu master had taken in 110 million Chinese yuan (£8.1m).

Audiences in a Beijing cinema were particularly enthusiastic about the performances of the Chinese action star Jackie Chan and the American-born actress Lucy Liu but Jack Black, who voices the main character, Po, was also a big hit.

Grown-ups interviewed after the screening said they felt the film was a sensitive and amusing depiction of a Chinese story. The children, once they stopped high-kicking and neck-chopping each other, said they thought the kung fu was really cool.

Lu Chuan, a leading Chinese director, said in his blog that Kung Fu Panda was a challenge to the Chinese film industry to make a film as good. "From a production standpoint, the movie is nearly perfect. Its American creators showed a very sincere attitude about Chinese culture," he wrote.

The Chinese are hugely proud of kung fu and they also love their national symbol, the giant panda, so it is a tribute to the DreamWorks Animation movie that it managed to address these two big issues sensitively.

But for a while it looked like the film might not get a screening at all. The performance artist Zhao Bandi, best known for carrying around a toy panda and using panda images in his work, including clothes designs for panda prostitutes and panda concubines, called for a boycott of the film. He said it was in poor taste and disrespectful to victims of the 12 May earthquake in which 90,000 died or are missing.

Because of Zhao's complaints, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, the state body which tightly controls the entertainment business, decided to delay the film's release in the Sichuan earthquake zone, fearing it might offend victims. This prompted a huge online backlash. "Ridiculous! It is a very good film. Why do they not think about the reasons that Chinese people cannot produce such a film?" wrote one blogger.

An editorial in the Shanghai Evening Post asked: "Why the boycott? What's with the postponement? Is it about Zhao's own fragility, or does he genuinely believe that the quake-hit victims are too sensitive? The panda is cute, the kung fu is Chinese, the story is hilarious, and the theme is inspiring! Is this not what the people in the disaster area need most right now?"