Huo Zhijing：Further Stimulate Film Productivity and Building Commanding Heights of Film Culture with Socialist Characteristics
This year marks the beginning of the implementation of the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. China’s economy and social life are recovering rapidly. Despite three years’ impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the film industry was off to a great start with the record gross box office and good ratings of films released during the Spring Festival, and grand opening and conclusion of the 13th Beijing International Film Festival (BJIFF). “Let’s enjoy the best films in Beijing this spring”—being the first international film festival that fully resumes offline operations in China, the 13th BJIFF set new records in terms of the number of participants and participating countries and market activity.
During the festival, the Beijing Film Market resumed its offline events and activities at Langyuan Station, where visitors were crowded, more than 100 film companies were gathered, and approximately 1,000 projects and WIPs were presented. We truly felt the enthusiasm of filmmakers and the revival and vitality of the film industry.
In recent years, Beijing has resolutely followed Xi Jinping’s thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics for a new era, and has vigorously promoted the development of a national cultural center in accordance with the functional position of “four centers” defined by the central government. In particular, we prioritize the construction of a high-level and internationalized national cultural center based on the abundant resources that Beijing boasts.
Special attention and strategic coordination for powerful leadership of film development
The CPC Beijing Municipal Committee and People’s Government of Beijing Municipality attach great importance to the development of the film industry. Major leaders have given important instructions and put forward clear requirements about the robust development of filmmaking, and innovation and optimization of the business environment of the film industry for many times. And they chaired creative meetings and coordinated the shooting of key films in person so as to boost the confidence of the industry. In 2022, we formulated and issued The 14th Five-Year Plan for the Film Development in Beijing, which put forward the implementation of “7 Upgrading Projects”, and construction of a core area of the film power and demonstration area for high-quality film development. Since last year, the CPC Beijing Municipal Committee has proposed to build the cultural brand of “Great Performances in Beijing”, and given full play to Beijing’s model and leading role in making fine arts and cultural products, and building a platform for exchanges. The BJIFF has continued to improve and upgrade itself. And it delivered continuous high-quality organization even during the pandemic, which fully demonstrates the unremitting resilience of China’s film industry. Last year, we hosted the first Beijing Culture Forum. Thanks to the huge support of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, the second edition is upgraded to an internationalized national high-end forum, during which international filmmakers will be invited to China for exchanges.
Full respect for the law of creation and focus on themes of the era to scale new heights of creation
As General Secretary Xi Jinping clearly stated, the literary and art sector should put the creation and production of outstanding works on top of its agenda. As a region clustering the most filmmaking entities, Beijing has constantly maintained the highest quantity of annual film production nationwide. In addition to stabilizing the quantity of production, we kept improving the work mechanism, strengthening organizational support, and promoting the steady enhancement of filmmaking quality. First, we vigorously implemented the Beijing Cultural Excellence Program. Through forward planning, call for entries, and review and selection, we selected projects with distinctive themes, solid creation and competent creative teams, announced them on a regular basis, and provided one-on-one follow-up, guidance and support. Second, we prioritized the creation of key themes. Focusing on key milestones, such as the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China and 100th anniversary of the founding of the CPC, and key projects designated by the China Film Administration, such as My People, My Country, The Battle at Lake Changjin and The Great War, we concentrated our support and ensured excellent production of films about key milestones and projects. Third, we offered scientific and precise support in creation. A total of 100 million is granted each year to fund high-quality projects that are evaluated and selected by stage, phase and category in accordance with the law of creation. In this way, the know-how, flexibility and precision are all reinforced, and the fiscal support in creation is maximized. Fourth, we adhered to people first and unity of main melody promotion and diversified creation, and combined people’s cultural needs and consolidation of spiritual power. We screened themes for the new era, and advanced the development of realism projects, such as Beijing in Progress, Coffee or Tea 2 and Break Through.
Sound industrial system and prosperous film market to facilitate high-quality development of the film industry
Beijing cinema has attained remarkable results since the adoption of film industrialization. The number of registered cinemas across Beijing increased from 135 in 2012 to 292 with 2,118 screens. And Beijing earned the highest gross box office around China in 2022. Last year, in response to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, RMB 50 million was granted by the People’s Government of Beijing Municipality in addition to the special film funding to support construction of new cinemas. Also, a rent subsidy policy was introduced to subsidize cinemas’ rent. With a focus on the construction of demonstration zones for the cultural creative industry, we support the upgrading of key film and television industrial parks, and development of private film companies in Beijing. Last year, another 97 industrial parks were accredited as municipal parks, and the number of registered film entities exceeded 5,000. The cultural industry recovered rapidly in the first quarter of this year. Specifically, the revenue of cultural enterprises above designated size across Beijing increased by 13.1% year-on-year, an increase of 3.0 percentage points as compared to the same period in 2019. We accelerated the construction of China (Huairou) Film and Television Industry Demonstration Zone, and supported the collaborative growth of industry, academia, research and application to build China Film Capital with international influence. We propelled the construction of key projects, such as China Film Group Production Base Phase 2, Huairou Campus of the Beijing Film Academy and Huairou Base of Bona Film Group to maximize industrial agglomeration, set up special cultural entertainment and tourism businesses, and promote the integration of cultural tourism. We have strengthened supply-side reform. We initiated and founded the Capital Star Art Film Theaters League, Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Arthouse Cinema Alliance and the China Documentary Films Screening Project to ensure “weekly film screenings”, create more screening opportunities for low- and mid-budget films and arthouse films, and secure differentiated, diversified and high-quality content supply for the film market.
Better system and mechanism, and optimized government services to create favorable growth environment
Since the change of governing film authority, thanks to the support of the support of the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee, we have maintained smooth transition of administration. Meanwhile, we’ve given full play to advantageous resources allocation and overall coordination of the CPC Committee and Department to create better conditions for the industry development. First, we improved the administrative system, and built a stronger team of talents. Last year, the Film Development Center was set up, a public institution directly governed by the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee. The permanent staffing was increased to bring in professional talents and improve operational efficiency. Beijing is assigned with heavy load of film review assignments. We continue to enhance our content censorship, expand the professional review committee, dynamically adjust the structure of the review committee, carry out training and case exchanges, and keep improving the expertise and accuracy of the review opinions. Second, we offered to conduct exchanges and services, and unite stakeholders. Following the philosophy of services plus administration, we opened a hotline for the film administration to enable smooth communication with creative entities; we integrated film services into the “construction of two zones”, streamlined administrative procedures and shortened approval time to the maximum extent; we set up creative meeting mechanism to solve the difficulties that creative teams and production entities have; we improved services for film and television shooting, and launch “service package” to strengthen crosscutting coordination among multiple departments. Third, we optimized public services and facilitated in-depth integration. We have innovated and upgraded film public services, and launched free film viewing activities to the public. Film vouchers worth RMB 10 million were issued to encourage the public to watch films in cinemas. We also launched a pilot project of the New Era Cultural Center to improve public screening level in rural areas. We reinforced the deep integration of the construction of cultural center and science and technology innovation center, and sought new paths and achieved new breakthroughs in the development of technology-driven film industry.
Moving forward, we will dive in and implement the spirit of the 20th CPC National Congress, undertake our mandates, spare no efforts, stick to integrity, innovation and high-quality development, strive to build commanding heights of film culture with socialist characteristics, and contribute more to the construction of the film power!
(Based on the speech delivered at the 2023 National Film Work Conference, slightly abridged)