TIBET-CHINA: New Film Rekindles Beijing's Wrath
Rich Winkel
/** ips.english: 478.0 **/
** Topic: TIBET-CHINA: New Film Rekindles Beijing's Wrath **
** Written 4:15 PM May 8, 1998 by newsdesk in cdp:ips.english **
Copyright 1998 InterPress Service, all rights reserved.
Worldwide distribution via the APC networks.
*** 05-May-98 ***
Title: TIBET-CHINA: New Film Rekindles Beijing's Wrath
By Antoaneta Bezlova
BEIJING, May 5 (IPS) - Yet another film about Tibet, a favourite
subject in American film circles, has earned the ire of Chinese
officials who call it an attempt to ''deceive'' world audiences on
the situation in the Himalayan land.
'Windhorse' is the third Hollywood production about Tibet to
hit movie screens after two recent and equally controversial
films, 'Seven Years in Tibet' and 'Kundun'.
Chinese authorities had demanded the cancellation of the
Washington premiere last week of 'Windhorse', which was shot
clandestinely in Tibet and Nepal and directed by Academy Award
winner Paul Wagner.
A spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington called the
film an attempt to smear China's policy toward Tibet, where
dissident groups are seeking goals ranging from genuine self-rule
to independence from China.
The spokesman said the film would not help Americans develop a
''fair understanding'' of Tibet, and demanded its withdrawal from
the Washington International Film Festival last week.
The Chinese slammed 'Windhorse' even before its official
premiere, dismissing the ''political realism'' that earned it the
awards of Best U.S. Independent Film and best director at the
Santa Barbara International Film Festival in California in March.
Subsequently, the official 'China Daily' ran an editorial
criticising 'Windhorse', along with other U.S. films about Tibet.
'Windhorse' was trying to ''deceive audiences'' and ''hurt a
nation's feelings'', the paper said.
The film was made even more sensitive by the fact that it came
out months ahead of a visit by U.S. President Bill Clinton to
China in June.
'Windhorse' director Wagner sees the movie as a sequel of sorts
to 'Seven Years in Tibet' and 'Kundun', two recent American films
that climax with China's invasion of Tibet in the 1950s.
Windhorse picks up a 1996 story and focuses on the lives of
three young Tibetans searching for personal fulfillment amid the
clashing cultures of Tibetans and ethnic Chinese in what Beijing
considers the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Charming Dolkar is a gifted disco singer who, with the help of
her Chinese boyfriend, stands on the verge of stardom. Her brother
Dorjee, an idle drunkard, regains his nationalism after meeting a
young, Tibetan-speaking American tourist. Their cousin, Pema, is a
Buddhist nun imprisoned and tortured by the government for her
religious beliefs.
Though different, the lives of the three Tibetans carry a
common theme -- the tragic struggle to preserve Tibetan culture
and political freedom after 40 years of Chinese occupation.
Calling the film a work of political realism, Wagner said: ''I
think of it in the tradition of 'Salt of the Earth, the 1953 film
about Mexican American mine workers created by Hollywood black-
listed filmmakers, based on actual political events and using non-
actors from the little village where the story is set.''
The film's uniqueness also stems from the fact that several
crucial scenes were shot clandestinely inside Tibet. Due to
possible political repercussions, many Tibetan cast and crew
members are identified in 'Windhorse' credits with the phrase
''name withheld''.
Even while shooting in Nepal, the crew was forced to conceal
the exact nature of the film project for fear that the topic's
sensitivity would prompt Nepali authorities halt the production.
Reports say that Nepali officials asked the filmmakers to bring
in for review all the material they shot. This happened on the
last day of production, while cast and crew were filming an anti-
Chinese demonstration set in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, and one
of the most eloquent scenes in the movie.
The film was saved by the quick thinking of the crew, which had
arranged for the valuable footage to be carried out of the country
a few days earlier.
Virtually all of the cast and crew are said to be Tibetans with
no previous film experience, which heightens the sense of
'political realism' claimed by Wagner.
But the Chinese are not impressed by the supposed creativity of
American films on Tibet. Earlier in fact, Beijing launched a
counter-propaganda drive to demolish as ''sheer fabrication'' the
film 'Seven Years in Tibet'.
Last month, 'China Daily' ran a one-page opinion piece based on
an interview with Ngapoi Ngawang Jigme, the controversial Tibetan
who signed a 17-point agreement with Mao's government that laid
the foundations for China's annexation of Tibet.
Jigme, vice-chairman of the Chinese Political Consultative
Conference, China's highest advisory body, is portrayed in 'Seven
Years in Tibet', based on a book written by Austrian mountain
climber Heinrich Harrer.
Jigme said the film does not match the facts, except for
trivial events like the Dalai Lama's study of English. For
example, the film shows Jigme sending Harrer a robe. ''There was
not such a thing at all, I had never thought of sending a robe to
him. Harrer and I didn't have that sort of contact and
relations.''
Harrer was introduced to Jigme at a party held in a Lhasa park
in 1948, and later visited Jigme's house once or twice. ''We only
talked about some trivial things when we met, nothing in depth,
and we didn't talk about political issues,'' Jigme said.
He called the film a vicious personal attack, one with many
scenes ''fabricated by movie-makers''.
Asked why he signed the 17-point agreement, Jigme said: ''The
400 million Chinese (at the time) in other parts of the country
could make a living after the Chinese Communist Party took over
political power, so why would our less than 1 million Tibetans not
be able to live?'
Jigme recalled that after communist China was founded in 1949,
there were rumours in Lhasa that communists killed monks, burned
monasteries, looted properties, raped women and even practiced
cannibalism.
But ''if the Communist Party was like what the rumours said, I
think the Chinese would not stand the bullying of the Communist
Party,' he concluded.
For the Tibetan opposition however, four decades of Chinese
rule have increased impatience and a tendency to turn to violence.
Last month, a Tibetan protester who set himself on fire died of
his injuries in New Delhi, India.
The Dalai Lama, who lives in exile in Dharamsala, India, says
he has so far been able to persuade people to shun violence but
added ''it's clear that a sense of frustration and urgency is
building up among many Tibetans''. (END/IPS/AP-IP-HD/AB/JS/98)
Origin: Manila/TIBET-CHINA/
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