Tuesday, March 11, 2008

But...she was the heroine!

You know, for a country determine to hold a good Summer Olympics this year, China seems strangely determined to score own goals also.

That's what I felt when I read that Oscar-winning director Lee Ang has come out to support Chinese actress Tang Wei, whose advertisements have been blacklisted in China following her role in Lee's "Lust, Caution." I didn't even know she was blacklisted till then, but the reason for the blacklist really got me laughing.

Now it's strange that China's State Administration of Radio Film and Television told local stations to cease airing ads starring Tang last week, what's even stranger to me was the reason why. Local Chinese media have linked the order to Tang's debut performance in the World War Two drama "Lust, Caution," but the reason why the Chinese were unhappy was because the movie 'defend the country's traitors.'

Now the movie features some lengthy and sometimes violent sex scenes with Hong Kong co-star Tony Leung (which were totally necessary by the way), but in what way did the movie 'defend the country's traitors'? Did they watch a different movie from me? Tony Leung's character (the traitor in question) was the bad guy wasn't him? A sensitive bag guy maybe, but he did torture and kill a hell of lot of people in the movie didn't he? In what way did "Lust, Caution" defend China's traitors? Which movie did they watch?

What's even funnier was that they punished Tang for the movie...and she was the patriotic heroine of the movie! Tang plays the student activist who gave her all to seduce Leung's Japanese-allied Chinese spy during the Japan's World War Two occupation of Shanghai. I mean what sense does it make to punish her?

After all the effort China has put into the Summer Olympics, I would strongly suggest they don't do anything else from now to the end of the Olympics; that way maybe they can stop scoring own goals.

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