Xi's 'Lovable' China Is Moving Further Out of Reach
The communist leader's insistence that art and film are inseparable from politics is sending the wrong message to the world.
Censorship isn’t lovable.
Source: Bloomberg
Last summer Xi Jinping stood before a group of senior Communist Party members and urged them to create a “lovable” image of China. At the time, he was likely thinking of China's cratering image in the US and other developed countries. He might also have been thinking of Kung Fu Panda.
Ten years ago, the lighthearted celebration of two revered Chinese symbols — kung fu and pandas — was massively popular in China and abroad. For some Chinese filmmakers, intellectuals and policymakers, that popularity was cause for soul-searching, not celebration. Why, they asked, did foreigners and not Chinese, make the films? Was there something in how China is run that prevents its artists from creating work that appeals beyond its borders?