The cast of The Battle at Lake Changjin on the stage Photo: Li Hao/Global Times

Meng Yu was paying close attention to several chat groups on WeChat for a long while before the 12th Beijing International Film Festival opened on Saturday to grab tickets for her preferred film screenings for the event.

On Wednesday, she called up a group of friends to help her and tightly held onto her mobile phone waiting for tickets to go on sale. Unfortunately, she was unable to get tickets for all the screenings she was interested in and so had to seek the tickets she missed by trading with others in a dedicated chat group. 

Meng is just one of the many Chinese movie fans who see the film festival as a carnival, especially after the outbreak of COVID-19 in Beijing a few months ago.

"The coronavirus outbreak obviously affected the film market, but the desire to consume movies in our country has not decreased. Holding a film festival at a time like this is kind of a compensation for Chinese movie fans," Shi Chuan, vice chairman of the Shanghai Film Association, told the Global Times on Sunday.

Besides the film festival, the rising box-office results of recently released movies such as Moon Man and the introduction of overseas works, including Minions: The Rise of Gru and The Mauritanian, increase Chinese filmmakers' confidence in the fast recovery of the industry.

Carnival for movie fans 

"This will be a carnival for Chinese audiences, especially those who are loyal fans of the big screen," Shi noted, getting approval from other Chinese film critics.

Different from the mainstream commercial market, film festivals tend to offer a more diverse array of themes from around the globe, so easily attract movie fans in droves. 

The movies screened at the Beijing International Film Festival 2022 also come from a variety of countries such as India, Japan and France. Some, such as the 2022 Japanese anime action-adventure film One Piece Film: Red, are recent releases while others are decades-old classics like the US crime film trilogy The Godfather, now restored in high definition 4K.

According to data from Chinese ticketing platform Maoyan, the first ticket sold on the platform was for screenings of Japanese animated film INU-OH on August 21. Meanwhile, in just the first two hours of sales on the platform, the biggest winner was animation Ghost in the Shell, which sold 3,361 tickets for eight screenings, followed by INU-OH and French-German drama film One Fine Morning.

At the opening ceremony of the film festival on Friday, Chinese filmmakers introduced their favorite films screening at the festival, including well-reviewed Indian movie Jai Bhim.

The opening ceremony gala captured the attention of many netizens on Chinese social media platform Sina Weibo. Many Chinese stars, including popular action star Wu Jing and Hong Kong actor Wong Cho-lam, posed on the red carpet during the opening ceremony.

The cast of the war epic The Battle at Lake Changjin about China's historic military victory in a battle during the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea (1950-53) also appeared at the event with two People's Volunteer Army veterans. Two Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics gold medalists, Gao Tingyu and Qi Guangpu, presented bouquets to the two veterans. Shen Haixiong, chairman of the organizing committee of the film festival, noted at the opening ceremony that they chose to hold the event at its scheduled time despite the pandemic to unite domestic and foreign filmmakers and inspire them to accept challenges together.

"I am eager to seeing new films from around the world that I have never watched before at the film festival," Luo Luo, a Beijing-based film critic, told the Global Times.

Bright future

When speaking at the opening ceremony, many filmmakers remarked that they are confident in the Chinese film industry despite the hiccups brought by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. According to Maoyan data, a total of 67 films are currently screened in Chinese mainland cinemas, with 16 still set for released before the end of August.

So far this summer, the biggest box-office winner has been comedy sci-fi film Moon Man, starring Shen Teng Ma Li. The hit film has earned over 2.3 billion yuan ($341 million) since its debut on July 29. Among the 16 remaining to hit theaters, 2022 US computer-animated comedy film Minions: The Rise of Gru is set to debut in the Chinese mainland on August 19.

Additionally, many new works are currently in production, such as Chinese People's Liberation Air Force film Born to Fly, which focuses on China's military modernization over the past decades. 

In the trailer released on Saturday, the country's most advanced J-20 stealth fighter made an appearance. The story of the film will follow the scientists and military personnel who worked together to make the domestic-made jet fighter a reality.

Directed by Liu Xiaoshi, a director experienced in filming military promotional ads, the movie features popular actors Wang Yibo, Hu Jun, and Zhou Dongyu. 

The film is set to release before the end of 2022.