Amazing China

Amazing China (Chinese: 厉害了, 我的国) is a 2018 Chinese propaganda documentary film that displays China's achievements in science, technology, industry, and poverty reduction since Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (paramount leader of China) in 2012.[2][3]

Amazing China
Theatrical release poster
Amazing China
Simplified Chinese厉害了，我的国
Traditional Chinese厲害了，我的國
Literal meaningAmazing, my country
Directed byWei Tie
Based onAmazing China (2017 series)
StarringXi Jinping[1]
Production
companies
Distributed byAlibaba Pictures
Release date
  • March 2, 2018 (2018-03-02) (Mainland China)
  • May 9, 2018 (2018-05-09) (Macao)
Running time
90 minutes
CountryChina
LanguageStandard Mandarin Chinese[1]

Name

The original Chinese title of the film is "厉害了, 我的国" (pinyin: lìhaile, wǒde guó roughly translates to "Amazing, My Country"), and derives from the online slang expression "厉害了，我的哥", meaning "bravo, my brother", often used by several official social media accounts of state organizations like the Communist Youth League of China.[4]

Content

The content of the film is from a six-episode TV documentary with the same English title shown in 2017 (Chinese title: 辉煌中国),[5] including the construction of the China Railway High-speed, the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge and the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope.[6]

Huajian Group, a Chinese shoe making company hiring thousands of workers in Ethiopia, was portrayed in the film as a model of "introducing China's experience of prosperity to Africa." According to a report of the Associated Press, though, the company's Ethiopian workers complained about low wages, the lack of safety equipment, forced labor and not being permitted to form a trade union.[7]

The documentary ends with a song performed by pop singer Sun Nan.[8]

Production

It was co-produced by the China Central Television and China Film Co., Ltd, and directed by Wei Tie.[9]

Release

The film was released in Mainland China on March 2, 2018, distributed by Alibaba Pictures.[10] It was reported by South China Morning Post that some state companies and government-affiliated organizations required employees to watch the film. On 19 April 2018, the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China issued a memo requesting that Chinese websites and cinemas stop showing the film.[11][12]

The film was screened in a theater in Macao from May 9 to May 14, 2018.[13]

Reception

Douban, the leading film review website in China, disabled the commenting and rating functions on the film's page, instead showing a "media rating" of 8.5/10 and reviews written by state media including Xinhua and the People's Daily.[4][8][14]

Internationally, it is widely considered to be a propaganda film, and an effort by the Communist Party of China to increase its soft power.[7][8][15] The film also is believed to be a significant step towards a personality cult of Xi Jinping by some observers.[8][15][16] While Amazing China does demonstrate a new level of sophistication in state propaganda, along with other self-congratulatory representations of China's growth "betrays an unshakeable anxiety about the continuing legitimacy of CCP rule."[17]

References
  1. "Li hai le, wo de guo (2018)". IMDb. Retrieved 12 April 2018.
  2. Peng, Ying (9 March 2018). ""Amazing China" becomes highest-grossing documentary in China". Xinhua. Archived from the original on 11 April 2018. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  3. Li, Weida (7 March 2018). "'Amazing China' documentary takes in 100m yuan at the box office". gbtimes. Archived from the original on 12 April 2018. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  4. Fang, Tianyu M. (16 March 2018). "'Amazing China,' A Documentary Extolling Xi Jinping, Is The Movie That Officials Want People To Love". SupChina. Archived from the original on 8 June 2018. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  5. 辉煌中国. 豆瓣 (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 12 April 2018. Retrieved 12 April 2018.
  6. Wang, Kaihao (2018-02-28). "Film shows how amazing China is". China Daily. Archived from the original on 12 April 2018. Retrieved 12 April 2018.
  7. Meseret, Erika; Kinetz, Elias (2 May 2018). "'Amazing China' documentary more fiction than fact". Star Tribune. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 4 May 2018. Retrieved 8 May 2018.
  8. Zheng, Sarah (14 March 2018). "Xi Jinping takes leading role in hit propaganda film extolling 'amazing' China". South China Morning Post. Archived from the original on 2018-04-01. Retrieved 1 April 2018.
  9. 厉害了，我的国（豆瓣）. 豆瓣 (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 11 April 2018. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  10. 厉害了，我的国（豆瓣）. 豆瓣 (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 11 April 2018. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  11. 《厲害了我的國》傳網上停播 竟與中興事件有關？. 中國頻道 (in Chinese). 20 April 2018. Archived from the original on 20 April 2018. Retrieved 8 May 2018.
  12. Chan, Tara Francis (26 April 2018). "China quietly pulled a propaganda film celebrating its tech giants days after the US sanctioned one of them — and it could be troubling news for Huawei". Business Insider. Archived from the original on 9 May 2018. Retrieved 8 May 2018.
  13. 《厉害了，我的国》在澳门举行观影礼 (in Chinese). people.cn. 2018-05-09. Archived from the original on 10 May 2018. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
  14. Huang, Zheping (15 March 2018). "China's top-grossing documentary of all time is about how great Xi Jinping is". Quartz. Archived from the original on 2 May 2018. Retrieved 21 March 2018.
  15. Connor, Neil (17 March 2018). "Xi Jinping propaganda film breaks box office records in China - because citizens have to watch it". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 19 March 2018. Retrieved 11 April 2018.
  16. Martin, Dan (March 14, 2018). "China dragoons viewers to make pro-Xi film a blockbuster". AFP. Archived from the original on 21 March 2018. Retrieved 21 March 2018.
  17. Davies, Gloria (April 11, 2019). "Talking (Up) Power". The China Story Yearbook: Power. ANU Press. pp. 37–49. doi:10.22459/CSY.2019. hdl:1885/160595. ISBN 978-1-760-46280-2.
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