Pretty Picture

Award ceremony shows China’s film industry gearing up

- Yuan Yuan

It was the annual gathering of top film-makers in China. The masks that the participants wore and nucleic acid tests that people had to go through before joining the event served as a reminder that the event was still held in the shadows of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

The Golden Rooster Awards, formerly staged once every two years, has become an annual event since 2020. Different from being hosted across different cities around China in previous years, this event has chosen to settle down in Xiamen, a coastal city in Fujian Province in southeast China, starting from 2020. Established in 1981, the Year of the Rooster, this award has become one of the most prestigious national film awards in China.

The organizing committee, though shortening the 33rd China Golden Rooster Awards from five to four days on November 25-28, 2020, due to the ongoing pandemic, rolled out a full schedule by arranging more activities including concerts, screenings and forums at this festival.

The pandemic spell

China’s film market encountered a nationwide stagnation in the first few months of 2020. A cluster of movies slated for release during the Spring Festival holiday, a peak time for the Chinese box office, announced an unspecified delay in coming to theaters.

Li Shaohong, a 65-year-old film director, called it a disaster. “I’ve never experienced anything worse than this in my film career,” she said at a forum at the festival on November 26, 2020. “It is a nightmare for the world’s film industry.”