December 12, 2005
Ben Shipley points out an interesting intersection (literally):
As giants like Louis Vuitton, Armani, Cartier and Zegna pour money into flagship offerings on the Bund or Nanjing Lu it is great to see the retail evolution playing out in other areas of Shanghai. The emerging retail cluster around the Hauihai/Sha'anxi intersection provide fine examples.
One block north of that interesection are both Garden Books, and the Thing. Two blocks north at Yan'an Rd is the fairy-tale Moller House. Huaihai/Shaanxi Rd is definitely in the thick of things.
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December 17, 2005
Yahoo reports that Filmmaker Wu puts arms around 'Babes':
The Paramount Pictures project centers on a young American woman who moves to Beijing and becomes famous playing a vixen in a Chinese soap opera. It is based on Rachel DeWoskin's memoir "Foreign Babes in Beijing: Behind the Scenes of a New China," which chronicles her experience amid China's changing cultural landscape in the 1990s. It was published in May by W.W. Norton.
Wu, a native of San Jose, Calif., directed the short "Trick or Treat" before writing and directing her first feature, "Saving Face," a Chinese-American family comedy-drama.
That's pretty much the whole story, don't even bother clicking through the link. This will be interesting for two reasons: to see how Chinese-American Alice Wu does a movie set on the mainland, and to see how she plays the sexual roles in the book. According to LA-based Calendar Live, Alice Wu was born in San Jose to parents who immigrated from Taiwan
. Given second-generation Taiwanese-Americans' often strange and somewhat strained relations with the mainland, I wonder how this director will portray DeWoskin's mid-90s China. Corrupt, polluted, dirty, exciting, glamorous, Communist China? Or will she focus on something different entirely? A New York Times reader going by "danbloom" asks pretty much the same question, but of the media:
I wonder if the US media makes much of a distinction in writing about this movie's genesis and players, in terms of who is from communist China and who is from free, democratic Taiwan (at least, by parentage). Maybe the USA doesn't even make a distinction between China and Taiwan, although they are two separate and distinct countries, with very different mindsets.
Also, since Alice Wu's last movie, Saving Face, was so willing to run a lesbian relationship as mainstream, how will the director mix her own creative ideas and personal experiences with a book that so charmed the conservative-yet-risqué Chinese censors? All the more reason to keep your eyes open for this one.
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December 24, 2005
I can't say I scoop Danwei all the time, but every once in a while... I'll write about Babes in Beijing, and then they write about Babes in Beijing; or I'll write about Muzi Mei's podcasts, and then they write about Muzi Mei's podcasts. I'm just sayin', hehe.
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