Liu Ye plays a real "Iron Man"

March 9, 2009 | Posted in Mainland China,Movies, Tagged , , , ,

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Liu Ye and Huang Bo”s new movie, “Iron Men,” just finished filming. The movie, directed by Yin Li, depicts the struggles of two oil workers in their pursuit of their dreams.  While filming in the Taklimakan(Uyghur for place of no return) desert, Liu Ye almost got “Desert Depression.”

Liu Ye says that while filming “Iron Men,” he became a real iron men.

In our everyday lives, it’s rare to meet a real oil worker. This time, I realized that they are the true “Iron Men.” Under such difficult environments, they selfishlessly give us so much.

He also comments on his first visit to Xinjiang and a desert:

It was only after I arrived that I learned that there, there are no water, no trees, no insects nor bird; there’s nothing, only vast expands of yellow sand, endless and borderless like the ocean.

He says that at its hottest, the desert can reach about 40 to 50 Celcius (120-140 Fahrenheit).

When he’s bored, he says that his new “Idol” is Xiao Shenyang, the comedic skit actor that rose to film through this year’s Spring Festival Gala.

I saw his skit on the Spring Festival Gala, he’s too hilarious. During breaks, I often watch his videos on my cellphone. People who dont’ know thought I was texting my girlfriend!

source: Sina

Nanking! Nanking! : China Begins to Look at Own Holocaust

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Why was a Holocaust with a death count of hundreds of thousands a forgotten one? And why is it being remembered now? While this subject has often been placed into the realm of political sentiment, at the heart of it is simply a matter of finding self-identity from the past.

China fifty years ago after the Holocaust was burdened by the toll that Qing dynasty decay, WWII, and a devastating civil war took on it, in no shape to ask for any sort of remembrance for the victims of the massacres. Also, unlike the Jews after World War II, China was communist and thus could not receive help in this matter from abroad. Thus fifty years passed while China tried to rebuild itself with far more pressing matters to think about than the past. Only the present and future mattered. However, recently China has gotten to a economic state where she has the luxury of remembering this forgotten Holocaust.

Recently a string of movies have been made about this subject; as the Chinese movie industry grows, more and more Chinese directors have wanted to tackle it. The newest is perhaps the most promising yet…Nanking! Nanking! by Lu Chuan, starring Liu Ye and Gao Yuanyuan.

Trailer for Nanking! Nanking! (opens this summer)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbjjPGULTfI]

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Liu Ye plans to marry in France and China

October 29, 2008 | Posted in Mainland China, Tagged

Yes, another Chinese actor is going to be taken off the market, although it’s not sure when. I usually don’t care about marriages until they actually happen, but I thought his story about how she found out he was an actor was cute, so I translated everything about that. He also talked about other stuff that I didn’t translate because I’m not a machine, like about his acting, working in Hollywood, and how he got his pecs for “The Underdog Knight”. The reporter asked if his muscles were computer-generated and he said no. Well that’s one mystery solved.

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XXX: A Forbidden Love Story Is Up!

October 18, 2008 | Posted in Mainland China,Movies,Taiwan, Tagged , , ,

Watch the Entire Short Film Here

I just watched this and honestly, I have no idea what to make of it.

Short Film: XXX

October 11, 2008 | Posted in Mainland China,Movies,Taiwan, Tagged , , ,

Budding Taiwanese director, Alexi Tan (Chen Yili?!?), who’s first feature film tanked critically, and yet gave those who watched it a gleam of hope for the future of Taiwan cinema, has tapped into less examined aspect of Chinese cinema, the short film. He’s nabbed stars Liu Ye and Gao Yuan Yuan for the leads in his 10 min short for a clothing brand.

And no it’s not porn.

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Has Liu Ye Bulked Up?

October 8, 2008 | Posted in Mainland China,Movies, Tagged ,

Liu Ye, perhaps the most talented young actor in China to date, who first broke onto the scene playing a young gay Adonis in the film Lan Yu and hassince been constantly reinventing himself with a diverse range of roles from maligned foreign exchange students to psychopathic kinappers, stars in a new movie, The Underdog Knight for which he seemingly gained some weight. Muscle weight. He plays someone in the army who had an accident, and was afterwards mentally impaired causing him to go around fighting. It was screened at the Pusan Film Festival to which it received warm reviews.