Mainland Chinese film mogul Wang Haige is determined to transform Macao into “Mollywood”, the Business Wire news service reported this week.
According to the report, Wang’s “China Mollywood” project is co-sponsored by hundreds of artists from China’s film and television entertainment industry.
The report, datelined June 22 from Langfang, a city in Hebei province, said that the project was officially launched at the Xianghe Guohua Film and Television Base in the mainland.
The report said that the project would “target Hollywood in the United States to comprehensively strengthen the international competitiveness of the Chinese film market and initiate a new film model with Chinese characteristics.”
According to the report, “Mollywood (Macao-Hollywood)” aims to set up an “Eastern Hollywood”.
“Mollywood” also refers to Malayalam cinema from southern India’s state of Kerala, as well as Mormon cinema. Mollywood is also the name of a Belgian film funding company.
“Mollywood” is the latest film hub initiative following the Hollywood example, after Bollywood in Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay) and Nollywood in Nigeria.
The report quoted the organiser (Wang) as saying that “Mollywood” is jointly sponsored by more than 100 renowned Chinese entertainment industry giants including Wang, Jackie Chan (Chan Kong-sang), Yu Dong, Gong Yu, Sammo Hung (Hung Kam-bo), Wen Jun, Liu Jiang, Chen Baoguo, Gaowa Siqin, and Gong Hanlin.
According to previous media reports, Wang is the founder of the Huading Global Film Awards.
“Based on the film industry, music industry, e-commerce and smart technologies, the project will build a comprehensive eco-system as a ‘platform+content+community’ model, and create a ‘global technology and film culture centre in the new era of intelligence’,” the report said.
“Succeeding Hollywood and Bollywood, it will be another world film, music, fashion production and communication hub,” the report said, adding that “it will also become an experimental base for the combination of technology and film and television.”
The report described Wang as “the World Peace Culture Ambassador and the Chairman of Mollywood Group,” quoting him as saying that “Mollywood covers various fields such as film and television production and distribution, the music industry, big data centres, artificial intelligence, entertainment marketing and advertising, e-commerce, creative exhibitions, fashion entertainment, KOL bases [talent agencies], talents training and many industrial chains.”
Registered in Hengqin, headquartered in Macao
According to the report, the company is registered in Hengqin, but its international headquarters is in Macao, “in order to give full play to the resource advantages of the two places for both the domestic market and the international market.”
The report quoted Wang as saying that “Mollywood will launch a series of preferential policies to welcome technology companies, film and television institutions, celebrities, directors, and investors worldwide, including Hollywood in the United States, to work and live in Mollywood.”
The report also quoted internationally renowned Chinese film director Chen Kaige as saying that “Mollywood will speed up building itself as a base for communication and cooperation with the mainstream of Chinese culture and the coexistence of multiple cultures, and [also] will play a more active role in promoting cultural exchanges between East and West and mutual learning between civilisations”.
According to the report, “Mollywood insists on light-asset operation and actively promotes the coordinated cooperation and joint development of China’s film and television production services.” The report also said that Mollywood will establish a “film and television base cooperation certification” mechanism worldwide to form a standardised service system for the connection and integration of film and television production, consultation and coordination services.”
Plans to transform Macao into an international film hub go back to the 1980s.
(The Macau Post Daily/Macau News)
PHOTO © The Macau Post Daily/Business Wire
