In celebration of the 10th anniversary of China’s proposition of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road (MSR), a film festival honoring this initiative was inaugurated in Quanzhou, a city in East China’s Fujian Province, on Monday. The festival aims to emphasize the cross-cultural dimension of the MSR, following the theme of “promoting the spirit of the MSR and documenting the changes of the times.”
The event is focused on creating a mutually beneficial international platform that fosters cooperation within the film and cultural industries. It has succeeded in attracting over 400 professionals from both domestic and international circles, including figures like Mathieu Béjot, the director of strategy and development of the international documentary marketplace, Sunny Side of the Doc. This organization has a long history of collaboration with China and hosted 15 Chinese film organizations in 2023.
Béjot highlighted the potential of locally grounded Chinese narratives to engage international audiences. As a response to the theme of MSR, topics such as “history,” “international trade,” and “geography” are being increasingly explored by documentary makers worldwide.
One of the festival’s main attractions is an initiative by its artistic committee to encourage sustainable international documentary exchanges. The initiative includes plans to showcase MSR-related film productions at other international documentary festivals.
Documentary filmmaker Wang Muxin sees this strategic promotion as a source of inspiration for filmmakers to delve deeper into the narratives of the MSR. Wang anticipates that the MSR theme could emerge as an “independent newcomer” at renowned events such as the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam.
The initiative further encourages collaboration within academia, planning to team up with global scholars in various disciplines, such as anthropology, sociology, and ecology, to host annual MSR-related research events.
Hong Lei, the vice president of the Fujian Media Group and one of the event’s organizers, underscored the significance of “international collaboration” in the documentary industry.
The festival, co-hosted by several organizations including the China Foreign Languages Publishing Administration, the Fujian Provincial Administration of Radio and Television, and the Quanzhou Municipal People’s Government, is set to conclude on Thursday.
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