NZ film fest tours Chinese cities

Tapping the foreign film market

"When you see her films, you forget this is an actress," Kwan says. "She makes you believe she is a mistreated prostitute, a loving mother, or a downtrodden factory worker. To me, her beauty is in her performances, through which you feel her pain."

The CFA and BFI began its digital remastering of this film in 2012, and due to the technical limitations of the time, did not achieve ideal results. This year, with improved technology, a second effort successfully brought the restored footage back to the big screen.

The foundation will release a DVD version of the film accompanied by the China Philharmonic Orchestra's performance, says Davies, who set up the foundation in 2007, naming it after her father Dato Wong Kee Tat, who was also an art-loving philanthropist.

The Goddess is only a start to celebrate women and cinema in the foundation's grand plan called Goddess, Martyr, Heroine: A Portrait of Women in Chinese Cinema. The program, including 15 films, will focus on the role of Chinese women over the last century, as shown though film. It will start its world tour in Paris in June, as part of the celebrations marking the 50th anniversary of Sino-French diplomatic relations.

The next project, Davies notes, will be commissioning famous Chinese female composer Liu Suola to write a totally new score of the 1946 French film La belle et la bete (Beauty and the Beast), which will premiere at the 17th Shanghai International Film Festival in June.