Posted on 09/10/2020 7:39:08 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Disney’s newest live-action movie, “Mulan,” was released Friday. So far, reviews have ranged from mostly positive to absolutely glowing: “an exciting, well-crafted action movie,” a “robust” and “family-friendly, live-action Disney fantasy,” and an “epic-scale tribute to female empowerment.”
However, the feedback on Mulan has chilled considerably after reports that Disney filmed substantial portions of the movie in China’s Xinjiang province, with the blessing and cooperation of the Chinese Communist government.
Xinjiang is the home province of some 12 million Muslim Uighurs. According to the U. S. State Department, over one million of them have been moved to concentration camps where “they are starved, abused, tortured, electrocuted, raped and even killed.” Uighur women have been “forcibly sterilized . . . [and] made to use intrusive birth control methods.” There have even been reports of forced abortions and even infanticide.
Yet, not only did Disney choose Xinjiang province, “ground zero” for China’s savage persecution of the Muslim Uighur population to film “Mulan,” in the closing credits, they thanked four Communist Party propaganda departments and a public security bureau in Xinjiang—the very organizations, as the Washington Post reports, “that are facilitating [these] crimes against humanity.”
Calling the treatment of the Uighur population in China “crimes against humanity” may sound harsh, but it is fitting. In fact, what’s been happening in Xinjiang fits the United Nations’ official definition of genocide: the “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” This can include “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction,” and “imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.”
To be clear, Disney has chosen to cozy up to the Chinese government for years. In 1997, a Disney film that cast the Dalai Lama in a positive light so upset the totalitarians in Beijing, they “restricted the studio’s ability to work in China.” Disney’s then-CEO Michael Eisner quickly issued an apology and promised not to insult Disney’s “friends” in the future. Appeased, Beijing opened the doors for Shanghai Disneyland, which opened in 2016. “Mulan” has handed Beijing a propaganda victory.
Given their strong stands on behalf of progressive causes such as LGBT issues and abortion, Disney seems more guilty of a bad worldview than spinelessness. In 2016, for example, Disney threatened to stop filming in the state of Georgia after the legislature passed a bill protecting religious liberty in the wake of same-sex marriage. Disney’s current CEO said he would find it “very difficult” to continue filming in Georgia after the state passed a fetal heartbeat bill to protect the lives of the unborn. Many don’t realize just how lucrative film and television is in Georgia, much less the tax and other financial incentives Georgia now has in place for studios, directors, and others in the industry. In 2018 alone, the state reported about $9.5 billion in revenue from the film and television industries.
Why then, would Disney be willing to put the economic screws to a U.S. state over abortion and LGBT rights, but not to a Communist dictatorship over human-rights violations and even genocide?
While Beijing clearly doesn’t care about world opinion, too much world opinion cares about China… especially China’s money. Having propped up its authority for so long on economic promises, the only pressure China is likely to take seriously is financial. Nations like Japan and India, and even some corporations like Apple, have taken a stand and moved business out of China. Disney, on the other hand, gave China a great big PR win instead.
I’m usually not much for boycotting as a strategy, but my family will not be watching “Mulan.” In fact, the boycott of “Mulan” seems to be spreading, especially in Asia. I hope it spreads in our country too, as a way of putting action to all of our words about human dignity, human value, and human rights. No amount of money will ever make acceptable the treatment that Muslim Uighurs face at the hands of the Chinese government.
I never saw the original. There are lots of movies that are just not my thing. Especially nowadays.
Raw, unadulterated capitalism unhindered by a belief in the God of the bible in all it’s glory.
China has also destroyed, imprisoned, tortured and killed the faithful of the underground Catholic Church, the one which persevered through decades of fidelity to Rome only to be abandoned by Francis and thrown to the wolves.
China has also destroyed, inprisoned or killed any member of Protestant churches, Buddhist temples, and any other religion which acknowledges President Xiis not a god and communism is not supreme.
Disney is a horror.
Interesting point. Yes, I recall some Hollywood idiots, saying how they wouldn’t be “safe” in Georgia, because of that heartbeat bill.
It’s interesting how liberals say they are not “safe” in a state which has passed pro life laws.
What does “safe” even mean to these people?
You are much safer in most places in Georgia, in terms of personal safety, than in many parts of Chicago, for example. Safe from what, and how do we define the words liberals use?
No data on Boxoffice Mojo, and only $5M on IMDb (the movie review version of msfnbc). Remember, a movie has to make 3 times its gross production to break even today.
We know it is not COVID as “Trolls” did very well released straight to streaming.
Rotten Tomatoes is owned by Disney and still shows only 55% fresh and since Disney has already been busted influencing RT by deleting bad reviews and ‘botting good reviews. So it is probably 35%
RE: No data on Boxoffice Mojo, and only $5M on IMDb (the movie review version of msfnbc). Remember, a movie has to make 3 times its gross production to break even today.
It will be a huge bomb. REASONS:
1) Citizens in Taiwan and Hong Kong are urging boycotts.
2) The pandemic has practically CLOSED all movie theaters worldwide.
3) Pirated streams are all over the internet.
4) Freedom loving people everywhere are aware that the movie was partly filmed in Xinjiang where nearly a million Uighurs are incarcerated in re-education camps, while Disney cooperates and thanks the CCP for their help in making the film.
5) The lead actress, Liu Yi Fei has expressed her support for the CCP backed Police that has been crushing the protests in HK.
6) Disney spent nearly $200 Million to make the film! AN EXHORIBITANT AMOUNT !
See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mulan_(2020_film)
You are UNLIKELY to recover that amount using streaming with all good will gone.
Hollywood Censorship, and Chinese Appeasement: It All Comes Down to Greed
Townhall.com ^ | August 23, 2020 | Erin Elmore ESQ
FR Posted on 8/23/2020, 7:30:32 AM by Kaslin
COVID restrictions are slowly beginning to lift, so AMC movie theatres just announced that it will be reopening with 15 cent movies. Great price, however, when it comes to Hollywood blockbusters, we’re not in Kansas anymore. We’re in Beijing. Not in some transformative ethereal cinematic way, but in the way that Communist China plays a significant role in what Americans see on the screen. From product placement to content censorship, stateside cinephiles can say “Hasta la vista” to movies without a motive.
The moviemaker’s motive is clearly one of financial gain. But for COVID, China would have surpassed North America as the biggest movie consumers worldwide. Couple that massive revenue source with the fact that China’s Communist regime severely restricts the number of foreign movies shown into China, approximately 34 films a year, and you have a studio who knows the audience and is eager to please.
This audience is technically the Chinese consumer, but China’s pockets are so deep and reach so broad that Hollywood makes the movies that everyone sees worldwide to please the Chinese government. The result: propaganda as product placement and content that is aligned with China’s viewpoints, which are frequently pro-China, bigoted, and authoritarian in nature.
The product placements may go totally unnoticed or seem innocuous, but the plot thickens. Take for example tech wiz Tony Stark of “Avengers End Game” fame. In the movie, he uses a cheap Chinese Vivo flip phone, which is not available in the United States. A geek such as Stark would never use such a low-quality phone; although, it’s worth noting that he also wouldn’t have much of a choice given that the U.S. government would never let Ironman use a device with such poor security features, especially when serious technology spying allegations have been credibly made against other Chinese companies such as Huawei and ZTE. Hollywood often requires us to suspend reality, but here they are promoting an alternate reality that could result in our military secrets being exposed or our private data targeted. This subliminal Chinese promotion, and others like it, aren’t done as an act of altruism. They are done as an act of massive financial gain for the movie studio. As long as it lines their pockets, they don’t seem to care what message they are sending to the viewer.
They also don’t care about censorship. Communist China not only guarantees that the population doesn’t see what they deem as unfavorable ideals, but it also works to make sure that China is only shown favorably.
The Communist Chinese Party does not support gay rights or allow gay marriage. In fact, according to “Newsweek”, China is the worst place in the world to be gay. That’s why China’s version of “Bohemian Rhapsody” did not address Freddie Mercury’s sexuality. They deleted scenes where he dressed as a woman and his proclamation that he had AIDS was muted and not subtitled. Twentieth Century Fox, who made the film, had no comment.
A film will also receive no comment from China if it features Pandas… well sort of. Winnie the Pooh seems harmless enough but Pooh memes have been used to criticize Chinese dictator Xi Jinping. So, “Christopher Robin” got banned in China and those cuddly bears are seen as a symbol of anti-government Chinese activism. Wait, what about “Kung Fu Panda”? Well, that’s obviously different: the film was made as a collaboration with a Chinese media company, China Film Group. Government sensors literally dropped in to monitor the movie’s production… no activism from that animated panda was guaranteed.
Perhaps the most relevant censorship example of all comes from the book “World War Z”, where an earth-shattering plague originates in China. American filmmakers purposefully changed this portion of the plotline and moved the plague to Korea.
Whether it’s an actual plague from China or a movie plague, the point is clear, the dangling carrot in Hollywood is money and they will conceal the truth, suspend reality or shift the plot all for financial gain. As Frank Lopez (Robert Loggia) said in “Scarface”, “Lesson number one: Don’t underestimate the other guy’s greed.”
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