Macau Wake Up !
Filming our lives, telling our own stories

By Chantelle Ng

As a city with more than 450 years of history, Macau should have many stories to tell. However, apart from Gaming, what else grabs your attention? Issues like Ao Man-long corruption case, foreign labor, inflation, housing...? Economic development, surely, is important in this capitalistic society. Cultural development has long taken a backseat in Macau.

Macau will have a thriving movie and television industry
"Cultural creative industry (CCI) will thrive in the 21st century," said Li Qian-kuan, chairman of the China Film Foundation in the 1st Mainland, Hong Kong and Macau TV and Movies Development Forum 2007. "It should be a new turning point for Macau's prosperity if it can overcome the insufficiency in CCI foundation, management concept and calibers issues,"

Meanwhile, Li pointed out that a movie carries the comprehensive culture of a nation and its people as it involves arts, technology and various industries. It just liked "a diplomat in an iron-box" to tell the world about our country, he said.

Famous films like Bruce Lee's Game of Death (1978), Rouge(1987) starring Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui, Exiled (2006) directed by Johnnie To, Isabella (2006) winning the Silver Bear for best film music at the 56th annual Berlin International Film Festival, taking views in Macau are cases in point.

A Cannes in Macau
Though physically small, lacking in natural resources, and seemingly weaker in cultural development than its regional counterparts, Macau has more than 450 years of history. This history is rich resource for a vibrant movie industry.

Cai An-an, the president of Macau Media Advancement Association (MMAA) and the general manager of the first movie corporation in Macau, suggested: "Macau's natural condition is similar to Cannes, and even goes beyond Cannes with its unique cultural blend."

Cheang Kok-keong, the council chairperson of MMAA, agreed with Cai that Macau can take this advantage to hold the Latin-speaking countries and territories Film Festival.

Still in need of government policy and calibers
When being asked about the stagnant state of local movie development, Cheang said without hesitation that financial resources and professionals, which are another two key factors for movie besides cultural characteristics, are widely insufficient.

He added with a sigh that relative policy, department in-charge establishment or film foundation is yet to be in place although our government has reiterated the need to develop CCI as well as movies and televisions industry.

As the development of movies and televisions production still lacks supporting policy, today's producers have to find money and sponsorship for their creativeness and the productions come in the forms of independent films or experimental videos, less commercial-driven, less profitable. It seems for the interest of "minority". Will it discourage our young producers?

"I will keep going; this is my interest and I love story telling," said Jordan, Cheng Kwan-chi, a gradate student of University of Macau. He has participated in video production for several years. His works sci-fi video 1112 (2006), horror video 99 (2006), and short-novel adapted video Fault me not (2007) have been selected for Macau Indies of Macau International Film and Video Festival in 2007 and 2008 respectively.

He also added that video-makers indeed could find ways for production instead relying on the government budget; on two sides of the same coin, local producers still could not give enough confidence for the government to invest millions of dollar.

Although people have different views towards Macau's movies and televisions development, there is a group of passionate people who love filming and telling stories about our city, culture or art. Where there's a will, there's a way.