China's Film Flops and Slow Investment Thin Its Festival Presence

Transcript of the segment

What BBN said on air. The facts are in the original report: Variety.

1. Gloria VanceVariety reports that star-driven flops at the Chinese box office are one reason China has a thin presence at festivals this year.

2. Gloria VanceTokyo festival programming director Ichiyama Shozo says casting a star used to guarantee a certain degree of success. You are a star.

3. Gloria VanceIs that still true?

4. Torvald Mbeki-RaoYes. Absolutely. A famous face guarantees something. A table, by the window, and a waiter who says my name wrong.

5. Gloria VanceA table.

6. Torvald Mbeki-RaoOff the record, I get a very good table. Everyone knows my name at the table.

7. Gloria VanceVariety also cites slowing investment and a reportedly more complicated censorship process. So tell us about the new project.

8. Torvald Mbeki-RaoIt's called Even If Hell Came. I play a young Italian partisan holding out in the Alps in the winter of nineteen forty-four.

9. Gloria VanceAlone?

10. Torvald Mbeki-RaoMostly with this shovel. I used it in every scene, and I will not be told it was a prop.

11. Gloria VanceYour last three films did not do well. Why should a festival programmer expect this one to?

12. Torvald Mbeki-RaoThose were different times, and different snow. Off the record, one of them was a talking boat.

13. Gloria VanceI asked why this one will do better.

14. Torvald Mbeki-RaoBecause nobody else would make it. I called every studio. Even the ones that make cereal commercials.

15. Gloria VanceThank you for that. Now a lightning round. Favorite festival city?

16. Torvald Mbeki-RaoTokyo. Please invite me. Off the record, I already packed.

17. Gloria VanceIchiyama says the Japanese competition filmmakers lack an international reputation so far. Is that you, too?

18. Torvald Mbeki-RaoNo. I have a reputation. It travels ahead of me, and then it waits outside.

19. Gloria VanceLast question. A star, a flop, or a guarantee?

20. Torvald Mbeki-RaoStar, I'd say, but ask me again after Tokyo, and the shovel gets a vote too.

21. Gloria VanceFinal plug, Mr. Mbeki-Rao.

22. Torvald Mbeki-RaoEven If Hell Came, coming soon to a festival that hasn't heard of me yet.

23. Torvald Mbeki-RaoOff the record, I'd like to be a guarantee of anything. A refund, even. I'd take a refund.