Funny business

By Liu Wei (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2008-12-23 10:43

As the curtain falls on another year, Feng Xiaogang is back doing what he knows best-making people laugh. For more than a decade the popular director has forged a New Year-film tradition with a string of mega hit comedies. If You Are the One (Feicheng Wurao), a romantic comedy loosely based on When Harry Met Sally, is his latest effort and revolves around a middle-aged man's arduous and amusing search for his dream girlfriend.

Feng Xiaogang says his new movie is a New Year's present to Chinese moviegoers, who have experienced a tough year in 2008. Wu Huang

Feng says the movie is a New Year's present to Chinese moviegoers, who have experienced a tough year in 2008.

Heavy snowstorms, a disastrous earthquake and the financial crisis have brought too much hardship, and now is the time for people to let down their guards and enjoy a good old-fashioned laugh.

"Life is complicated and hard enough, so people want films to be simple and relaxing," he says.

"They don't want to ponder riddles in theaters. This is a film they can watch and feel relaxed and comforted."

For years, Feng has been creating stories about common peoples' ups and downs and his efforts have won wide spread popularity among mainland audiences.

But because Feng is always serving up mainstream fare, some critics say the 50-year-old director is incapable of making "big, award-winning" films.

"Whether a film is big or not is not decided by the creators," he says.

"You think it is a big film with depth and insight, but if viewers cannot relate to it, it is small and empty.

"Things like the election of the United States president or the abolishment of apartheid in South Africa are big enough to change the world.

"But for a common Chinese citizen, whether his child can go to a better school seems bigger than that.

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