A hundred flowers bloom in Chinese cinema

Editor's Note: The Beijing Film Forum was organized by the China Film Association and the Beijing Federation of Literary and Art Circles on Aug 8 during the 38th Hundred Flowers Awards in Beijing. The forum brought together filmmakers, industry professionals and scholars to discuss the value, evolution and future of cinema. Below are reflections from four participants, as reported by Li Wei of China Daily.

Cinema shapes the way we feel

By Ding Yaping

While a film's plot may quickly fade from our memory, certain moments linger forever — an evocative glance, a poignant dialogue or a solitary figure walking away can stay with us for years, sometimes returning unexpectedly when we encounter feelings we cannot quite name. In this sense, cinema does more than tell stories. It shapes how we feel and understand the world.

This process unfolds in three steps: seeing ourselves, feeling for others and becoming a "we".

First, cinema provides a language for feelings that are difficult to express. For example, the conversations, silences and companionship between the women characters in Her Story allow audiences to recognize the emotions from their own lives.

Similarly, Dear You, with its Chaoshan dialect and family histories that crossed the South China Sea, speaks of waiting, regret and longing that many families can understand.

The influence of cinema on an era's sensibility often begins with such moments of recognition.

Then cinema takes us beyond our own experience. Each of us can live only one life, but a film allows us to live a borrowed life.

In Big World, audiences follow a young man whose disability is just one aspect of his identity.

In Nobody, seemingly insignificant creatures struggle with frustration and unfulfilled hopes, mirroring the struggles that many adults recognize in themselves.

In Dead to Rights, history acquires human faces through the fears, hesitation and courage of ordinary people.

Empathizing with others does not necessarily mean agreeing with them. It is to pause before judging and try to understand the other person's perspective.

This is the essence of cinema's people-centered nature. "The people" are not an abstraction. They are individuals with names, faces, disappointments and dreams. The more unfamiliar lives an era is willing to understand, the wider its emotional world becomes.

The author is the dean of the Faculty of Arts at Communication University of China and a distinguished professor at Beijing Film Academy. The views don't necessarily reflect those of China Daily.