AT THE end of March a website run by the Communist Youth League published news of a remarkable development in China’s staid, heavily censored film industry. A preview had been released online of what is being described as mainland China’s first film focusing on a gay romance, “Looking for Rohmer”. (On television, there have been documentaries about gay relationships before, as well as dramas hinting at them.) The new film, to be shown “soon”, describes the relationship of two young men, one Chinese, one French, as they travel across Tibet.
The two are not shown holding hands, let alone doing anything more intimate. But China’s cultural commissars, rarely open-minded at the best of times, have been in an unusually censorious mood since 2014, when President Xi Jinping stressed that art must “serve socialism”.
Cheng Qingsong, a film critic, says the makers of “Looking for Rohmer” worried that the censors might change their minds after they approved the film for release last year. The trailer’s appearance, and the Youth League’s interest in it, suggests all is well. More broadly, it shows that, despite a political chill,...Continue reading
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