A report from Variety.com, published last week:
China’s Ministry of Propaganda, which controls the film industry through the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (Sarft), has decreed that the Shanghai Intl. Film Festival, China’s premiere international fest, will become a “local” event instead of internationally driven. Same will happen to the Changchun fest.
SIFF was China’s first international festival and the only one recognized outside the country as A grade. Fest workers were quoted in the local press as saying they have not received official confirmation of the news and expect this year’s June 11-19 event to go ahead as scheduled…
…The new China Broadcast Film and TV Awards will become the only
national laurels and will combine eight other kudos. This includes the
Huabiao Awards, which are sponsored by Sarft and began as the Ministry
of Culture’s Excellent Film Awards in 1957.
The government org has mandated that several other kudofests will become biennial rather than annual. These include the Golden Eagles television awards, the Golden Rooster film kudos and 40-year-old Hundreds of Flowers film laurels.
No one took any of those film festivals seriously anyway, so this is not much of a loss.
Thanks to Jamie Lai for the article.