The Cannes-winning filmmaker attended a launch ceremony at Zangshan Hill in China’s northern Shanxi province with cast members actress Fan Bingbing and actors Ge You, Huang Xiaoming, Zhang Fengyi and Wang Xueqi on Saturday, footage shot by the Chinese news Web site Sina.com showed.Chen’s new project is based on the ancient Chinese play “The Orphan of Zhao,” about the surviving member of a massacred family who seeks revenge from the rival family behind the killings when he grows up. The original, first published in the Yuan Dynasty (1271 to 1368), was adapted by French writer Voltaire into the 1755 work “The Orphan of China.” Zangshan Hill is where the orphan hides from the rival family in the play.
Besides “Farewell My Concubine,” which won him the top Palme d’Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1993, Chen’s credits also include “Yellow Earth,” “The Emperor and the Assassin,” “Killing Me Softly,” “Together” and “The Promise.” His most recent movie is the 2008 biopic of late Peking Opera star Mei Lanfang, “Forever Enthralled.”
