Film nominees unveiled
BEVERLY HILLS - "American Beauty," a dark satire about a suburban middle-class family, captured eight Oscar nominations on Tuesday, including for best picture, topping the list of 1999 films selected for Hollywood's most prestigious awards.
Listing
Nominees for the 20th annual "Rrazzie Awards," the flip sidde of the Oscars:
Seeing dark side of American in films
BERLIN - Tom Cruise's new film that showed here on Monday was the latest in a series of dark self-portraits of America shown at the Berlin film festival.
Create your own label at wine making club
A HOME-made bottle of plonk may not beat the most expensive wines now available on Shanghai's supermarket shelves in terms of quality, but it could still become your most satisfying tipple.
Marriages of inconvenience
ABOUT 42 per cent of married couples in China are either "unsure" whether they would choose the same partner, or categorically would not pick the same person, if they had the chance to do it all again.
Foot, fist and morality: Taekwondo
WITH a striking yell, a slender figure in white brings her right foot squarely down on the target. "That's typical Taekwondo," said Ju Yunjie, a sophomore of Shanghai Jiaotong University. "I practise it every week," she said, with a contented smile.
Fat wieners, but thin on flair
CHINA has iridescent, figure-hugging qipaos and Japan its kimono. The Brits, well our traditional costume - sequined outfits of the East End's pearly kings and queens for example - may be anything but sexy, but at least we can lay claim to the miniskirt, thanks to pioneer fashion designer of the '60s, Mary Quant.
Seeing dark side of American in films
BERLIN - Chinese director Zhang Yimou's romantic film "The Road Home" drew loud applause at the Berlin film festival on Tuesday, gaining recognition after being rejected last year for competition in the Cannes festival. "Not One Less," another film that Cannes festival director Gilles Jacob had refused for competition for unspecified "artistic reasons" last May, won at the Venice film festival in September. Zhang is in competition here for the Berlinale's Golden Bear award for best film. Ironically, his former girlfriend, and the star of many of his films, Gong Li, is the head of the Berlinale jury. "The Road Home," in Chinese "Wo De Fu Qin Mu Qin," is a lushly photographed tale of how a village teacher and a peasant girl fall in love during the time of the Anti-Rightist movement in 1957. Politics are not directly mentioned but the couple must wait two years to reunite after the teacher is punished for "disobedience" by returning to the village in defiance of the authorities. Zhang told reporters after the screening that Cannes had rejected the film for competition since Jacob thought it was "political" but that he disagreed. Zhang said he had tried to show "emotions" and that he felt the Chinese "should go back to true values" as everything has become a commodity and for sale in the current culture. Zhang, 49, is considered by many to be China's best director. His first film Red Sorghum, won the top prize at the Berlin film festival in 1989 and his film Judou, about a liaison between a woman and her husband's nephew, was the first Chinese film to be nominated for an Oscar. Zhang's "Wives and Concubines," took the Silver Lion award at Venice in 1991 and his "Qiu Ju, a Chinese Woman" won the Golden Lion in 1992. Judges at Cannes gave best actor honours to Ge You in Zhang's "To Live" in 1994. The film tracks the sorrows and struggles of a family through the upheavals after founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949. (Agencies via Xinhua)
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