3D Monkey King to be on screen next summer
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A three-dimensional Monkey King is to meet the world's audience next summer, Chinese film makers have said.
"We want to present a Monkey King that is loved by audiences all over the world, like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck," said Ren Zhonglun, president of Shanghai Film Group (SFG).
Uproar in Heaven, on which the 3D version is based, staring Monkey King, was filmed in 1964. The award-winning animation remains one of the favorite animations of Chinese children today.
Only small changes to dialogue, musical and other effects will be made in the 3D version, Ren said.
The 3D version of Uproar in Heaven will be the first movie produced by a joint venture of Shanghai Film Group and France's Thomson Group.
Other 3D versions of classic Chinese animations are in plan, including Black Cat Police Chief and Secrets of the Heavenly Book, said Wang Tianyun, vice president of SFG.
"We are looking for natives speakers of foreign languages with characteristic voices to dub for the movie so that Monkey King can reach more people in the world, speaking various languages including English, French, Russian and Japanese," Ren said.
As Ren strived to get Monkey King global, Zhao Lihong, deputy chairperson of Shanghai Writers' Association, called for the promotion of Journey to the West, from which the movie Uproar in Heaven was based.
Zhao proposed to the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, to build a theme park featuring Journey to the West to protect the literal and cultural legacy of the novel amid increasing foreign impact, especially when a Disneyland theme park is to be built in Shanghai.
Journey to the West, one of the four classic Chinese novels, written by Wu Cheng'en in the 1590s during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).
The movie Uproar in Heaven features the part of the novel when Monkey King made trouble in Heaven and defeated an army of 100,000 celestial soldiers, led by the Four Heavenly Kings. Monkey King was subdued by Buddha and later became a protector of a Buddhist monk Xuan Zang during his pilgrimage to India in the Tang dynasty (618-907).
China has been supporting its comic and animation industry. In 2006, the State Council put forward a plan to make the industry a competitive player in the world in terms of creativity and productivity in five to ten years.
In July, the Ministry of Finance and the State Administration of Taxation jointly issued a favorable taxation policy to support the development of comic and animation industry.
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