Night falls on Sun Movie

Those who habitually tune in to cable movie channels may have noticed that Sun Movie (channel 64, 春暉電影台) has been missing since the Oct. 1 moon festival. Due to low advertising revenues, the movie channel had to stop airing programs, despite its loyal support from film fanatics, according to a Sun Movie announcement last week. The channel says it is now preparing to re-position itself as a pay-per-view movie channel.

"Sun Movie has not died," said a staff member from the channel who preferred to remain anonymous. "We will be back on the air again in a couple of months." But despite the talk of a comeback and promises to continue airing quality films, an atmosphere of depression and stress permeates the six-year-old company. Half of Sun Movie's 60 some odd staff have been laid off, and the rest temporarily moved to Sun Movie's mother company, film distributor Spring International (春暉國際).

Chen Chun-jung (陳俊榮), CEO of Spring International and also a major shareholder in Sun Movie, declined to be interviewed for this report and has dodged phone calls since last week. Most of the Sun Movie staff would only agree to talk to the media on the condition that they not be named.

"I would like to talk about the film business, but as for Sun Movie, I don't want to say anything about it. I just feel very, very sad," Chen was quoted as telling the Chinese-language media last week.

One of many

Chen has a reason to feel sad. In 1995, when Sun Movie dove into Taiwan's chaotic cable market, it was among several new channels with a glossy line-up of award-winning movies and box office hits.

During the years when Spring International distributed many of the Cannes and Oscar-winning movies, Sun Movie became the premier outlet for films in the cable market, carrying such titles as Sex, Lies and Videotape, Queen Margot, Malcolm X, Orlando, Dances with Wolves and Driving Miss Daisy.

Sun Movie had also become a showcase for renowned European films such as Kryzstof Kieslowski's Blue, White and Red series, most all of Luc Besson's films from The Big Blue to The Professional and Lars Von Trier's Breaking the Waves, Idiot and Dancer in the Dark. Many winners of the Oscar for best foreign film, such as Like Water for Chocolate (1992) by Alfonso Arau, Through the Olive Trees (1994) by Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami, were also shown under the Sun Movie banner. The channel served as an on-screen movie library for many film buffs in Taiwan. And it is also the only source -- apart from the limited-space Film Archive -- to find quality, non-Hollywood films.

Among the best

Sun Movie has been listed among the top 10 favorite cable channels for the past six years, according to annual statistics published by the Consumers' Association.

"All the cable channels are losing money. Sun Movie is just the first one to be affected, said one staffer.

There are five local movie channels in Taiwan's cable market, mostly showing Hollwood films that have already made their rounds at the box office and HBO.

Taiwan's cable TV market has long been notoriously monopolized by a few conglomerates. And there has been a gap between consumer demand and the existing supply of channels and programs.

Two years ago, popular movie channels, including HBO and Cinemax, had their airing blocked by cable operators for a few days due to a contract disagreement. Sun Movie was also blocked for a week. "We didn't want to be dragged into the battle between the conglomerates this year and have our channel pushed to the edge. So we decided to back off and try to find a new path," the staff member said.