The documentary Beyond Beauty: Taiwan From Above (看見台灣) has overtaken Go Grandriders (不老騎士) as the highest-grossing documentary in the nation’s history, the film’s distributor said yesterday.
Over the weekend, Beyond Beauty broke the NT$30 million (US$1.01 million) box office record set by Go Grandriders, according to Activator Marketing Co.
TEN-DAY RECORD
Beyond Beauty, which captures the beauty of the nation from the air, set a new box-office record by grossing more than NT$35 million just 10 days after opening on Nov. 1.
Go Grandriders, a story about 17 elderly men who embarked on a motorcycle journey around the country, took 63 days to reach the NT$30 million mark.
BIGGEST DAY
The highest single-day gross for Beyond Beauty was Nov. 9, when it raked in NT$6.5 million countrywide, Activator Marketing said.
Celebrities and other prominent figures have given the film positive reviews and it is currently being screened in 51 cinemas around the nation.
Chinese pro-democracy activist Wang Dan (王丹), a student leader in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests in China, said on his Facebook page on Sunday that words could not express how touched he was by the film.
“I think anyone who has seen this documentary would fall in love with this country,” Wang wrote.
MESSAGE
The documentary was made over a period of more than three years by director Chi Po-lin (齊柏林), an aerial photographer and former civil servant who quit his job to pursue the project.
It gives viewers rare bird’s-eye glimpses of Taiwan’s natural beauty, from mountains to oceans, and sends a strong message about the importance of environmental protection.
Eight Chinese naval vessels and 24 military aircraft were detected crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait between 6am yesterday and 6am today, the Ministry of National Defense said this morning. The aircraft entered Taiwan’s northern, central, southwestern and eastern air defense identification zones, the ministry said. The armed forces responded with mission aircraft, naval vessels and shore-based missile systems to closely monitor the situation, it added. Eight naval vessels, one official ship and 36 aircraft sorties were spotted in total, the ministry said.
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Taiwanese officials were shown the first of 66 F-16V fighter jets purchased by Taiwan from the United States, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday, adding the aircraft has completed an initial flight test and is expected to be delivered later this year. A delegation led by Deputy Minister of National Defense Hsu Szu-chien (徐斯儉) visited Lockheed Martin’s F-16 C/D Block 70 (also known as F-16V) assembly line in South Carolina on March 16 to view the aircraft. The jet will undergo a final acceptance flight in the US before being delivered to Taiwan, the
The New Taipei Metro's Sanyin Line and the eastern extension of the Taipei Metro's Tamsui-Xinyi Line (Red Line) are scheduled to begin operations in June, the National Development Council said today. The Red Line, which terminates at Xiangshan Station, would be connected by the 1.4km extension to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, while the Sanyin Line would link New Taipei City's Tucheng and Yingge stations via Sanxia District (三峽). The council gave the updates at a council meeting reviewing progress on public construction projects for this year. Taiwan's annual public infrastructure budget would remain at NT$800 billion (US$25.08 billion), with NT$97.3