Following the phenomenal success of a local film set in southern Taiwan, the government plans to revise regulations to provide better incentives for the domestic film industry, Government Information Office (GIO) Minister Vanessa Shih (史亞平) said yesterday.
If the box office takings of locally produced films or those whose directors are Taiwanese top NT$50 million (US$1.54 million), they will be eligible for a subsidy of 20 percent of the box office takings, she said.
Shih’s announcement came as Cape No. 7 (海角七號), the debut feature of director Wei Te-sheng (魏德勝), topped the NT$100 million mark after its Aug. 22 opening.
She said Cape No. 7 will therefore be able to claim a subsidy of NT$20 million, adding that this would provide a boost for Wei and help him to move on to his next picture.
Taiwan produces about 20 films annually, with an average box office take of just NT$2 million, the GIO said.
Wei’s film, which cost NT$50 million to make, tells two stories in different times and spaces that echo one another.
The first, a love story, is about a Japanese man who is leaving Taiwan as well as his Taiwanese lover with regret when Japan gives up its colonial rule of the country.
The other, which takes place more than six decades later, is about the ideals and dreams of a group of nobodies in southern Taiwan, amateur musicians who have to hastily form a band to open for a concert by a visiting Japanese band.
In a related development, meanwhile, the cast and crew of Cape No. 7 visited Kenting (墾丁) — the main location of the film — to celebrate the film’s success, a phenomenon that has surprised many given the lethargic state of the local film industry for almost a decade.
“I still feel that I’m on cloud nine. The feeling is so unreal,” Wei said, attributing the success of the film to old-fashioned good storytelling that touches the hearts of the audience and has the power to move them to laughter and sometimes to tears.
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