Sino-Japanese relations continue to deteriorate. It is reported that there will be no “Japanese Film Week” event during the Beijing International Film Festival scheduled for April this year, and there are currently no Japanese films participating.
According to a report by the Japanese media “Kyodo News” on March 17, the “Beijing·Japanese Film Week,” one of the activities of the Beijing International Film Festival, will not be held this year. The film festival is scheduled to take place in April, and organizers have stated that there will be no “Japanese Week” this year, and there are currently no Japanese films that will be showcased.
The report mentions that the Japanese Film Week has been held almost every year in China since 2006, in conjunction with film festivals in Beijing and Shanghai. In Japan, as part of the Tokyo International Film Festival activities, a “Chinese Film Week” has also been consistently organized. Even during the Japanese government’s nationalization of the Senkaku Islands (Diaoyu Islands) in 2012 and amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the film exchange activities have not been disrupted.
It is reported that it has not been confirmed whether a Japanese Film Week will be held during the Shanghai International Film Festival in June.
On November 7 last year, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takai explicitly stated in the parliament that if “something happens in Taiwan,” it could constitute a “crisis of survival” for Japan, triggering strong reactions from the Chinese Communist Party and leading to a series of retaliatory measures, causing a rapid deterioration of Sino-Japanese relations.
The CCP’s series of retaliatory measures include media warfare, diplomatic warfare, economic warfare, such as warning Chinese tourists not to travel to Japan, suspending the resumption of importing Japanese seafood products, and halting the approval of new Japanese films.
In the entertainment industry, various activities of Japanese artists in China have been canceled, such as the musical “Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon” and Ayumi Hamasaki’s concert being halted, and unreleased Japanese films have all been withdrawn.