Beijing Sports Film Week opens

The fourth International Sports Film Week is underway in Beijing. The week-end opening ceremony was attended by Olympic medalists and celebrities of entertainment.

The fourth International Sports Film Week is underway in Beijing. The  week-end opening ceremony was attended by Olympic medalists and  celebrities of entertainment.

The opening ceremony for International Sports Film Week started with a rite of blessing. Sports and film stars hung cards on a "blessing tree" offering best wishes to the people in the earthquake-stricken Sichuan.

Forty-five sports films from fifteen countries are competing for honours at the event. Twenty-three of those are from China. Among the Chinese films are "One Person's Olympics" and "Mymyti's 2008". "Mymyti" won the top price at the Beijing Student Film Festival earlier this year.

The Beijing Sports Film Week will hold an expo of sports films from Japan and South Korea. There'll be a forum on the genre. A screening tour to villages across China is also planned.

The forty-five sports films competing at the event are screening at ten cinemas in Beijing. Venues include China's Film Archives' Museum and Beijing's Youth Palace. Admission prices are nominal at 10 yuan. The turnout is expected to be large.

There was an announcement at the opening ceremony that a copy of the film "Dream 2008" has been collected by the International Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland. The flick was shot by China's Central Newsreel Film Studio. It examines the affect of the Olympics on ordinary people in China. And it chronicles the process of the Game's preparation. The film earned high praise from the International Olympic Committee. Some foreign film agencies including America's NBC are consulting with the Chinese producers , in the hope of broadcasting the film to an international audience.