An increasing number of Belt and Road Film Festival Alliance members from Russia, Italy, and Kazakhstan, etc. were remarkably seen during a press conference held earlier in the afternoon on Saturday, amid all the attention and excitements as the 2019 Shanghai International Film Festival (SIFF) officially kicked off in the city.

Currently, there are film festivals and practitioners from as many as 33 countries and 38 institutions along the Belt and Road route, having been encouraged to join the alliance formed last June. 

“There are a lot more opportunities for them to get to know Chinese buyers,” said Hu Jinjun, deputy head of the Publicity Department of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China when giving his speech during the press conference. 

Thanks to all the successful cases of joint projects and co-productions that have been achieved in the past year, a new round of cooperation on the cinematic work and cultural exchange was launched on Saturday. The SIFF Market Screening and Meeting is also considered as a new section for this year’s event, with seven films around the globe containing marketable value to be screened in particular.

Representatives of eight nominated films from places such as Belarus, Estonia, and Hungary have also made their debuts in the press conference, with their work about to participate in the competition for certain awards. 

There are a total of 24 cinematic works from 24 countries being screened now in Shanghai for the Belt and Road Film Week. With a theme of “the light of life” this year, the longing for light has been interpreted as a pursuit of art and cinema aesthetics among all these places by the local media, which is always believed to be closely interlinked, no matter how different their language, custom, and cultural backgrounds are.

How to balance the creative, aesthetic qualities of film works and its marketable value? It may remain a topic for further discussion in terms of better cooperation between the Belt and Road Alliance members from a global perspective.