Comfort women movie a surprise hit at box office
Print Edition
wvWhen Chinese director Guo Ke made a short documentary in 2012 about “comfort women” — women forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese army during World War II — he named it “Thirty Two,” the number of known survivors on the Chinese mainland.
When he began a follow-up two years later, that number had dropped to 22, which became the name of the second documentary, released on August 14 this year.
Box office revenue for “Twenty Two” exceeded 10 million yuan (US$1.5 million) on its first day, and 100 million yuan within a week, making it the most successful documentary release in China.
According to China Film News, as of August 27 the film had made over 160 million yuan in total and ranked seventh in last week’s box office earnings.
It scored 8.9 out of 10 points on Douban, a popular Chinese movie rating platform, higher than 80 percent of its peers in the documentary category.
Guo attributed the success to the audience finally paying attention to the history and the traumatic experiences of this group of women. He has said he will donate his personal profit from the film to the Research Center for Comfort Women at Shanghai Normal University.
Across Asia some 400,000 women were forced to be sex slaves for the Japanese army during WWII, with nearly half of them Chinese, according to the center’s research.
It is estimated 300,000 women died as a result.
When “Twenty Two” debuted last month, the number of known survivors had dropped to no more than 20, although there are many more who have not admitted to being survivors due to the shame of what they went through.
According to Su Zhiliang, director of the research center and an adviser for Guo’s film, the oldest known survivor is now 97 years old and the youngest already 89.
“They will soon all be gone,” Su said, describing the task of locating the remaining survivors and collecting evidence of their experiences as a “race against time.”
“Twenty Two” was not expected to be a box office success. Few people believed it could make money, Guo said he had even considered selling his house to finance the production.
At that crucial stage, actress Zhang Xinyi donated one million yuan, and the rest of money was raised through a crowd-funding program.
Zhang said she did not expect any return on her investment and was impressed by the powerful “strength of society” revealed by the film’s box office performance.
Guo is pleased the documentary has received so much attention, and hopes young people who see it will have a greater understanding of the women’s history and experiences.
According to Taopiaopiao, a ticket-selling website, about 20 percent of the audience are in their teens.
One Weibo user wrote: “This is history. This is part of the past that should never be forgotten.”
Teenage viewer Li Jingfen said: “I felt uneasy for a long time after I walked out of the cinema. I was feeling sorrow. These elderly women are leaving so fast but we are coming too late.”
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