娱乐英语新闻:New movie refreshes memory of young Chinese generation

BEIJING, Feb. 13 (Xinhua) - To many Chinese in their 20s or 30s, blockbuster Eternal Moment, which aired on Saturday (two days before Valentine' s Day), is far more than just a movie. Rather, as the sequel to a hit TV show from 12 years ago, it is a renewal of the teenage memory of viewers.

The theme song once again resonated in the streets. "At the corner where we met, people still come and go...mourning for our adolescence..." the song goes.

"In this movie, we tried to show to our audiences some possibilities of what could happen to a pair of young lovers after 12 years," said Zhang Yibai, director of the movie during an exclusive interview with Xinhua.

AT THE CORNER WHERE WE MET

In 1998, a 20-episode TV series called "Cherish Our Love Forever" caused a stir across China. It was the first youth drama in the Chinese mainland. The show featured two college students, Yang Zheng and Wen Hui, who fell in love on campus but broke up at the end.

Zhang Yibai, a director of the show, said that when the series were first aired, his expectations were not high at all. "Later, when people told me that the teleplay was welcomed and even shaped the view of love of many youngsters, I thought they were flattering," he said.

Over the past 12 years, Zhang said more and more people advised him to make a movie from that original story, but the director refused until finally Xu Jinglei, the main actress in the show, joined the advisory team. The movie includes three stories for the possible sequel: Yang and Wen got married but found love fading between them, the pair met after separating 12 years ago, and Yang received a phone call from Wen and falls in love with her again.

"I want to convey to our audience that whatever happens and no matter if you are 18 or 31, the persistence to those you love should never be missing," Zhang told Xinhua. At the age of 48, Zhang met his girlfriend in 1998 when they were making the TV series. "To cherish our love, means to preserve the ability of loving, despite twists and turns," he said.

PEOPLE STILL COME AND GO

The light was off in a cinema in Shijiazhuang, capital city of north China's Hebei Province. The old theme song started, signaling the beginning of the movie. Wang Juwei, 28, covered her mouth with her hand and fought back her tears.

"I was 16 when I first watched the teleplay," she said. "After that I began to realize 'wow, that's love'." Wang noted that it was the TV series that gave her the dream of romance on campus.

"As soon as the song started, I knew that I could no longer control my emotions," said 29-year-old Gou Zhe. "It was a complex sentiment. We have reached the age of being reminiscent." In fact, as early as last year when Zhang Yibai announced that he would make the movie, Internet users voiced their excitement.

"After watching the TV series, I swore to myself that I would go to the seaside with my boyfriend in the future," said a comment from a user named Tangtangxiaowei. In the TV series, the heroin, Wen Hui, held a cell phone by the sea to let her boyfriend listen to the sound of the tide.

"That's the age of innocence. There were no skyrocketing housing prices, and college students could easily find a job. I longed for the life like those in the TV series, to strive for a better future," she wrote on douban.com, a website for film and book reviews.

Another comment, which came from a user named Chen, believed it was the memory of their teenage years that gave them a special affinity for the movie. "After we grow up, things are no longer as simple as we saw when we were young, like love," he said. "Some of our dreams were realized, some were not... We, the generation born in the 1980s, felt the burden of life increasingly heavier with the passing of time...The movie, Eternal Moment, was a wish that beautiful things could last forever."

MOURNING FOR OUR ADOLESCENCE

There are many online posts that show the pictures of food and toys people used in the 1980s. The people from this time were dubbed as the post-1980 generation. A person who took the alias Xiao Li, 26, was the owner of a shop named "memory hall of post-1980 generation."

"I traveled to the markets all over China to search for the old stuff," he said. From the eraser to cartoon pictures, from building blocks to the enamel cup, the shop boasted 166 items that ignited the memory of young people.

"Each month, an average of 1,000 items were sold," Xiao Li said. Not much. But he noted that the items revived his sentimentality. A new T-shirt pattern has become popular. The t-shirt features a girl and a bespectacled boy named Han Meimei and Li Lei. They were both characters in English textbooks for middle school students from 1990 to 2000. It was estimated that hundreds of millions of students used the book.

The textbooks had been changed. In the new book, which was published in 2009, Han Meimei was married and had children but her husband was not Li Lei. In connection with the characters,, songs and dramas were produced about the imaginary love affair of the two cartoon figures.

He Jing, who was born in 1981, became popular after he posted his drawings online. The pictures showed the middle-aged lives of cartoon figures that are popular with the post-1980 generation. On the pictures, Shiryu from the Japanese cartoon Saint Seiya became a masseuse. Saint Seiya was one of the best-known Japanese cartoon characters from which Chinese children learned the horoscope.

On the pictures, detective Black Cat was imprisoned for taking bribes, and the Bottle Gourd Brothers joined a televised talent show. The figures were all from Chinese cartoon films.

He, a fan of cartoons when he was a teenager, said that he got the idea based on social reality. "Bribery was common and the talent show was a novel thing in those years." Sociologist showed their understanding of the nostalgia for the post-1980 generation.

Zhang Sining, a research fellow at the Liaoning Provincial Academy of Social Sciences, believes that the fast-pace of society made young people frustrated and lonely. "As a result, they began to miss the old age when they were carefree," he said.

Also, he noted that with economic development, people began to seek spiritual fulfillment. "The memory could soothe their hearts." Chen Changwen, director of the Sociology and Psychology Department of the Sichuan University, said it was human nature to reminisce. "The reason was usually dissatisfaction and pressure," he said, adding that since the single-child policy started in 1980, pressure could be big for that generation.

However, he believes that the post-1980 generation should look ahead. They are going to be in their 30s, the professor said. In Chinese there is a saying, "a man should be independent and steadfast at the age of thirty."

"Now the generation has become the backbone of their families and society at large, they should take up more responsibility," he said.

(Xinhua reporters Cao Yan from Sichuan, Wang Ying from Liaoning, as well as Bai Ying and Sun Yi from Beijing contributed to the story.)