The 27th Shanghai International Film Festival will be held from June 13th to 22nd. Shanghai will then transform into a "City of Film" and welcome Chinese and foreign filmmakers and movie fans with open arms.
Among the 48 official screening theaters of this year's film festival, there is a shining new member - the Jiukeshu (Shanghai) Future Art Center (hereinafter referred to as "Jiukeshu Art Center") located in Fengxian New City.
This is the only selected film screening venue in Fengxian District. The theater-level configuration of the first forest theater in China and the second largest theater in Shanghai will run in both directions with the Shanghai International Film Festival, bringing a world-class light and shadow feast to the citizens at their doorstep.
Exterior view of Jiukeshu (Shanghai) Future Art Center
Enjoy a premier audio-visual experience at the price of a movie ticket
Located at No. 99 Shuhuan Road, Fengxian District, Jiukeshu Art Center is the first cultural complex in Fengxian District. Since its opening in 2019, it has created a "24-hour art" micro-vacation ecology with the concept of "more than a theater", attracting more than 2.44 million visitors and becoming a cultural landmark of Fengxian New City.
In the view of Chen Xijia, general manager of Nine Trees Art Center, Nine Trees’ joining the film festival screening system is a natural result of the combined effect of hardware upgrades and enhanced content operation capabilities.
In April this year, the Jiukeshu Theater was renovated and upgraded to the second largest theater in Shanghai with a capacity of 1,046 seats. The upgraded Jiukeshu is equipped with a 15.9m*8.4m visible screen, a high-end metal screen with a gain of 2.4, a Barco 33,000 lumen laser projector and the internationally renowned Dolby 7.1 surround sound system. It takes only one hour to quickly switch between the theater and the cinema, creating an ultimate immersive experience of "sound and picture integration". The stepped seat layout and ultra-wide row spacing design ensure that every audience has an unobstructed golden viewing angle.
Cinema interior
On May 4, the upgraded theater welcomed its first event, the screening of the movie "Dumpling Queen", which received enthusiastic responses from the audience and positive comments from the industry. The perfect hardware conditions combined with the successful premiere experience helped Jiukeshu pass the review very smoothly when applying to become a screening theater for the Shanghai International Film Festival.
"Dumpling Queen" road show
For Fengxian movie fans, this is a long-awaited "return" and "upgrade". At this Shanghai Film Festival, the Nine Trees Art Center will screen six films, including "Nezha Conquers the Dragon King", "The Other Side of the Medal", "Sauna Battle!", "Life and Death Together", "The Shepherd", and "Blood Brothers", including restoration screenings of classic old films and "Belt and Road" themed series of films. Among them, "Nezha Conquers the Dragon King" and "The Shepherd" are the most popular old films, with only a few vacancies left on the ticket purchase app.
During the Shanghai Film Festival, the Nine Trees Art Center also held several star-studded events:
On June 13, Weibo Movie Night will welcome filmmakers such as Cao Baoping, Chen Jianbin, Rao Xiaozhi, Fei Zhenxiang, Guan Hu, Dong Chengpeng, Wu Lei, Zhang Ruoyun, Zhu Yilong, Li Gengxi, Wang Anyu, and Huang Jue.
On June 16, the crew of the movie "Jiangyuan Lane" will come to Jiukeshu for a roadshow, with director Chen Kexin, starring Zhang Ziyi and other main creators attending. At that time, the cinema lobby will display many props of "Jiangyuan Lane · Unsolved Case" - authentic "Republic of China Electric Meters" from the 1940s, restoring the details of life in Shanghai during the Republic of China, allowing the audience to travel back to the light and shadow of the alleys in the 1940s before watching the movie.
Electric meter props for "Jiangyuan Lane: Unsolved Case"
After the Shanghai Film Festival, Nine Trees will present performances and movies in a dual mode of "Forest Theater + Top Cinema" simultaneously. Audiences can enjoy the hall-level audio-visual experience of a theater with a capacity of 1,000 people, and experience the artistic genes of a professional theater at the price of an ordinary movie ticket.
Bring your pet to Jiukeshu to watch an outdoor movie
During the Shanghai Film Festival, in addition to indoor screenings of films at the main venue, Jiukeshu also planned a "Hong Kong Film Nostalgia Night" at an open-air venue, screening classic Hong Kong films such as "Infernal Affairs" to pay tribute to the golden age of Chinese-language films and meet the nostalgia and appreciation needs of movie fans.
Zhao Mengmeng, the publicity director of Jiukeshu Art Center, said that open-air movies are a popular activity at Jiukeshu. Every Friday and Saturday night from April to November, Jiukeshu will launch the "Summer Night Starry River" project to create a movie-watching scene that combines indoors and outdoors.
The list of open-air movies is rich and timely. For example, they will screen works such as "Hello, Li Huanying", "Man Jiang Hong", and the "Wandering Earth" series, which have triggered a wave of movie-watching in theaters, are well-known to the audience and have a good reputation, covering a variety of genres such as comedy, suspense, and science fiction. For example, on Children's Day, animated films such as "The Lion Boy", "Big Ear Tutu: Tyrannosaurus Rex in Action", and "Pig Man Movie: Ocean Diary" will be screened, and main theme blockbusters such as "My Motherland and Me" and "My Fathers and Me" will be screened on National Day to create a festive atmosphere.
Open air movies
It is worth mentioning that Jiukeshu Art Center is one of the few pet-friendly art centers in Shanghai. When showing open-air movies, audiences can bring their pets with them. Jiukeshu also planned a "pet-themed screening day" to show pet-themed movies such as "Hachiko: A Dog's Story", "A Dog's Purpose" and "Togo", attracting many pet lovers to socialize.
“Ticket Stub Economy” Extends Film Festival Enthusiasm Beyond the Screen
During the May Day holiday, the Nine Trees Art Center planned activities such as the intangible cultural heritage handicraft market and parent-child intangible cultural heritage workshops, and brought performances such as the national-level intangible cultural heritage Fengxian rolling lanterns and the municipal-level intangible cultural heritage Lianxiang dragon dance, attracting thousands of spectators to participate and experience the "tangible cultural memory."
Chen Xijia told reporters that this year is the Chinese Film Consumption Year. At the beginning of the year, the National Film Administration and the Ministry of Commerce proposed "tasting food with movies", encouraging the integration and development of the film industry and the catering industry and other industries, and innovating consumption scenarios. Intangible cultural heritage food exhibitions, traditional skills interaction and other activities are responses and attempts to this. In the future, Jiukeshu will continue to deepen the linkage of intangible cultural heritage and strengthen the immersive expression of cultural scenes.
During the Shanghai Film Festival, the "Ticket Economy" activity will connect multiple business districts in Shanghai, allowing the enthusiasm of the film festival to extend from the screen to every corner of the city. Nine Trees has connected multiple surrounding hotels, commercial complexes and Fengxian Museum. Audiences can enjoy discounts on hotels and shopping malls with their film festival tickets, forming a consumption closed loop of "watching a movie and visiting a new city".
Some movie viewing benefits
"The fact that our Nine Trees Art Center can become one of the official screening theaters of the Shanghai International Film Festival has the most direct significance of greatly enriching the supply of high-quality cultural content in Fengxian District and improving the quality and internationalization of regional cultural life. At the same time, it has effectively promoted the transformation of Nine Trees from a traditional performing arts space to a comprehensive cultural and artistic highland." Chen Xijia said, "The addition of the film festival has formed a linkage with theater performances, art exhibitions, aesthetic education activities and other formats, and jointly built a more diversified and complex cultural consumption scene, meeting the citizens' growing demand for high-quality and diversified cultural and artistic experiences."
"More importantly, this has significantly enhanced the level and influence of Jiukeshu as a cultural and artistic landmark in southern Shanghai, and has also greatly enhanced the comprehensive cultural soft power and attractiveness of Fengxian New City as an independent comprehensive node city. Fengxian District has taken another solid step forward in providing high-end cultural services and satisfying citizens' aspirations for a better life," said Chen Xijia.
