Beijing
China’s film authority canceled the release of the U.S. film Memoirs of a Geisha this week, after activists criticized the use of Chinese actresses to play Japanese geishas. Chinese movie stars Gong Li, Michelle Yeoh, and Zhang Ziyi have been denounced on Chinese Web sites as “traitors” and “national embarrassments.” Anti-Japanese sentiment has been high in China in recent years, stoked by Japan’s release of textbooks that play down war crimes against the Chinese. Still, Chinese who really want to see the film can easily do so. Pirated DVD copies of the film are already available in China on the black market.
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