A group of amateur filmmakers will release a movie on April 27 to celebrate the Olympic Games.
The film is named after the Beijing Olympic mascot known as "Fuwa" and will debut at a low-income housing community in the capital city.
The 65-minute movie about five children and their adventures with Fuwa was funded, directed and shot by people living in the Tiantongyuan Community, in northwest Beijing's Changping District. Tiantongyuan, one of the largest affordable housing projects in the capital, has more than 300,000 residents.
Jiang Yuan, the director, said all 340 free tickets for the premiere, the only public screening, had been booked by Tiantongyuan residents.
Jiang, who graduated from the Beijing Film Academy, freelances in the film industry. The film crew of Tiantongyuan residents started work on the movie early last year.
"We never imagined we would get such community support," he said.
Early last year, Jiang, who also runs the community website, held an online chat about how to mark the Olympics.
"Our first plan was to make some short digital videos about the lives of Tiantongyuan residents and upload them to our website," he said.
But then he saw a posting about a girl who "encouraged her parents and friends to draw pictures of Fuwa," he said. "I posted my first movie script about the girl on the community website."
"Hundreds of Tiantongyuan residents sent me more stories about Fuwa and the Olympics," he said. Some of these tales made their way into the final script.
Casting for the movie was a little more complicated. "We planned to get local kids to act in the movie but some community residents complained this was unfair," he said.
In the end, all five actors and actresses, aged seven to nine, were chosen from among 674 candidates at an open casting call, he said.
The film had one thing in common with many Hollywood blockbusters: the costs rose along the way. The original budget was 20,000 yuan ($2,857), but the final tally was more than 100,000 yuan, Jiang said.
"We are happy anyway, since it's not a commercial movie," he said. "Fortunately, the community property managing office has promised to make 10,000 DVDs, so more Tiantongyuan residents can see the movie," he said.
