Animating Jewish-Chinese Relationships

Judaism and Israel are hot topics in China. Over ten Chinese Universities now offer programs in Judaic Studies, at least one offering a doctoral program. China’s state-owned television network, CCTV, recently aired a documentary titled “Walk into Israel- Land of Milk and Honey”, its first series on Israel. The story of the Jews in Shanghai in the first half of the 20th century, a story little known to even most Jews in the world, is suddenly popular in China. The opening of the Israeli Pavilion in Shanghai, along with architect Haim Dotan’s own China story, made headlines. And shortly after the May opening of the World Expo in Shanghai, the Chinese government granted the Jewish community in Shanghai, long-awaited permission to again use for worship the Ohel Rachel Synagogue, a historic synagogue built just after the turn of the 20th century.

The growing ties between Chinese and Jews helped set the scene for the release of director Wang Tianyun’s animated film, A Jewish Girl in Shanghai. It not surprisingly is self-cited as the first Chinese animated film to portray the Holocaust. While some might question whether it really portrays the Holocaust, which largely is just a backdrop for a family drama, for many Chinese the movie will be their first introduction to the destruction of European Jewry. The film’s producers also refer to A Jewish Girl in Shanghai as the first animated film to express the Chinese - Israeli friendship; an increasingly important relationship for both sides.

A Jewish Girl in Shanghai tackles many difficult topics as it tells the story of a Jewish girl named Rena who along with her brother, Mishalli, seeks refuge in Shanghai after escaping from Europe. While awaiting the arrival of their parents, Rena meets a young Chinese boy, A-gen, and immediately the two forge a friendship. They share their cultures with one another and help one another to ease their burdens of everyday living in a war-torn world where poverty, loss and conflict are their shared realities.

The screenplay is based on a graphic novel, also titled A Jewish Girl in Shanghai, published by the East China Normal University Press in 2008. Wu Lin, from Shanghai himself, wrote both the graphic novel and the screenplay. Wu says the book was a huge success, selling 4,000 copies in the first half year since its release. The book, published in China, has a somewhat limited market, as it was only published in English though the film version is in Chinese and subtitled in English. A Hebrew edition of the book, Wu said in the interview with AJL, is in the pipeline. A year after the book’s publication, he created the screenplay for the animated film version hoping this would allow the story to reach a broader China-based audience.

The film version premiered throughout Shanghai in May and then debuted in Israel at the Jerusalem International Film Festival in July. Wu adds that this was the first Chinese film to be included in the Jerusalem Film Festival and was very well received. It was nominated for an Avner Shalev Yad Vashem Chairman’s Award for Artistic Achievement in Holocaust-related Film. Wu, sitting at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Macau the week after the Jerusalem premiere, spoke enthusiastically about his affinity for the Jewish people. He adds that events marking the end of the Second World War initially inspired him to tell this story taken from the pages of a history little known to most, Jew and Chinese alike. Wu, who started his entry into the workforce as a history teacher, explains that, “In 2005, for the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the victory of anti-fascism war, many newspapers and magazines in Shanghai published the stories of Jewish refugee in Shanghai during the 1940s.” He wanted to learn more and knew that he would somehow develop this into the framework of a novel, “to take a small story and build it up,” he explains.

He was moved by the struggle the Jews endured during that time and saw parallels between their struggles and those of the Chinese against Japan and explains that it was a very hard time for both people in the face of fascism.

Within Shanghai, the story of the Hongkou Jewish ghetto is now familiar to many and, he explains, has made an impression on both Chinese and Jews. “It was not forgotten for our people.” He talks about the number of former Shanghai Jews who still hold China in a special place in their hearts, a sentiment repeated throughout many recent memoirs and films produced about the Jewish experience in China. Over the years, Wu has met many of these former Jewish Shanghai residents who spent their childhood in the city while on various business trips to the United States. He also had the opportunity to meet other former Jewish resident of Shanghai at the Jerusalem Film Festival.

Their wartime stories of life among Shanghai’s Jews and Chinese helped inspire Wu to write his novel. “Mutual help and support during the harsh time illustrates the harmony and friendship between the two races,” he says. “Hence I came up with the idea of writing a book to demonstrate this period of history which would also provide more or less positive impetus to the peace of the world.”

Volunteers Jumping Through Hoops to Help At-Risk Israeli...

Some Good News for Israel’s Vulnerable

Gilad Shalit Visits ‘Homeland’ Set in Tel Aviv

Canadian Writer, Producer Calls Israel: a Totalitarian...