Qin Hailu in photoshoot to hype new movies

Qin Hailu did the film equivalent of scoring the winning goal in her initial Premier League match, winning the Golden Horse for best actress for her role in Durian, Durian, her first film, in 2000. She has two coming the the theaters this year Love Tactics and The Piano in a Factory which she also produced.

Playing to one of her strengths those who make such decisions decided to put her in a couple of cheongsams and take some pictures.

CRIEnglish

Carrie Ng at the Toronto International Film Festival

For those who don't frequent the Hong Kong Movie Database Brian Thibodeau posted some quick photos he took of Carrie Ng in the lobby of the theater where her film Red Nights was showing. She always seems extraordinarily sexy to this viewer. Posted with his permission.

HKMDB

Fan BingBing in Paris (where else) with a Lin Chi-ling bonus

The always reliable  Dennis Lee pointed the way to coverage of Ms. Fan in the City of Lights that popped up on several sites, most of them Chinese, over the past few days. She was in her now familiar front row spot at the Louis Vuitton Spring/Summer 2011 show escorted, as usual, by LVMH supremo (at least the LV side) Yves Carcelle whose picture appears quite often on this blog.

She also hobnobbed with Bono, a famous humanitarian, at the Edun show. Edun is a fashion label founded by Bono and Ali Hewson (Mrs. Bono) in 2005 as a for profit company with  "a commitment to encourage trade with Africa" according to their website. Most of the manufacturing has been shifted to China due to lack of supply chain infrastructure in Africa. There has been a lot of coverage of Edun and Bono in the fashion, financial and humanitarian press, the content veering between schadenfreude and snark with some policy showing up occasionally. It is a notable effort.

The pictures with Bono look as if they were taken with a camera phone. The Edge looks bored with it all in the background.

With an African infant dressed in what must be an Edun designed and manufactured frock:

Looking great with the ubiquitous Mr. Carcelle (LVMH recently bought a big stake in Edun) who may have made one trip too many to the wine bar:

With designer Marc Jacobs and Ali Hewson:

Unfortunately, the next day...Fan BingBing in full war paint: alabaster skin, fire engine red lipstick, kohl black eyes, hair pulled back in a loose bun that frames her face--and a dress that not even she can make look good.

Just too much going on with that dress (the unfinished edges don't help either) and it is a terribly unflattering to anyone just below mid-calf length. The big bow at the bodice is a completely unnecessary embellishment:

Plenty of photographers:

Front row at Louis Vuitton. Yves Carcelle has a great job.

Once again an overworked or just not observant photo editor at Zimbio decided that if Fan BingBing was in Paris then she must be every Chinese actress there. These pictures of Lin Chi-Ling were tagged as Fan BingBing and vice versa. Here is Lin Chi-Ling waiting for the Christian Dior show to start next to Rachel Bilson:

Looking delightful either before or after the show. Strange background of people hanging around:

And here is a picture tagged Lin+Chi+ling+Louis+Vuitton+Tuileries+Gardens. Oops.

sina.com sina.com zimbio

And in other news...Michelle Reis and Hello Kitty get awards

Sina.com had an awards ceremony for those celebrities who: a) would show up and b) have a chance of being covered beyond sina.com. Among them were Michelle Reis (identified as Michelle Lee by Sina), perfecting her "deer in the headlights" look and Hello Kitty, looking as unconcerned and casual as ever:

Michelle Reis announced she was four months pregnant but there was nothing in the family additions department (or anything else) from Hello Kitty.

 Sina.com

Jiang Yiyan in cheongsam.

Jiang Yiyan in one of the ubiquitous "photo shoots" that pop up in the Chinese celebrity press--and which often wind up here. More qipao/cheongsam goodness with a bonus of a blazing red, intricately embroidered wedding dress. Proof (as if any more is needed) that god was in a benevolent mood when he decided to create silkworms.

She has a movie coming out soon, a Chinese/German collaboration that might be based on the latest release from the Steve Jobs digital empire, I Phone You.

I think the work is really impressive--here is a detail from the wedding dress enlarged 2.5 times:

Jiang Yiyan images from CRI English

Carina Lau and Li Bing-Bing hype "Detective Dee"

Li Bing-Bing once again in her "effortless beauty" mode.

Carina Lau looking wonderful.

It must have been at least this big:

Not at all--more like this:

With some supporting players:

From a couple of days ago in Sina through dleedlee.

Something else completely different: Ponyo

It is easy to see why Ponyo has such a devoted following among discerning filmgoers: it is a fable full of fantasy with a very simple story line and plenty of fantastical characters. It is essentially a three-hander. Ponyo herself should be a grotesquerie, a demon, a nightmare created by an evil genius; a fish with a human face could only happen is a horror movie--unless it was from masterful hand of Hayao Miyazaki and then it if becomes as loveable as any movie character. Her opposite, the person who completes her and allows her to become human--which is not species chauvinism, it is clear from the beginning that she isn't really a fish--is Sosuke a five-year-old boy who  rescues her after she is stuck in a bottle and washed up on shore. Her first line is "Ponyo loves Sosuke" which sums up their relationship perfectly. The third part of the trio is Lisa, Sosuke's mother. The consumate movie mom, she is sensitive, loving, courageous and a great driver--if you need to get your tiny car across a flooded ditch during a typhoon Lisa should be at the wheel.

Lisa is the adult necessary for the Ponyo/Sosuke story to unfold. If it stayed at the level of the magic fish girl and the young boy it couldn't develop. When Sosuke tells her about his new friend, a ham loving goldfish who has changed into a little human girl she simply says that life is amazing. In doing so she welcomes Ponyo into her extended family (which includes, in addition to her sea captain husband, four old ladies who live in the home for the aged where she works) and into the human world generally.

Ponyo is full of operatically grand and fantastically impossible characters. Ponyo was the result of the union of Fujimoto and Gan Mamare. Fujito is an easily distracted and not very competent wizard, formerly human and still with a lot of human characteristics including his hair-metal coiffure and chalk-striped suit. He hates humans because they destroy the environment and would like the world to reverse evolve back to the Cambrian age. Gran Mamare, his estranged but still friendly wife, has a human form but is both gigantic (although never threateningly so) and ephemeral, seeming to be as much a part of the spirit world as of the fishy tangible one. Ponyo has many younger sisters--I am pretty sure they are all girl fish--who have proto-human faces and who, one imagines, may want to test their destiny on dry land at some point. The old ladies change from a dour pain filled existence in death's waiting room to people who are joyous, active and who love a good time.

One of the many strengths of this movie is lack of exposition. We don't know anyone's background, simply what they are in the moment. Before the huge storm Lisa is piqued at her husband who has to take his ship on another short voyage instead of coming home that night. Sosuke exchanges loving greetings with him using Morse code sent with a signal light while Lisa sulks and then blows up a bit at him sending her own Morse signal. We get the idea that this is a not uncommon situation--which is all the "backstory" of any of the characters that I can recall.  There are amazing scenes throughout, from the hugely cinematic--Ponyo running over the huge waves caused by the typhoon, keeping up with Lisa and Sosuke in the car along the cliff road with something very close to "The Ride of the Valkyries on the soundtrack--to the intimate and tender--Sosuke hiding Ponyo's fishbowl in the bushes then coming back to make sure that she will be safe from wandering cats.

Ponyo is a great movie.

This just in: Gong Li borrows Shakira wig from 2006, has picture taken.

From yesterday's opening of The 25th Biennale des Antiquaires in Paris, first of the the autumn season of European fine art and antiques fairs (WSJ) where you can "completely satisfy an escapist fantasy of a life lived in luxury" (NYT), Gong Li accompanied, as if often the case in when she is in Europe, by Yves Carcelle, CEO of Louis Vuitton. New hairstyle--or at least unfamiliar to me hairstyle, amazing ballgown, slightly pornographic necklace with a strategically placed ruby. A great look. From Zimbio. I hope there are a few more images of Gong Li in this outfit floating around.

Michelle Yeoh in Venice: Reign of the Assassins

Not to put too fine a point on things, Michelle Yeoh looked great. The green Alberta Ferretti dress was a perfect color for her and was complemented by the gorgeous, almost flamboyant, Boucheron earrings. Walking elegantly in the Versace sky high stilettos was probably no more difficult than jumping a motorcycle onto a moving train in Police Story 3.

Beautiful, confident, and relaxed. Not much more to say: