A live-action remake of Disney’s Mulan, already a target of boycott, has come under fire for shooting in Xinjiang, the site of alleged widespread human rights violations against Uighurs and other Muslim minorities.
Directed by Nikki Cairo, the film is a 1998 adaptation of Disney animation about Hua Mulan, a young woman who disguised herself as a man to fight in the royal army instead of her father.
Actor Liu Yefi, who plays Momen, said the remake drew criticism when she supported the Hong Kong police in their often violent crackdown on pro-democracy protesters.
After the film’s release last Friday, observers noted other controversial elements: In the final credits, Disney offers “special thanks” to eight government agencies in Xinjiang, including the Public Security Bureau in Tarpan, a city in eastern Xinjiang, where there are several re-education camps. Has been documented.
The film also thanks the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda department in Xinjiang, the “Publicity Department of the CPC Xinjiang Uyghur on Tonomi Region Committee.” Disney has been contacted for comment.
China has faced international scrutiny over its dealings with Muslim minorities in Xinjiang, where an estimated 1 million residents have been detained at the Judge Interment Camp. In what scientists describe as a “genocide of the population,” Uighur women have reported tremendous sterilization and birth control as part of a government campaign to suppress births.
According to media reports prior to its release, Mulan was shot in about 20 locations in China, including the Mingasha Shan Desert, part of which is in Xinjiang, and an Oasis village east of the Turk Valley, Turpan.
Activists calling for a boycott of the film are now publishing its links to Xinjiang, while researchers have noted that the Public Safety Bureau monitors Tarpan. At least 14 internment camps In the area.
It just keeps getting worse! Now, when you look # Mulan, Not only are you turning a blind eye to police brutality and racial injustice (for reasons for the main actors), not only that, you are also potential in the mass captivity of Muslim Uighurs. #Boycottmoolan https://t.co/dAMgZ6PWTD
– Joshua Wong 😷 之 鋒 😷 (@ JoshuaWangCF) September 7, 2020
Mulan thanked the Tarpan Bureau of Public Security as it was filmed in Tarpan in 2018, which is again the pinnacle of the education campaign. How many thousands of Uyghurs were put in the camp while Mulan was being shot there by the Turpan Bureau of Public Security? https://t.co/yX0xssPnKW
– Shaun Zhang September 7, 2020
In 2017, on an explicit location scouting mission, Cairo posted a photo of the Ringing Hills rolling and tagged the “Asia / Urumqi” image, referring to Xinjiang’s capital. The following comment from Caro’s post said: Shame on you, speak out against #BoycottMulan and #Uighur #GenoSide! ”
The film follows Mulan as he joins the imperial army to defend an area known as the “Northwest China” of the Rauran invaders – the sages who now come from Mongolia. The release of the film also comes at a time when the Chinese Autonomous Region, the inhabitants of Inner Mongolia, are protesting against the mandatory introduction of Mandarin language instruction and the gradual erosion of their language and culture.
“It all feeds into China’s current national mythology with incredible borders. The film was partly made in Xinjing, where the genocide is currently taking place, said Jannet Ng, a fiction writer from British-Hong Kong. “It makes the film frames of people who are currently destroying their culture, the lion’s share of bad people such as Han domination and Chinese nationalism.”
Parts of the story are set along the Silk Road. At one time the Xinjiang area was an important part of the route. The film’s production designer, Grant Major, told Architectural Digest that he and the production team had “spent months in and around the northwestern province of Xinjiang” doing legwork research before installing the camera.
Grant said the team has consulted with Chinese educators so that “we can extrapolate what we find and use our creativity to make it feel right.”
