We’ve no way of knowing for certain whether or not Ren Qingtai had an inkling of the legacy he’d leave behind when he first ordered a French-made, wooden-bodied, hand-cranked camera to roll, back in the fall of 1905.
But chances are he did. History reveals Ren was a very smart man, and a multi-hyphenate, a good century before that phrase even emerged. Importantly, he was also the man who directed China’s first-ever film, Dingjun Mountain.
“The production of this film stands as a symbolic milestone, marking the end of an era without Chinese cinema and devoid of domestically produced films by the Chinese people,” explains Professor Li Zhen from the China Film Archive.
Now, just look at what Ren started. Fast-forward 120 years, and China boasts the second-largest film industry in the world, with such recent mega-hits as Ne Zha 2, which the Beijing fest is also celebrating.
The 15th edition of the Beijing International Film Festival is marking those 120 years of Chinese cinema with a special program under its “Beijing Panorama” section, one that attempts to trace the evolution of movie-making in the country.
Program curator Sha Dan has cast the net wide, and the selection offers a collection of treasures, from rare screenings of restored silent films (1927’s Spiders and The Goddess from 1934 included) complete with live scores, and on to the early days of animation and China’s, and Asia’s, first animated feature, Princess Iron Fan (1941).
“Created during wartime China, it reimagines mythological tales with undertones of national salvation,” says Sha.
Charting a course through history, audiences can all catch Fei Mu’s aching classic Spring in a Small Town – in 2025 voted the best Chinese film of all time – and work their way through the likes of kung fu blockbuster Shaolin Temple (1982) and on to “contemporary visions” such as Jia Zhangke’s era-spanning anthology Mountains May Depart (2015).
“Overall, this special program honors the pioneers and trailblazing artists of Chinese cinema. It also offers a great opportunity to understand how Chinese film has developed over the past 120 years,” says Sha.
‘Dingjun Mountain,’ courtesy of China Film Archive
The occasion of the 120th anniversary is also being marked by discussions on film history hosted by filmmakers Jia Zhangke and Huo Jianqi, and it also offers film geeks a chance to reflect on the people – and the circumstances – that first brought cinema to China.
And that leads us back to the story of Ren Qingtai.
Film had first landed in China in 1896 with screenings in Shanghai of shorts from France’s Lumière brothers. As Li tells it, Ren was born into poverty in the 1850 of Faku, Liaoning, at first turning to carpentry in the hope of finding his fortune. His work turned heads and he began to look for new opportunities just as photography reached China.
By 1892, Ren had opened the Fengtai Photo Studio in Beijing, and he was soon counting among his clients none other than the Qing Dynasty’s Empress Dowager Cixi (1835-19080 – famously portrayed on her deathbed in Bernardo Bertolucci’s Oscar-winner The Last Emperor (1987). For that work, he was awarded a “fourth-rank official’s hat and peacock feather”, which brought “great fame”, says Li.
Motion pictures were at the time quickly turning heads, and Ren seized the opportunity, buying that wooden camera of his from Beijing’s Kierulf’s Store, and enlisting the services of Peking Opera veteran actor Tan Xinpei and budding cinematographer Liu Zhonglun in the courtyard of his studio in order to create China’s first film.
“Filming took place over three days, capturing three excerpts from the Peking Opera Dingjun Mountain – Requesting Orders [Qing Ying], Sword Dance [Wu Dao], and Battle Engagement [Jiao Feng],” explains Li. It is said that after completion, Ren Qingtai screened the film at his Daguanlou Theater and other theaters. “He founded the first professional cinema in Beijing, the Daguanlou Cinema, transforming the film-viewing experience and helping to shift cinema from a court novelty to a form of mass entertainment.”