Organisers of an annual independent film festival in China said on Saturday that authorities had blocked it from opening. The Beijing Independent Film Festival has become a rare and influential venue for the showing of movies that could be critical of the government.
The artistic director, Wang Hongwei, said authorities had forced the cancellation of the event, which was scheduled to run through to 31 August.
"In the past few years when they forced us to cancel the festival, we just moved it to other places, or delayed a day the screening. But this year, we cannot carry on with the festival, it is completely forbidden," he said.
Police in the Beijing suburb of Songzhuang, where the event was supposed to open, said on Saturday that they were unaware the festival had been cancelled. ......
But security was tight at the would-be festival site, with about two dozen men blocking the area and preventing around 30 film directors and members of the public from entering.
The men, claiming to be villagers, tried to stop anyone from photographing or videotaping the scene, and in a scuffle, broke a video camera an Associated Press journalist was operating and took away another AP journalist's cellphone.
The phone was later returned.
"If one of the rare film festivals, like the Beijing Independent Film festival, is shut down, then it will be very difficult for us to survive as filmmakers," said documentary filmmaker Hu Jie.
The festival has seen obstruction in past years, but this is the first time it's been dealt a complete shutdown.
Started as a film forum in 2006, the event over the years has grown to be one of the most important events for China's independent films, but also has attracted the attention of authorities eager to regulate free speech.
In 2012, electricity was cut off shortly after the festival opened, but organisers still managed to show some new movies.
Last year, the festival went on, although public screenings were banned.
