When the Louvre Meets the Forbidden City

Helmed by Zhou Bing and Xu Huan, the masterminds behind The Forbidden City (2005), this 12-episode documentary offers an in-depth exploration of Chinese and Western art.

According to Zhou Bing, it was inspired by the Napoleon I Exhibition held at the Palace Museum in 2008. All the 100 exhibits related to Napoleon were provided by the Louvre.

Both Zhou and Xu saw the exhibition as a spiritual dialogue between two different streams of human civilization, and this gave them the idea to make a documentary that strings together the two great art centers.

They took their idea to the Louvre staff and found an enthusiastic response and for the first time, the Louvre was thrown open to Chinese filmmakers. Featuring rare collections seldom shown in public, the documentary delves into Egyptian, Roman and Renaissance art, and so on, juxtaposing them with Chinese art achievements of the same era.

The docu is being shown from Feb 17 to Feb 28.

China's Modern Marvels

Filmed in partnership with China Intercontinental Communication Center (CICC) and The National Geographic Channel, in 2007, this six-episode series is one of the few documentaries focusing on China's massive building projects, including ports, railways, roads, airports and commercial buildings, and residential housing.

In the segment on the Shanghai World Financial Center, the tallest building on the Chinese mainland, it offers exclusive footage of the project, revealing what cutting-edge technologies were employed to engineer the 101-floor skyscraper and how human genius triumphed over the formidable challenges its completion presented.

The program also follows the construction of the Yangshan Deep Water Port near Shanghai which, with 20 km of quays and 50 berths, has become the biggest deep water port ever built.

Other architectural marvels showcased include the National Aquatics Center in Beijing (Water Cube), and the Beijing National Stadium (Bird's Nest), one of the world's largest enclosed facilities.

The program will be shown from Mar 1 to Mar 6.

South China Sea-1

This documentary centers on an ancient trade vessel, built during the Song dynasty (AD 960-1279), which sank in the South China Sea about 800 years ago with a cargo load of porcelain, gold, jewels and other artifacts.

The 30-meter long merchant ship, Nanhai-1, or South China Sea-1, was discovered lying 25 meters below water off the coast near Yangjiang city in Guangdong province in 1987 by Guangzhou Salvage Bureau and a British underwater salvage company.

The ship is believed to be the first ancient vessel discovered on the "Marine Silk Road" - China's southern passageway to the outside world.

The cuspate-headed ship was salvaged whole on Dec 22, 2007, and was later moved intact into a sealed pool in the "Crystal Palace" at the Marine Silk Road Museum in Yangjiang.

The documentary is a treasure trove of information on China's history in seafaring, ship building and ceramics making.

The program will run late this year.

Felice Beato's 1860

During the second Opium War (1856-60), an Italian photographer, Felice Beato, accompanied the Anglo-French forces in China.

Under extreme wartime conditions, Beato took approximately 100 pictures, said to be the first photographs of a military campaign, documenting the seizure of what is now Beijing and the destruction of the Old Summer Palace. The two-part documentary pieces together Beato's photographs, recounting his experiences in 1860s China by digging up the stories behind the black-and-white images.

The docu was shown on Feb 12.