So, what do you think about the opening ceremony of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games on Friday night? It’s a decent show for me; not great, but nice.
The ceremony started off well. The fou (the drum like instrument) performance managed to draw the crowds’ attention, the giant footsteps’ fireworks were cool, and the countdown managed to boost the mood very well.
Then came the splendid fireworks, followed by the formalities of flag raising and national anthem singing.
The masterpiece of the show was revealed after that… the giant paper scroll, which was quite captivating at first. The initial performances still managed to keep me in front on the TV, but things started to turn boring for a few reasons…
1. Over-artistic. It’s a masterful art show, which Zhang Yimou is really good at, no question about that. Thing is, not all audiences were having similar artistic value… that’s a reason why the likes of “Transformers” or “Dark Knight” are selling better than “Atonement” or “Babel” etc… it’s about appealing to the mass.
It’s ok if there was one or two ‘deeper’ performances, but when most parts of the show were thought-provoking… it became a bit too tiring to watch on.
2. Over-dependent on the scroll. It was a creative idea to start with, but everything seemed to be revolving on the scroll… lack of variety obviously.
3. The quality of filming. The camera angles and timings were poor… lots of the features were not nicely shot and couldn’t be seen clearly.
4. Too Chinese oriented… which could be good or bad depending on personal preferences. I think it’s overdone on showing the Chinese culture… it doesn’t really fit the “One World, One Dream” theme, and I couldn’t feel the Olympic spirit until the earth popped up.
5. Too Chinese’ Chinese oriented. There are 55 ethnic groups officially recognised by the Chinese government… but did they manage to show the fact?
Fine, it was just a show, but imagine this - if the minorities are sidelined in every other aspects in real life like the opening ceremony… little wonder why there are so many protest against the centre government.
Ok, enough bad stuff… it was not a bad show after all. There were a few memorable highlights… the taichi, the dove, the fireworks, Sarah Brightman, and the splendid lights and sounds throughout.
The final torch lighting was nice as well. Li Ning was the final torch bearer as rumoured; and when he started ‘flying’ into the sky, I believe there are lots of ‘ooh’ ‘aah’ around the world… and then he started running in the air, which actually looked a bit odd, but I like it. It was a great ending for the show.
There were some other performances after that, mostly from the pop stars… but the live broadcast ended just after Jackie Chan and Karen Mok’s performances, which was kinda disappointing. Not sure if other regions managed to watch the rest of the show… no luck for me obviously.
Overall, I’ll give a 7/10 for the opening ceremony. The middle of the show was just ok, but they managed an awesome start and ended it in a high note.
I also thought it was a little to chinese oriented but overall I thought they did a good job. The performances were very well organized, with 50,000 performers.
i liked it alot, but my tv station cut the opening ceremony off after the torch lit. not cool… i thought the opening performances were great though.
for me.. not good, not bad. maybe a bit more towards the good side.
the chinese singer who sang the theme song was severely under-dressed!
i totally agree with zewt.
I can’t disagree with zewt and Emilie.
Didn’t you see the children dressed up in ethnic costumes representing 55 minority groups, walking into the stadium at the beginning of the show, when the little girl in red was singing? it would be surprising to me if China didn’t include the minorities in such a historic moment for the nation.
Evans… yes I saw that; the organiser didn’t outcast the minorities from the ceremony completely… but I felt that they could do much better. When it comes to the main show the minorities were mostly sidelined, at least from the performance perspective.
Boring..man..i wish i didn’t stayed until emm 12? TVB was showing only a lil bit of the singing in the end.. i wish they continued..T_T
Since Chinese culture is famous..everything was really predictable! perharps we are asking for too much..well, almost every press was like “this is going to be the best Olympics in the history”
and yeah.. absolutely agree with zewt! it’s such a huge event but he’s wearing a tee?
I think it was really geat¡¡¡¡ its the first one that i saw till the end (not much of a fan sport) just to imagine the hard work to put up such an incredible show¡¡
i loved it , 100% perfect
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