Chinese Producer, Director With Checkered Pasts Accused of Exploiting Taiwan Drama Subsidies

This publication's investigation found that Wu Meili, the drama's Chinese producer, secured the rights to adapt a Junji Ito series as early as 2016. At the time, Wu used her Beijing-based company to obtain 8 million RMB in first-round financing from the well-known film and television venture capital firm Houde Capital. She later reached investment deals with two media companies, Beijing Culture and Ciwen Media, securing production funds — yet the project was never made.

According to sources familiar with the matter, the original script was adapted from Junji Ito's famous horror manga "Tomie." The Chinese side turned it into a series, but it repeatedly failed to pass review by China's National Radio and Television Administration. The script was revised endlessly and the shoot could never be completed. After the entire project died in the womb in China, the team turned to Taiwan seeking investment, changing the title to "Clever Town" and approaching Taiwan's Ministry of Culture a second time. This time they succeeded in obtaining a government grant. "Wu Meili holds the Chinese-language adaptation rights from the Japanese side, and the license only runs through this year, which is the main reason they were rushing to start filming."

Wu Meili, the Chinese producer named in the exposé, has previous experience investing in productions filmed in Taiwan. While producing the Chinese-funded series "The Solitary Gourmet," Wu entered Taiwan, hired Taiwanese director Chiang Feng-hung to direct, and brought in Taiwanese actor Winston Chao — who has built his career on the mainland — to shoot in Taipei. During that time she also negotiated with Taiwanese e-commerce companies to sell merchandise tied to the series, but restrictions on Taiwanese capital and on food import-export regulations ultimately caused the merchandise deal to collapse.

Meanwhile, Hsieh Chun-yi, the director helping the Chinese side secure the film subsidies, has also been exposed by this publication in the past for a checkered history of defrauding grants. In 2016, the production team behind the film "Take Me to the Moon," starring Jasper Liu and Vivian Sung, was accused of using dishonest and cunning methods in an attempt to fraudulently obtain a grant. The film's director was originally Hsieh Chun-yi, who gave the presentation before the review panel to compete for the funding, yet the grant application documents were filed under another director's name, Wang Wei-hsiang. This shows that lax oversight by the Ministry of Culture is nothing new.

Democratic Progressive Party legislator Lo Chih-cheng said that the Ministry of Culture's grants for domestic films and television dramas were established to support Taiwan's homegrown film and television talent. The ministry intends for applicants who lack capital to have the government step in as a major shareholder, giving quality Taiwanese dramas a chance to reach the public. These subsidies, including domestic film grants, do not exist to serve as "one type of funding the Chinese capital market can tap." Yet Chinese financiers have now found a loophole, applying with false information and using it as a means to fraudulently claim film and television subsidies. If the Ministry of Culture allows such bad precedents to stand, how could genuine local filmmakers feel anything but wronged.

Lo said Taiwan does not prohibit Chinese capital from filming in Taiwan. But if such parties use methods that effectively amount to fraudulently claiming subsidies — redirecting film grants and funds meant for local Taiwanese productions into a source of Chinese capital — it completely violates the purpose for which Taiwan's grants were established, and the process is also illegal.

Source: Mirror Media — https://www.mirrormedia.mg/story/20220601inv002