From left, Chiling Lin, Andy Lau and Jingchu Zhang, the stars of the forthcoming Chinese action film Dwelling in the Fuchan Mountains, at yesterday's press conference in Dubai. Satish Kumar / The National
From left, Chiling Lin, Andy Lau and Jingchu Zhang, the stars of the forthcoming Chinese action film Dwelling in the Fuchan Mountains, at yesterday's press conference in Dubai. Satish Kumar / The NatiShow more

Dwelling in the Fuchan Mountains begins filming in Dubai this week



The Burj Khalifa may have towered over proceedings in Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, but some of Dubai's other notable landmarks will soon be getting screen time, thanks to a new big-budget Chinese action film.

Dwelling in the Fuchan Mountains, which begins shooting in Dubai this week, will include key scenes filmed at Atlantis, The Palm, the Burj Al Arab, on an Emirates Airline A380 and alongside the Burj Khalifa. The project is being billed as a "Chinese James Bond" and stars the singer-turned-actor Andy Lau, described as "the Michael Jackson of China", and the Taiwanese model Chiling Lin. It is also the first Chinese film to be shot predominantly outside China.

The director Jay Sun, who admits that the film is likely to cost "a bit more" than the Dh74 million production budget, says the project will offer a more favourable portrayal of the UAE than Mission: Impossible - without the sandstorms. "We don't want to make comparisons with the film, but one thing you can be sure of is that we can do a much better job at presenting the best of this country," he says.

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A rough cut of the scenes already shot across China shown during a press conference announcing the film at the Atlantis yesterday revealed a fast-paced thriller with more than a few similarities to Tom Cruise's spy outing. The few minutes included helicopters, explosions, fist-fights, characters abseiling down glass-fronted towers, car and boat chases, a splash of romance and what looked like a Bugatti Veyron engaging in some daredevil parking manoeuvres.

While the exact length of shooting in Dubai wasn't made public, Tim Smythe, the chief executive of local production company Filmworks, which is working on the film in Dubai, says it is a major project for the city. "In total, we'll end up with about 300 people working on it; we're doing a lot of work in a very tight time."

The film is named after a landscape painting - considered one of the most valuable in China - that is one of the few surviving works of Huang Gongwang and was painted between 1348 and 1350. The painting was partially burnt 300 years later and ended up in two pieces, with one now kept in Taipei and the other in Hangzhou. The story of the painting is in itself enough to fill a film, having passed from various high-profile owners and with at least one well-known forgery having done the rounds. Last year, the two pieces were famously reunited for the first time in the National Palace Museum in Taipei.

It is at this reunification of the painting that the film takes up the story. "They have been fighting for this painting over the past couple of hundred years," says Sun. "In this film we have gangsters fighting for it across the whole world, with Andy Lau as the hero to protect this national treasure and save lots of lives."

The actress Jingchu Zhang, who also stars alongside Lau, says that she's looking forward to shooting in Dubai, despite the risks her character will be up against. "I'm going to have a very dangerous scene, sitting in a car that is being pulled up by a helicopter, but the view is going to be wonderful."

The film is set for release some time this summer, and Sun says it will "definitely" be shown in Dubai. "I can guarantee the people here will be proud of their city."

While Mission: Impossible may still be topping box offices internationally, having passed US$450m (Dh1.7bn) since it premiered in Dubai last month, the hope is that Dwelling in the Fuchan Mountains will reach a bigger audience, especially in China. "It's going to be launched through the theatres, the internet, DVD and also national TV," says Sun. "There's going to be at least 400 million people watching this movie."

How Tesla’s price correction has hit fund managers

Investing in disruptive technology can be a bumpy ride, as investors in Tesla were reminded on Friday, when its stock dropped 7.5 per cent in early trading to $575.

It recovered slightly but still ended the week 15 per cent lower and is down a third from its all-time high of $883 on January 26. The electric car maker’s market cap fell from $834 billion to about $567bn in that time, a drop of an astonishing $267bn, and a blow for those who bought Tesla stock late.

The collapse also hit fund managers that have gone big on Tesla, notably the UK-based Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust and Cathie Wood’s ARK Innovation ETF.

Tesla is the top holding in both funds, making up a hefty 10 per cent of total assets under management. Both funds have fallen by a quarter in the past month.

Matt Weller, global head of market research at GAIN Capital, recently warned that Tesla founder Elon Musk had “flown a bit too close to the sun”, after getting carried away by investing $1.5bn of the company’s money in Bitcoin.

He also predicted Tesla’s sales could struggle as traditional auto manufacturers ramp up electric car production, destroying its first mover advantage.

AJ Bell’s Russ Mould warns that many investors buy tech stocks when earnings forecasts are rising, almost regardless of valuation. “When it works, it really works. But when it goes wrong, elevated valuations leave little or no downside protection.”

A Tesla correction was probably baked in after last year’s astonishing share price surge, and many investors will see this as an opportunity to load up at a reduced price.

Dramatic swings are to be expected when investing in disruptive technology, as Ms Wood at ARK makes clear.

Every week, she sends subscribers a commentary listing “stocks in our strategies that have appreciated or dropped more than 15 per cent in a day” during the week.

Her latest commentary, issued on Friday, showed seven stocks displaying extreme volatility, led by ExOne, a leader in binder jetting 3D printing technology. It jumped 24 per cent, boosted by news that fellow 3D printing specialist Stratasys had beaten fourth-quarter revenues and earnings expectations, seen as good news for the sector.

By contrast, computational drug and material discovery company Schrödinger fell 27 per cent after quarterly and full-year results showed its core software sales and drug development pipeline slowing.

Despite that setback, Ms Wood remains positive, arguing that its “medicinal chemistry platform offers a powerful and unique view into chemical space”.

In her weekly video view, she remains bullish, stating that: “We are on the right side of change, and disruptive innovation is going to deliver exponential growth trajectories for many of our companies, in fact, most of them.”

Ms Wood remains committed to Tesla as she expects global electric car sales to compound at an average annual rate of 82 per cent for the next five years.

She said these are so “enormous that some people find them unbelievable”, and argues that this scepticism, especially among institutional investors, “festers” and creates a great opportunity for ARK.

Only you can decide whether you are a believer or a festering sceptic. If it’s the former, then buckle up.

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Tree of Hell

Starring: Raed Zeno, Hadi Awada, Dr Mohammad Abdalla

Director: Raed Zeno

Rating: 4/5