Counting on lucky numbers ... and a great artisitic director

by Paul Myers

Article published on the 2008-08-08 Latest update 2008-08-12 16:15 TU

A couple poses after a wedding ceremony in Beijing. At least 16,400 couples in Beijing, and thousands more nation-wide, chose the eighth day of the eighth month, 2008 to get married.
(Photo: Reuters)

It starts at eight…don’t be late. How could I be late? I’ve come to Beijing for this very date. The Olympics start big time at eight in the evening on the eighth day of the eighth month of 2008. This hour has been chosen because the Chinese word for "eight" sounds like the word for "prosperity", causing the superstitious to believe that it is a cast-iron guarantee of good fortune.

Four, by contrast, is the unluckiest number because it sounds like the Chinese word for death.

 And, do you know what? I’m in building four at the hotel complex.

Despite all the lucky numbers going for it, nothing about the opening ceremony has been left to chance. 

The cast of thousands who’ll be participating in the three-hour extravaganza have been preparing for months. China's much-vaunted 5,000 years of culture will be projected before our eyes during the show.

The artistic director behind it all is Zhang Yimou and he’s no Johnny-come-lately. He’s the man who infused art house opacity with translucence.

What does that mean? Watch some of his early films, such as Red Sorghum, Raise the Red Lantern or the Story of Qiu Ju.

They were heavy with symbolism. I mean weighty. I remember watching Raise the Red Lantern when I lived in south London. I went to see it at one of the many art-house cinemas that graced the city in the late 1980s.

The screen was sufficiently large for you to appreciate the symbolic moments. The film was building to a crescendo of catastrophe and when some red dye spilt onto a white linen sheet, you just knew woe was a-coming. 

That 58-year-old Yimou should have his hands on the wheels of this drive into wonderland is reassuring. 

This will be a spectacle. There’s too much at stake for it to be left to something like luck ... or the right numbers.