Chariots of Fire
couple’s children had managed to flee to Canada, but Liddell had chosen to remain behind so that he could help others in the camp.
The Last Race is being directed and written by Hong Kong director Stephen Shin, co-directed by Canadian Michael Parker and will shoot in Britain and America as well as in China. It’s a co-operative project with some US backing, but Fiennes describes it as a “90 per cent Chinese production”. Being distributed by a Hong Kong-based company it will be shown on the Chinese mainland, where film distribution is tightly controlled by the government. Only 34 foreign films are allowed to be screened nationally each year. It is scheduled to wrap in August and is being made during a time of tension between historic rivals China and Japan. The atrocities committed by Japan against China during the Second World War remain the cause of much animosity between the two countries. It’s still hard to flick through China’s main TV channels at night without seeing a low-budget war film depicting Japanese soldiers as bloodthirsty brutes.
Fiennes claims that The Last Race’s directors have resisted the urge to slip such images into this film to please the Chinese authorities. “You can’t shy away from it and you have to portray what happened, but it’s a portrayal that isn’t a cardboard cutout,” he says. Parker adds: “There are characters on both sides who display different human qualities. There may be scenes of brutality, as was the case. But the heart of the film is Eric’s heart.”
Liddell’s heart was guided by his religious beliefs. However, the Communist Party of China promotes atheism and the country is overwhelmingly secular, with authorities often accused of oppressing Christians.
Shin admits that Liddell’s religious beliefs “will not be emphasised” in the film, adding that “our story is not telling [about] religion, it’s telling about love among people and his love for everyone”. Parker adds: “Eric wasn’t evangelical in terms of pushing Christianity on others. He was who he was, and as much as possible that will be portrayed in the film.” THE INDEPENDENT