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BEIJING -- "Batman" star Christian Bale was roughed up by security guards who stopped him visiting a blind activist living under house arrest in China.
Video footage of the scuffle was shot by a camera crew traveling with the Hollywood actor as he promoted a film he has made in the country.
CNN posted scenes of the confrontation between Bale and the guards on its website Friday.
The run-in and publicity is likely to cause discomfort in China's government-backed film industry, which hopes Bale's movie "The Flowers of War" will be a creative success at home and abroad.
The star's actions are sure to focus attention on the plight of Chen Guangcheng, guarded around the clock by plain-clothed and uniformed workers who have blocked dozens of reporters and fellow activists trying to see him in the past.
Bale was to leave China on Friday and his representatives could not immediately be reached for comment.
Bale, who won a best supporting actor Oscar for last year's "The Fighter," traveled Thursday with a crew from CNN to the village in eastern China where Chen, the blind lawyer, lives with his family in complete isolation.
They were stopped at the entrance to Dongshigu village in Shandong province by unidentified men.
'An inspiration'
The video footage shows Bale asking to see Chen, with a CNN producer providing interpretation, but being ordered by one of the guards to leave. He then asked why he was unable to pass through. The guards responded by trying to grab or punch a small video camera Bale was carrying.
"What I really wanted to do was to meet the man, shake his hand and say what an inspiration he is," Bale was quoted as saying by CNN.
Chen's case has been raised publicly by U.S. lawmakers and diplomats, including Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, all to no response from China.
CNN said Bale first learned of Chen from news reports when he was in China filming "The Flowers of War," China's official submission this year for best foreign language film Oscar.
"Chen Guangcheng is a newsworthy figure ... and as such it is in the interest of CNN's global viewers to hear from him," CNN said in a statement. "Mr. Bale reached out to CNN and invited us to join him on his journey to visit Chen."
Chen, a self-taught lawyer who was blinded by a fever in infancy, angered authorities after documenting forced late-term abortions and sterilizations and other abuses by overzealous authorities trying to meet population control goals in his rural community. He was imprisoned for allegedly instigating an attack on government offices and organizing a group of people to disrupt traffic, charges his supporters say were fabricated.
Although now officially free under the law, he has been confined to his home in the village eight hours' drive from Beijing and subjected to periodic beatings and other abuse, activists say.
While Bale's visit focuses new attention on Chen's case, CNN's role raises questions about activism and advocacy among reporters, said David Bandurski, editor of the China Media Project website at the University of Hong Kong.
"It made me instantly uncomfortable, wondering how it all came together. It raises questions about where the lines are drawn," Bandurski said.
Andy Wong / AP
Christian Bale, center, is led by security guards upon arrival on the red carpet for an event of the Zhang Yimou-directed new movie "The Flowers of War" in Beijing on Dec. 12.
Politically sensitive subject
The incident also drew strong interest — most of it highly positive — on social networking sites such as Twitter and its Chinese equivalent, Weibo.
Having their star's name pinging across the Internet in connection with such a politically sensitive subject puts promoters of "The Flowers of War" in a bind. The film opens in China on Friday and next week in the United States.
Directed by the renowned Zhang Yimou, it is also the most expensive Chinese movie ever made, at $94 million, some of which came from the state-owned Bank of China.
The movie centers on the 1937 sacking of the eastern city of Nanjing, a central event in China's pre-revolutionary "century of humiliation" and has been described by some critics as hewing to official propaganda portraying Chinese as heroic victims and Japanese as one-dimensional cartoon villains.
While China has the world's third-largest film industry — both in box office and output — it has made relatively little global impact. Story lines are often heavily influenced by the ruling Communist Party, whose culture commissars must approve scripts and have final say over whether a film gets released.
More from msnbc.com and NBC News:
- 'A new chapter': US shuts down Iraq war
- Village defiant as government creates new narrative
- Rev. Jesse Jackson to London protesters: 'Jesus was an Occupier'
- Identity, not policy, driving the new Egypt
- From Napoleon to Liz Taylor: perfect pearl's $11 million journey
- NBC's Richard Engel answers your questions about Iraq
The Associated Press and msnbc.com staff contributed to this report.
Leave a Comment:
Communists Suck
Actors thinking they are Diplomats suck! This guy is no different he wanted this to happen. And the End result......................................Stupidity once against becomes some sort of Vetting! They should of kicked his "Batman" arse!
Bale was not acting as a US diplomat. He was a visiting actor that wanted to meet Chen, shake his hand and tell him he is an inspiration. The Chinese government tips their hand again.
Fear, fear, fear....
OH..............................My post stands and your's not!
It's typical of idiots thinking they can go anywhere and do whatever they please, well it doesn't always work out for ya. He's lucky he didn't get his actor arse kicked. Anyone wonder why the rest of the world can't stand us. Typical privileged moron.
Any news positive or negative is good news to an entertainer, he will probably pick up a hundred thousand viewers for his movie who would otherwise not even known that he was in it, or knew anything about it. Their are several movie stars who regularly take political positions which they are happy to let the public know about. I am not against actors having a political position or agenda, but it should be like the true benevolent giver a private matter.
Next time, take Sean Penn along and leave him there. He can quote Mao and bash America while fellow actor(s) get their photo ops. The media has completely overstepped its supposed role in reporting news rather than attempting to sway opinions. These ego-maniacal actors forget that they get paid to pretend to be heroes, and then ignore laws and rules that the rest of us must obey.
dont understand why we so cozy with china when they subjugate thier people. we in a sense support the enslavement of an entire race all while we benefit from it. and this is okay?
Mind your f..k.g busyness...
Yeah and I bet on another thread you complain how celebrities do nothing to expose what is wrong with the world.
I would rather they donate some of their excess cash to a worthy cause. Nothing under God's green Earth makes any individual actor more qualified than any other individual to point out inequities of our Country or the world. We had an actor who became President, and I can't think of a single wrong that he righted. As President his role was the same as in his movies, the guy who didn't get the girl. Hollywood made him into the shining knight as a President, something they are well equiped to do.
You can't think of a single wrong that he righted??? Are you absolutely ignorant of history? Think what you will of Reagan, but the facts are that his policies caused the USSR to implode and the Berlin wall to come down. Don't you remember the "misery index?" 9% unemployment that he inherited (yes - HE inherited an economy that was just as bad as Obama inherited) - but unlike this empty suit of a president that we suffer under now. Reagandid something about the miserable economy. By the end of HIS first term - unemployment had dropped to less than half of what it was when he was inaugurated, and we were enjoying the robust growth that was the 80's, and America was well on its way to being the only remaining Superpower within the world. Methinks you should study a bit of history before you expose your political ignorance to the rest of the world.
N.C. Thorton: You should read a bit about Reagan before bashing him...and, yes, he got the girl. I won't list his accomplishments just to await a counter list, but there is a reason they called him "The Great Communicator." I think those separated by the Berlin Wall would have thought more of Reagan than you, but then again, you seemingly benefited from nothing he ever did.
chinese government always afraid, lol
It's ror, "raffing out roud." Just kidding everybody who's too PC to take 5 seconds of joking.
Too bad he's not the real Bruce Wayne, would've been a much more interesting video.
So he goes to see a guy and gets roughed up just to promote a movie? Sounds kinda like a non-story. But he's getting publicity, which is what he was after.
Now THIS ^^^ is population control.
Welcome to China! Sign here, here, here...aaaannnnnnd....here. Thank you. We now own you. Enjoy your stay.
He could have made his movie in America on the back lots of any studio or the hundred other cities in America which are trying to develop a movie industry, you know employed some Americans, but he chose to make it in China with cheap Chinese labor. He doesn't get my vote or sympathy. We don't condone Chinese coming to America and flaunting our laws, so why should he think that he can go to China and make a nuisance of himself.
Agreed!
N.C. Thorton: It couldn't have anything to do with the unions, could it? Why do you think Hollywood's relocated to Canada. My best friend's in the industry; they can't afford to shoot here anymore, thanks to the unions.
NC... I hope you realize that this was a Chinese movie, made by the Chinese... Not by Christian Bale who apparently "chose to make it in China with cheap Chinese labor." He was offered the role and accepted.
Good God, get a clue!
Throw his rear end and the CNN idiots with him in a Chinese prison for awhile and see what his rights are in a foreign country...........
What a bunch of bull@!$%#. Just crap to promote his movie. His motives are purely for self promotion. What an @!$%#. I have not seen anything about him trying to help bring attention to many of the problems here in the U.S.. We keep sticking our noses in other countries affairs when there is still a lot to be done here. We'll never learn.
He's British. I don't know which of the 4 he's from, but he's not sticking our (USA) noses in anything.
Isn't this the same putz that punched a bus driver in Cleveland? If so maybe he thinks he's somebody special. He is just some movie actor, right?
To all you pro-life nuts out there take a lesson: pro-choice activists don't support abortion, they just are afraid of giving the US government the right to say who can and can't have them, because if the government -and not the individual woman- has the right to force you to not have an abortion, they also have the right to FORCE you to have an abortion, and that's exactly what they do in Chain, and that's exactly what will happen in the US if women loose the power to control and say what happens with their own bodies.
But Pro-lifers don't care about a blind man in China trying to show the world what happens when the government takes the abortion choice away from a woman, they are to busy holding up signs at the executions of possibly innocent men and women screaming for their death blood murder, and then driving to abortion clinics and screaming at everyone walking on the street and calling them murders...
But being a conservative makes so much sense.
Actually being a conservative makes all the sense, being liberal doesn't add up! Pro-life means that women have a choice to give the baby up for adoption or keep him or her. There have been MILLIONS of babies aborted and in reality murdered in the name of pro-choice for no other reason than convenience!! Women who have health issues are still protected. The baby didn't have a choice and has the right to life. Just because the mother choose to have sex without protection, but does not give her the right to medically kill a baby. In the cases of rape there are procedures in place just like medical emergencies.
It is not about abortion, it is about control of every aspect of your life under guise of religious conviction. I don't see these anti abortion people stepping up and adopting these unwanted childred. They don't give a rat's ass about the childred per se. The fact that they also want to ban the after morning pill is and points out their real agenda. They want to ban sex period. There is a simple remedy to determine when life begins. Get the IRS in on the definition. Under the holy rollers concept every ovulated egg then becomes a tax deduction even if it is aborted naturally. Why some women and families could claim four or five deductions four each month in the year. After sex all they would have to do is name the sperm-egg cell and claim it as a dependent. Condoms and cotraceptives are tax deductible expenses. What do you think the IRS would do, if every family listed fifty dependents, forty nine who died in the womb. We could also insist that the insurance companies paid off on these deaths. To me life begins when the fetus is fairly complete at about the onset of the third trimester. I would ban these abortions on two counts, one being that the mother has had more than ample time to have an abortion on her on volition and two the fetus although still in the womb is beginning to resemble a live individual. Even so I would also require every individual who wants to ban abortions be required to adopt at least one unwanted child. Starting with the Congress people on a Federal and a State level who advocated banning abortions.
This is another example ...how arrogance this kind of attitude, it's their country, their government and their policy, he is just a visitor to their home he should respect the local law, what if someone from China, Russia, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan or N. Korea send someone and would like to talk with Pfc. Bradley Manning.
During visitor ours in jail, that's actually something someone can too in our country.
I expected more from batman.
lol!
A reminder to everyone that we have a paradise here in America compared to most of the rest of the world.
We have our problems but...
Its the same way here (in USA). The media/government controls what you say by either telling you what to say, or censoring it. Its just that China does it a little more aggressively. There is no "free speech" here because you will either be targeted, jailed, or fined for saying whatever you want here. They paint this big beautiful picture that America is the best place ever so you can stay here and continue to pay your ridiculously high taxes, mortgage, gas, and god knows whatever else. I'm not saying China is a better option, but don't say its all peaches and cream here when its not. Look around you (if you live in reality and not some fantasy world). If you're rich, well, you have nothing to worry about except your bank accounts... The problems of America do not apply to you.
Very true.
As somebody that has been to China many many times the people are very closed off from the rest of the world. They really don't know what it's like outside their boundariesand the Chinese government wants to keep it that way. Many of the web sites that we use on a daily basis wont even open up over there because they block them. The less the people know the easier they are to control.
N love,
The information is available here in the U.S. if you look for it. If you buy into everything the media says without fact checking than you are a moron. And I don't know of anybody serving jail time in the U.S. for speaking their mind. What planet are you on?
Bob,
So you don't think walking up to president obama saying "you are a terrorist" or better yet, dish out some pertinent information concerning fraud/illegal behavior in our political system, or better yet foreign affairs? You don't think someone would be held by the FBI or fined for saying such a thing? If not that, forced to apologize and clean up comments or else? If so, what planet are YOU from? Everyone knows you have to watch what you say in America..
I'm with Truman on that count. Truman told a bunch of reporters, one who had said something not so pleasant about his daughter, Margaret. He told those reporters that they could say anything they wanted about him or even his dog, and he would put a division of soldiers in the field to protect their right to say it, but he cautioned them, and these are his quoted words, "if any of you son's of bitches mentions my wife or daughter in anyway, you had better be prepared to kick my ass because that what I intend to do to you personally". I think President Obama thinks the same way. His protectors the Secret Service do not think so kindly of anyone who voices aloud denogratary remarks directed at the President in person, nor do most Americans. I didn't like Ike, Tricky Dick, Reagen or the second Bush but I respected them when they were in office as the President of the United States of America. I could still voice my opinion orally to those who would listen or write letters to my newspaper editors without fear of being arrested, detained or other wise harassed. Tel me where you are from, I have a few dollars toward your passage back there.
I was just tellin my friend today, somethings are unique to America. Where else can you go in the world and find a black man paid to watch parked cars. I'm not making a racist nor political point. I'm just pointing out something that is uniquely American. It might just as well be a white man or any other etnic group. I don't mean cars parked in a parking lot, I'm talking about unsold cars by the hundreds waiting to be delivered to a car dealer somewhere. Actually I was wondering where could I apply for a job like that. Just sitting in a car, smoking cigarettes, maybe a beer or two for eight hours and getting paid for it. Standing up every now and then to let someone know, hey I'm watching these cars. If you touch one I'll throw this empty beer can at you. Have a laugh and thank whatever God you believe in that you live in America.
Ha ha ha - Yeah, go ahead america - give china and all of Asia your benefits - bring more people to america with jobs waiting for them. In return you'll get a slap in the face and who knows, maybe in the future.........death - anyway that's what you are asking for; you know, the chinese don't like you!!! ha ha ha.
Mind your own business you egocentric moron
Maybe he forgot that he really isnt Batman!
I am so tired of Asians and their problems...
How arrogant to think he can go to a foriegn country and just do whatever he wants. Especially a country like China. Of course a lot of those Hollywood actors and actresses do think they are special and above the law. Does the name Lohan sound familiar??? The Chinese need to teach him a lesson. Court, trial, expulsion from the country. Whether we like China or not or agree with their politcs and laws, it is their country and all people should respect a countries laws.
You don't mess with the government and you don't mess with your neighbor. Those are the two main laws in China. If this guy is an activist, he has messed with the government. The people of China know that and foreigners should mind their own business. Just for your information, the people of China have more, let me repeat it MORE, personal freedoms then we do.
What an idiot.............he was told to leave? Why didn't he? Is he above the Chinese law.
You are not an illegal sneaking into America, and receiving everything your heart desires; in China you are potential cell bait! If that happens who do you think will come, and get you? They should have kicked your ass real good, and launched you back to hollywood!
If you think you can make a difference, change anything by writting cozy bloggs your wrong. Say to yourself, I'm an idiot. Again repeat after yourself, I'm an idiot.
Just another day in LaLa Land.
He's a human being on planet earth and has just as much right to pitch a bitch as anyone else, but only those who understand what freedom is would understand that.
He went there knowing and wanting that to happen and it did, and brought along his film crew to document it when it did. If he really only wanted to tell this guy he was an inspiration there were other ways to do it. It could've been done properly and respectfully and should've left the film crew at home.
And miss all the free publicity. Probably will help the films bottom line. Question is how many will go to see the film now that it has a aura of intrigue about it. Not I, " says he".
Should actors get involved in politics? Sure. Why not? Clooney did. Backed O'Bama. Groovy, huh?
Not really...look what happened to America when King Reagan took office. Down the tubes we went! No, not "groovy" at all.