Mighty soft power shows how to conquer beyond the norm

Chinese animated production Nezha: Demon Child Conquers the Sea, also known as Nezha 2, has taken movie viewers by storm, leading the Spring Festival holiday box office in the mainland by billions of dollars.

The production has been a striking success.

On one hand, the accomplishment has been due to ground-breaking visual effects made possible by progress in digital technology in the mainland.

On the other hand, the producer has discovered a way to tap the rich fantasy of Chinese folklore and legends and turn it into a type of soft power. If South Koreans and Japanese have been successful with their myths, the Chinese are catching up with their own examples.

Most important of all is an ability to top what is already well known with added value.

Before the demon child Nezha rode on the Wind and Fire Wheels to storm the sea, monkey king Wukong had angered the almighty in heaven.

This Wukong was more than the monkey king known in the Journey to the West thanks to its sense of black myth.

Nezha 2 is a direct sequel to the 2019 Nezha production. As inferred by the title, the big scene of this release involves Nezha facing a massive horde of mythical sea creatures.

Yet in addition to the 2025 box office record set by Nezha 2, there is something to learn over and above the reminbi generated.

One, it is not orthodox as some mainland productions have been. The mythical Nezha was born like an alien, refusing to be bound by rules and regulations. What the child did was often not sanctioned by the norm. However, Nezha was extremely righteous.

Here, a sense of similarity is shared with Wukong.

As evident in Nezha's box office sales and Wukong taking the world's video game players by storm, it is believed that they would have been less successful if these outstanding and universal properties had been chipped away by state censors prior to launch.

As producers continue to strive to make progress with the assistance of developing technology, they also need a free environment to let them nurture the so-called "soft power" that the world often associates with South Korea's and Japan's cultural exports. As Hong Kong congratulates the production team of Nezha 2, the city may also wish to know what it can learn from the other's success.

Remember the disgrace suffered by the city's ex-culture minister Kevin Yeung Yung-hung?

Could he still have been in office if he had successfully produced a blueprint for the city to develop an industry out of arts, culture and creative?

Yeung's successor Rosanna Law Shuk-pui may also wish to play the Wukong game and watch Nezha 2 after attending concerts by the band Mirror if she has not yet had a chance to do so.

The spectrum of soft power is far more than what one can imagine.

It is appreciated in both examples that creativity often comes from the general folk rather than government officials.

Yet, they are also related.

Let Law create for Hong Kong its own set of Wind and Fire Wheels riding on an effective masterplan aimed at generating an arts, culture and creative industry.