{"id":194717,"date":"2025-11-22T17:54:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-22T17:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/194717\/"},"modified":"2025-11-22T17:54:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-22T17:54:10","slug":"china-sea-about-a-canceled-martial-arts-champ-hits-you-in-the-gut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/194717\/","title":{"rendered":"‘China Sea,’ About a Canceled Martial Arts Champ, Hits You in the Gut"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tA canceled Lithuanian martial arts champion finds refuge in a Taiwanese family\u2019s restaurant as he tries to piece his life back together in China Sea, a hard-hitting drama about the weight of guilt and second chances from director Jurgis Matulevi\u010dius (Isaac, 2019<\/a>) and writer Saul\u0117 Bliuvaite<\/a>, whose feature directorial debut Toxic won the top award at Locarno 2024<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe movie, inspired by the real-life story of a Lithuanian fighter, world premiered at the\u00a029th edition<\/a>\u00a0of the\u00a0Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival<\/a>\u00a0(P\u00d6FF) in Estonia, where it just won the Critics\u2019 Picks Competition<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cChampion fighter Osvald (Marius Rep\u0161ys) is banned from competing after injuring a girl in a street fight,\u201d reads a synopsis for the film. \u201cStranded in his bleak Lithuanian hometown, he takes refuge in a run-down Taiwanese restaurant owned by his only friend, Ju-Long. Court-ordered therapy leads him to Skaist\u0117, a woman who offers a glimpse of a life he\u2019s never known. But as Osvald clings to this fragile hope, his violent past resurfaces, forcing him to choose between redemption and self-destruction.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe cast also features Jag Huang, Severija Janusauskaite, Sonia Yuan, and Vaidotas Martinaitis. Ieva Cern and Stasys Baltakis produced the film, with co-producers Amy Ma, Marta Gmosinska, Mariusz W\u0142odarski, Jakub Ko\u0161\u0165\u00e1l, and Vratislav \u0160lajer.<\/p>\n

\n\tWatch a trailer for China Sea here.<\/p>\n

\n\tTHR spoke to the film\u2019s director and writer about putting China Sea together as the first-ever co-production between Lithuania and Taiwan, mixing a true story and fiction, and exploring the dark sides of humanity in a proudly gritty style. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis story is inspired by a real person, a real fighter from Lithuania, who was a superstar in Asia, especially in Japan, in the early 2000s. He was a world superstar, really well known abroad,\u201d explains director Matulevi\u010dius. \u201cSo, some producers came to me and asked if I wanted to do a biopic about this guy, but they said that this film would be praising him. I Googled him, and I saw that yes, he was a superstar, but he was also a very controversial figure, so I would not praise him in a biopic. That\u2019s not my style.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSo, \u201cJurgis rejected the idea, but the story stayed in our heads because this guy came from my hometown,\u201d recalls Bliuvaite. \u201cAnd I was reading a lot about the stories that would come out. He was a superstar outside of his home country, but at home, he was known for very violent incidents and being associated with a bad crowd.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd he was shot in 2015 with an automatic rifle. There was another man that the filmmaking duo was curious about. In Lithuania\u2019s capital, Vilnius, there was a small Asian restaurant called China Sea. \u201cYou would see this middle-aged Asian guy just standing there [outside the restaurant] all isolated and smoking all the time,\u201d she explains. \u201cAnd so for me it became very interesting to explore this immigrant story in Lithuania,\u201d adds Matulevi\u010dius.<\/p>\n

\n\tA common theme between the two men struck him. \u201cThese are two very different people, but they both live their lives in a certain isolation. This kickboxing superstar feels isolated because he comes home and nobody really thinks of him as a star. And this family is trying to run an Asian restaurant in Lithuania, which is also an isolating experience. So, we felt that there was a connection there.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\u2018China Sea\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\tChina Sea starts off with actual TV footage of a fight with German commentary, taken from Eurosport, meshed together with footage filmed with the movie\u2019s lead actor. This writer must admit he could not tell, to which the director replies: \u201cIt\u2019s edited for you not to know. This first scene is to show his super-stardom.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFrustration, rage, and toxic masculinity all play into his challenges in finding a path in life that leaves him satisfied, though. \u201cOur main character has a man\u2019s body, but his mindset is still stuck in his teenage years,\u201d explains Matulevi\u010dius. \u201cThe world is changing, but you\u2019re still stuck in your teenage years, where you probably lived in a poor neighborhood, your role models were men full of toxic masculinity, and you tried to be a part of their world, because otherwise you would be a sissy, and they didn\u2019t show you any emotions. So, you only know anger and violence, and you can\u2019t express yourself because you were taught that men don\u2019t cry, men are strong, and don\u2019t have feelings. I think that\u2019s the tragedy of our main character.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHe is hoping for a transformation, though. \u201cHe starts thinking, \u2018I\u2019m probably doing something wrong, and I need to change. I need to be a better person\u2019,\u201d says the director. \u201cAnd he tries to do that. He starts training kids and befriends these immigrants, and tries to help them in the restaurant.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBliuvaite chimes in, saying: \u201cHe is trying to go on a path of healing. And you see these monks and psycho-therapy, while at the same time, you see crimes happening.\u201d Only when she saw the final version of the movie did the writer fully realize something. \u201cThis is a film about people who try to heal personally while being ignorant about what\u2019s happening around them,\u201d she tells THR. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe title China Sea, representing a huge hurdle you must overcome to get to the other side where you want to be, is \u201ca straight-up metaphor that was in the script in the early stages of this project,\u201d the writer adds.<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\u2018China Sea\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\tThe China Sea duo also shares some insight that you may not realize as a viewer. For example, the man playing the protagonist\u2019s coach was the actual coach of the real-life fighter who was the inspiration for the movie.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen we introduced this sea metaphor to the coach, I remember very vividly that he became emotional because he felt that connection to the person he knew, and this idea that you try to be better, but this [ocean] is getting bigger and bigger,\u201d says Bliuvaite.<\/p>\n

\n\tDirector Matulevi\u010dius had a cinematic inspiration for China Sea as well, The Work, a 2017 documentary from directors Gethin Aldous and Jairus McLeary that also deals with rehabilitation, and in an even more direct way. \u201cSet inside a single room in Folsom Prison, three men from the outside participate in a four-day group-therapy retreat with a group of incarcerated men for a real look at the challenges of rehabilitation,\u201d reads a synopsis for it.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe main China Sea actor, Rep\u0161ys, did martial arts for 10 years when he was younger, so he knew how to move and \u201chad the look,\u201d Matulevi\u010dius tells THR about his casting choice. \u201cBut, of course, for him, it was a really tough preparation, because when I invited him to be in this part, he weighed 110 kilos, and I told him he needed to be 84. And he said, \u2018Okay, I will do it.\u2019 And he was really committed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Taiwanese casting seemed somewhat surreal to the director, though. \u201cI went to Taiwan, and they were introducing me to some people. And I see these stars. And I was wondering: Can we get them? Do they really want to do this film? The actor playing the restaurant owner [Jag Huang (Life of Pi)] was acting in Ang Lee films. And Sonia [Yuan] was in Drive My Car. But they said, yes, they\u2019re really interested in traveling to a Baltic country.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\u2018China Sea\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\tProbably the hardest scene to shoot in China Sea, from a technical standpoint, is what the creative team simply calls \u201cthe ice scene.\u201d \u201cFor that shot, we needed an ice hole to be in the middle of this lake,\u201d the director recalls. \u201cOur health and safety supervisors told us we couldn\u2019t do that. But we could do it if we put strings on the actors. So, that\u2019s what we did. And then, for two months, we were deleting the strings in post-production. It was a very tiring job.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe China Sea creative duo does not have another major joint project lined up, instead working on their own new ideas. But she and Matulevi\u010dius like to share their ideas and script drafts, Bliuvaite emphasizes. \u201cWe understand each other very well, and it\u2019s a big help,\u201d she shares. \u201cAnd we give each our our honest, brutal opinion. Not everyone can do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMatulevi\u010dius shares this much about a film he wants to do next \u2013 he hopes it will take him from the wetness of the sea to a focus on dry sand. \u201cI want to go back in time to the middle of the 19th and 20th centuries in the Curonian Spit,\u201d he shares. This UNESCO World Heritage Site is a thin, curved sand-dune spit that separates the Curonian Lagoon from the Baltic Sea and is shared by Lithuania and Russia. In the lagoon, in past times, there was a lot of sand carried around by the winds. Explains the director: \u201cIt would drown people\u2019s houses, so they needed to relocate all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A canceled Lithuanian martial arts champion finds refuge in a Taiwanese family\u2019s restaurant as he tries to piece…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":194718,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[263],"tags":[18,117,19,1452,17,327],"class_list":{"0":"post-194717","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-international","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-movies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194717","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194717"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194717\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194718"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194717"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194717"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194717"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}