13 Nov 6th Annual Symposium on Pop Culture and International Law: Between Official Narratives and Popular Imagination – International Law in China’s New Mainstream Films
[Lu Yaoyao is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Law, The University of Hong Kong.]
The 2026 Chinese film Once Upon a Time in the Middle East tells the story of an ordinary Chinese protagonist caught in a foreign conflict. Unlike earlier Chinese new mainstream films, the film approaches war through everyday experiences and personal encounters. These different cinematic perspectives invite a broader examination of how China’s changing international role is imagined and narrated in popular culture.
China’s international legal discourse has long been shaped by historical experiences of foreign aggression and unequal international relations, with an emphasis on sovereignty, non-intervention, and opposition to hegemony. As China’s global influence has grown, these commitments have come to coexist with an increasing emphasis on participation in global governance and the protection of overseas interests. These developments reflect the coexistence of historically rooted understandings of international justice and evolving conceptions of China’s role in the world.
These developments extend beyond official discourse into popular culture. China’s new mainstream films, which combine official narratives with commercially oriented storytelling, offer a distinctive space in which international affairs are translated into stories meaningful to domestic audiences. Rather than simply reproducing official positions, these films selectively reinterpret ideas of sovereignty, peace, responsibility, and international justice through familiar narratives and individual experiences. In doing so, they reveal how China’s changing international role is imagined, negotiated, and sometimes contested between official narratives and popular understandings of international order.
Making a Foreign War a Chinese Story
The significance of Once Upon a Time in the Middle East lies not simply in its overseas setting, but in how it turns a foreign conflict into a story centered on Chinese experiences. Although the film does not explicitly identify the conflict as the Iraq War, its setting evokes that historical context, with its contested questions of military intervention, sovereignty, and international responsibility. Rather than addressing these questions directly, the film approaches war through the everyday life of a Chinese civilian. Xu Fu, the protagonist, is driven by personal concerns, including the need to repay his debts and provide for his daughter. Unlike the evacuation-centered narratives of some earlier Chinese films set in overseas conflicts, Xu Fu chooses to stay. This decision shifts the focus from escaping a foreign conflict to living through it. War becomes not merely a temporary danger to overcome, but a reality within which ordinary lives and relationships unfold.
The film’s attention to individual experiences extends beyond its Chinese protagonist. Zaid’s efforts to save his daughter and the personal experiences of American soldiers reveal the human lives behind political and military identities. The restaurant is central to this narrative. Unlike the battlefield, where individuals are often defined by their national or military affiliations, it offers a space for everyday encounters across such divisions. A Chinese American soldier serving in the US military, for instance, is reminded of his mother while eating Chinese food. The director’s comparison of food with life and war with death further captures the contrast between everyday human needs and the violence of conflict. Yet the choice of a Chinese restaurant also matters. It places a distinctly Chinese space at the center of a foreign war, allowing the experiences of others to be presented through their encounters with a Chinese protagonist. A distant international conflict thus becomes something experienced and interpreted through a familiar cultural perspective. This raises questions not only about how international affairs become meaningful to domestic audiences, but also about whose experiences and perspectives shape the understanding of a conflict.
These narrative choices have implications for the imagination of international law. By approaching war through everyday experiences and recognizing the humanity of individuals on different sides of the conflict, the film foregrounds questions of human dignity, suffering, and responsibility towards others. Such concerns resonate with the humanitarian principles underlying international humanitarian law. At the same time, the film’s decision not to explicitly name the war may also shape how its legal and political dimensions are perceived. While the narrative emphasizes the human consequences of conflict, questions about the legality of the use of force, sovereignty, and responsibility for the war itself remain less prominent. Recognising the shared humanity of those affected by war does not eliminate differences in the legal responsibilities of the actors involved.
The important question, therefore, is not whether the film offers a legally complete account of the conflict. Rather, it is how its narrative perspective shapes the relative visibility of different understandings of international justice. By making a foreign war into a Chinese story, the film does not merely bring international affairs closer to domestic audiences. It also offers a particular way of imagining the relationship between China, the wider world, and the legal and moral questions raised by international conflict.
Between Official Narratives and Popular Imagination
The meanings of Once Upon a Time in the Middle East extend beyond the film itself. Its reception in official media and online discussions reveals how the same narrative can generate different understandings of war, international justice, and China’s relationship with the wider world. These interpretations do not necessarily follow a division between official positions and popular sentiment. Instead, they bring different aspects of the film into focus.
Two commentaries published in People’s Daily illustrate this diversity within official media. An August review highlights the director’s attention to ordinary people and the moral complexity of individuals caught in conflict, particularly through Zaid’s experiences. But another commentary takes the Chinese restaurant as a starting point for a broader discussion of China’s presence overseas, connecting the film to cultural exchange, overseas Chinese communities, and Chinese businesses. The same film thus becomes both a reflection on the human consequences of war and a symbol of China’s expanding engagement with the wider world.
Audience discussions reveal further complexities. While many viewers embrace the film’s humanitarian message, others question what its emphasis on shared humanity leaves unexplored. Some critical reviews draw parallels between the conflict depicted in the film and China’s own historical experiences of foreign invasion, questioning whether the portrayal of individual American soldiers obscures responsibility for the war and marginalizes the perspectives of Iraqi society. Others situate the film within a broader discussion of how Chinese cinema imagines its relationship with the world, questioning whether its emphasis on everyday life and universal humanitarian values adequately confronts the political and moral complexities of international conflict. These responses suggest that the disagreement is not simply over the film’s anti-war message, but over how compassion for individuals should be reconciled with questions of aggression, historical responsibility, and international justice.
Taken together, these interpretations reveal a more complex relationship between official narratives and popular imagination than a simple division between the state and the populace. More importantly, they reflect a continuing tension within China’s evolving understanding of international order. Historically rooted concerns about aggression, sovereignty, and unequal power have not disappeared as China’s expanding global presence has brought new attention to international engagement. Instead, these different perspectives coexist in both official narratives and popular imagination, sometimes reinforcing and sometimes complicating one another. The film and its reception illustrate how international legal ideas are interpreted through this changing relationship between historical experience and contemporary international roles. Popular cinema, therefore, does not merely reproduce official narratives or express popular resistance. It provides a space in which different understandings of international justice and China’s place in the world are brought together, reinterpreted, and occasionally contested.
Conclusion
Once Upon a Time in the Middle East illustrates how questions central to international law can enter popular imagination without being explicitly articulated in legal terms. Through the experiences of ordinary people, the film brings a distant conflict closer to Chinese audiences, foregrounding shared humanity while leaving questions of aggression and responsibility less visible. Its reception, however, shows that these questions do not necessarily disappear from public understanding. They can re-emerge through historical memories, competing interpretations of justice, and expectations about China’s relationship with the wider world.
As China’s international role continues to evolve, historically rooted understandings of international justice are not simply replaced by new narratives of global engagement. Instead, they continue to inform how international affairs are imagined and debated. New mainstream cinema thus offers a revealing space in which these understandings interact with changing perceptions of China’s place in the world.