One-off
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Director(s):
JALLOT (Nicolas)
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Producer(s):
ARTE FRANCE, LADYBIRDS FILMS
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Territories:
Worldwide.
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Production year:
2012
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Language(s):
German, English, French
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Rights:
TV, DVD, NON-THEATRICAL, INTERNET, VOD
From an extraordinary true-life story, discover the life of an ordinary spy. A discreet, low-level French civil servant is manipulated by the Chinese secret services and becomes a spy out of sheer love.
How is it possible to suddenly plunge into a world of betrayal , manipulation and lies ? And at what price ?
In January 1964, President Charles de Gaulle announces the French Government is recognizing the People's Republic of China. A month later, France becomes the first Western power to open an embassy in Beijing since the Korean War and 20-year-old Bernard Boursicot arrives to serve as French embassy accountant.
June 30, 1983. On a busy commercial street in Paris, French Secret Service arrests Boursicot together with his wife, the Bejing opera singer Shi Pei Pu. The ordinary civil servant is in reality a spy who worked for Chinese Intelligence for the last 20 years. But this is not the whole story: The same day, Boursicot is told that his wife with whom he lived for twenty years is ... a man! Overnight, the incredible story is catapulted on international stage. It will inspire David Henry Hwang to write M. Butterfly, a hit Broadway play, and David Cronenberg to direct a movie of the same title, starring Jeremy Irons and John Lone. But the real story was never told, both Shi Pei Pu and Boursicot always refused to explain...