China-US tensions: video of PLA ‘attack’ on Pacific airbase uses footage from Hollywood movies

Military watchers spot scenes lifted from The Hurt Locker and The Rock in promotional film of simulated bombing raid

But video also carries a serious message to all foreign forces: ‘Don’t interfere in Taiwan’

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This scene from a PLA promotional video is actually footage taken from the Hollywood blockbuster The Rock, observers say. Photo: Handout

Published: 7:07pm, 20 Sep 2020Updated: 11:12am, 23 Sep 2020

China’s latest military propaganda film appears to show, once again, that the People’s Liberation Army’s publicity team has a passion for Hollywood blockbuster action movies.

According to some observers, several of the scenes in a new video produced for the PLA Air Force – showing a simulated bombing exercise on an American military base in the Pacific region – look like they were lifted directly from the 2008 Oscar-winning The Hurt Locker and the 1996 action-thriller The Rock.

And according to a source close to the Chinese military, they were.

The PLA’s new video borrowed from at least two Hollywood movies, observers say. Photo: Handout

The person, who asked not to be named, told the South China Morning Post that it was common practice for the PLA’s publicity department to “borrow” from Hollywood films to make their productions look more spectacular.

“Almost all of the officers in the department grew up watching Hollywood movies, so in their minds, American war films have the coolest images,” the source said.

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