AFFS's history museum Photo:Liao Danlin/GT

Aspiring actors still gather outside Beijing Film Studio, located just outside the city's North Third Ring Road, hoping to be cast as extras if they are lucky enough. But once the studio finishes its relocation to a remote suburb, its historic Beitaipingzhuang lot will be nothing more than a memory.

This month, the last departments of Beijing Film Studio will move to the China Film Group's new, high-tech production base (founded in 2008) located in Yangsong Town, Huairou District. Relocation will likely finish by the end of August, the Beijing Evening News reported.

The landmark Beijing Film Studio was founded in 1949, the same year of the founding of the People's Republic of China. At the time, it was one of three major film studios in the country. When China Film Group was founded in 1999, the studio became part of it. The current relocation marks the fourth time the studio has been moved.

Han Sanping, CEO of the state-owned film enterprise China Film Group, once said the Beijing Film Studio didn't exist anymore as a working entity, but it lives on as a production resource and as an inspiring symbol of the Chinese film industry. Therefore, he said, China Film Group will not just let it go.

In the past few years, major departments of the studio have already moved to the new Huairou District location. Additionally, many of the original studio's former offices and buildings have been rented to other film companies. Soon, mementos of a generation, including the former set of the famous "A Dream of Red Mansions" TV series, also used to shoot over 1,000 other TV shows and films, will be dismantled.

Li Xin, 76, still walks to the main office building of the studio looking for bit parts in films from some private film companies now occupying the former Beijing Film Studio offices. He has participated in two small budget films in the last year. Li is also a former director, once formed his own film studio in 1993. While he was good at the art side of movie production, his studio eventually closed after suffering operational and financial setbacks.

"I feel I'm still young and I can work," Li said. He started working in the Beijing Film Studio in 1971 and carries deep emotional ties to the site. He had heartfelt feelings for the Soviet-style main building, which is slated for demolition once the studio completes its relocation.

Li is just one of the nostalgic elder film workers who will miss the compound. Renowned directors like Chen Kaige, Guan Hu and Zhang Yang once lived on the stuio campus with their parents; while film stars Liu Xiaoqing and Zhao Wei are still staff members of Beijing Film Studio.

Zheng Huiwen, 60, started his film career in 1974 as art designer. He worked alongside six generations of heads of the studio. Zheng was in charge of constructing the famous 12,000-square-meter "A Dream of Red Mansions" sets, which cost 4 million yuan, an enormous sum at that time.

The massive construction of the sets also forced the removal of numerous peach trees inside the compound, Zheng recalled. "My son once yelled at me that we couldn't eat peaches anymore!" he laughed.

At that time, the Chinese film market was still in an early developmental stage. In response to requests from Hong Kong and Taiwan tourists requesting to visit the Beijing studio, then-president Wang Yang agreed to build a Chinese film tourist city. The tourist city generated more income, more jobs, and covered garbage disposal and water fees.

The original Beijing Film Studio comprised four filming studios built upon a football field, one of which covered more than 3,000 square meters and was recognized as the "largest film studio in Asia."

At first, the film studio produced news reels. Then, under the order of premier Zhou Enlai in 1954, the studio sent outstanding filmmakers to the former Soviet Union to learn film techniques. Upon returning, the directors began producing feature-length films in 1956. Several landmark Chinese revolutionary films were made during this time.

The Beijing Film Studio was also the first studio to adopt the producer system in 1988. Prior to 1988, the studio heads would decide which films to produce and then find the directors, who would choose a suitable "producing director." The cameramen and art directors were selected by sub-directors of units, not by director himself.

Under the old system, many films lost money. Finally, a director named Huangpu Keren suggested to the heads of the studio that he would like to fund a film. The top decision makers finally granted the permission and allow self-funding and organize an independent film crew as long as the director handed over 100,000 yuan in risk-guaranty money to the studio. The film, "Killer in the Wild," made a profit and opened the floodgates to new era of Chinese film industry which allowed producers to exist and gave filmmakers more freedom.

Looking back at his own experiences as well as the historic buildings set for demolition, Li Xin said he has mixed feelings about the studio's relocation. "Speaking from the heart, I hate to see it go, but I'm not quite sure, because, maybe this is the way of development," he said.

By Zhang Rui