Doco on Chinese Bloggers Screens Tonight in Melbourne

Chinese blogger "Zola" in Stephen Maing's documentary High Tech, Low Life.
 

Once again, it’s been waaaay too long between posts. Alas, life and work keep getting in the way of blogging. But I’ve roused myself to let Melbourne readers know that Stephen Maing’s excellent documentary High Tech, Low Life, about two prominent Chinese activist-bloggers, screens tonight at ACMI as part of the Human Rights Arts and Film Festival (HRAFF).

Art, Activism and Ai Weiwei - Alison Klayman’s "Never Sorry"

Ai Weiwei sends the authorities a message from his hospital bed after suffering a cerebral haemorrhage following a blow from a policeman in Alison Klayman's documentary Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry.

Alison Klayman's documentary Never Sorrry, about China's most controversial contemporary artist Ai Weiwei, has garnered acclaim around the world and was short-listed for the Best Documentary Academy Award this year (unfortunately it didn't make the final list of nominees). After screening at last year's Melbourne International Film Festival it enjoyed a brief theatrical season at Melbourne's Nova Cinema. It has now been released on DVD in Australia by Madman.

I interviewed Klayman when she was in Melbourne last year, and reviewed her film for the Dec-Jan issue of RealTime magazine. The RealTime article is reproduced below - you can see the piece in its original context here.




Art, Activism and Ai Weiwei - Alison Klayman’s Never Sorry

Ai weiwei has been accused of bigamy, charged with tax evasion, condemned as a subversive and dismissed as a clown. Although infamous as the artist the Chinese authorities love to hate, his critics are by no means only from government ranks.

Melbourne Film Festival Pics and Coverage of China Docos Program

Dan Edwards and Ou Ning at the Melbourne International Film Festival last month (Image: Luisa Mirabilio, www.thinkloco.com.au)

As I reported extensively here at Screening China back in August, the Melbourne International Film Festival hosted a small retrospective of Chinese documentaries this year curated by myself, entitled Street Level Visions. The program attracted considerable interest, and dGenerate Films have now published a full summary of media coverage of the program, which included stories on television and radio, and in newspaper and magazines.

I’ve also got some pictures here of filmmakers Ou Ning (Meishi Street) and Wang Jiulaing (Beijing Besieged by Waste), who were in Melbourne as guests of the festival. The images are from a panel that took place in the festival bar on 14 August.

All image by Luisa Mirabilio (www.thinkloco.com.au).

“A Rare and Precious Opportunity” – La Frances Hui on the China Exposé Program in Nepal

Last month the Film Southasia festival, showcasing documentaries from around the South Asia region, took place in Kathmandu, Nepal. China Exposé, a program of six independent Chinese works, was a prominent part of this year's festival. La Frances Hui of the Asia Society, New York, curated the China Exposé program, and I interviewed her last week via email about her work and the problems documentary maker Hu Jie experienced when he tried to travel to the event.

The interview with Hui was conducted as part of my research for an article last week for Crikey about some of the problems certain Chinese filmmakers are currently experiencing. Thanks to Hui for kindly allowing me to publish her interview here at Screening China.

Newsbites: Hu Jie Blocked from Travel, Beijing Indie Film Fest Blackout, and Painted Skin 2 Smashes Box Office Records

Screening China’s regular roundup of Chinese film news.

The environment for China’s independent film sector continues to deteriorate, even as box office records in mainstream cinemas are regularly broken. Two recent episodes have highlighted the difficulties independent filmmakers and festivals are facing.

Interview with Hu Jie, Director of "Searching for Lin Zhao's Soul"

Documentary maker Hu Jie.

The Melbourne International Film Festival is in full swing, including the program curated by myself, “Street Level Visions: Chinese Independent Docos.” Tomorrow (Monday 6 August) at 11am, Hu Jie’s landmark work Searching for Lin Zhao’s Soul will screen at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image on Federation Square as part of the program. A repeat screening will take place on Friday, August 17 at 6.30pm in the same venue.

To celebrate the screening of Hu Jie’s work, and the other titles in the "Street Level Visions" program, Art Space China has run the full text of an interview I conducted with Hu Jie in 2010.

Street Level Visions coverage in today’s Age newspaper

Zhao Liang's Crime and Punishment, one of seven titles screening at this year's Melbourne International Film Festival as part of the program "Street Level Visions: Chinese Independent Docos."

The Melbourne International Film Festival kicked off last night to great fanfare. I’m very proud to be part of this year’s event, which includes the program “Street Level Visions: Chinese Independent Docos," curated by myself. The Age newspaper today has an article by me about the program that you can see here.

There is also a short video interview with me on The Age website.

One of the films in Street Level Visions – The Transition Period – has already sold out, and several others are selling fast. So if you’re in Melbourne and keen to check out these films, jump online and book.

See you at the festival!

Chinese Doco Special in "Senses of Cinema"

Wang Jiuliang's Beijing Besieged by Waste, one of seven independent Chinese documentaries appearing in the "Street Level Visions" program at this year's Melbourne International Film Festival.

As announced in my last post, a program of Chinese documentaries programmed by myself kicks off on 5 August as part of the 2012 Melbourne International Film Festival. "Street Level Visions: Chinese Independent Docos" is a retrospective of seven digital documentaries made over the decade or so, featuring work by Zhao Liang, Hu Jie, Ou Ning, Wang Jiuliang and Zhou Hao.

To coincide with Street Level Visions, the well known Australian film journal Senses of Cinema have run a series of articles in their new issue edited by myself and Adrian Danks focusing on independent Chinese documentaries.

Street Level Visions: Chinese Independent Docos at the Melbourne International Film Festival

Zhao Liang's Petition, one of seven titles screening at this year's Melbourne International Film Festival as part of "Street Level Visions: Chinese Independent Docos," curated by Dan Edwards.

I’m very happy to announce that “Street Level Visions,” a program of independent Chinese documentaries curated by myself, will be screening next month as part of the Melbourne International Film Festival.

The program is a small retrospective of independent works produced in China over the past decade or so, many of which I’ve written about here at Screening China. As well as classics such as Zhao Liang’s Petition (2009) and Hu Jie’s Searching for Lin Zhao’s Soul, the selection includes Wang Jiuliang’s debut from last year, Beijing Besieged by Waste.

Directors Ou Ning and Wang Jiuliang will be in Melbourne as guests of the festival.

Here’s the full program – all screenings at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) on Federation Square unless otherwise indicated:

“Climaxes Can’t be Judged by the Critics”: the Debate on Documentary Ethics in China

Logo for the 8th China Independent Film Festival, where controversy erupted over the issue of ethics in Chinese documentary.

Ethics in documentary making is always a loaded subject that can raise the heckles of directors, viewers and subjects alike. Documentary makers not only have to negotiate their often fraught relationships with their subjects, but also have to consider the fact that their camera-mediated interactions are going to be put on public display on cinema and TV screens across the planet. Given the explosion in independent Chinese documentary making over the past ten to fifteen years, and the fact that many of these films involve a discomforting degree of observational intimacy, it should come as no surprise that debates centred on ethics have recently come to the fore in China.

The fault lines of the debate were thrown into sharp relief at a forum at the 8th China Independent Film Festival in Nanjing late last year (28 October-1 November 2011), when a heated discussion by academics on ethical issues was denounced the following day by a group of filmmakers in a series of “big character posters” (dazibao). Public posters proclaiming social or political messages have a long tradition in China, though they are particularly associated with the early Cultural Revolution years, when highly bombastic competing dazhibao from various Red Guard factions were plastered on every wall in cities across the country. Shelly Kraicer reported on the events in Nanjing for CinemaScope soon after they occurred, while the Harvard-based Chinese scholar Ying Qian recently penned a more detailed account and discussion of the issues thrown up by the forum in China Heritage Quarterly.

Cycles of Familial Abuse – Ji Dan’s "When the Bough Breaks"

The sisters survey Beijing's frozen winter landscape in Ji Dan's harrowing documentary When the Bough Breaks, screened recently at the "Seeing China" workshop at the University of Technology, Sydney.

If you’ve ever found yourself trapped with someone else’s family as they experience a major emotional meltdown, you’ll have some idea what it’s like to view Ji Dan’s documentary When the Bough Breaks (2011). “It’s just like guerrilla warfare,” comments one family member early in the film, although it’s unclear whether he is referring to life inside his family or the general conditions of life for those living in the cracks of Beijing’s fractured social landscape.

Newsbites: Sheffield, Censorship, Jia Zhangke’s Beijing Cinema, and Salacious Gossip

Me, sorry? Never! The new documentary Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry has been getting the Chinese embassy in London hot under the collar.

It’s been a very long time between posts here at Screening China. Fear not, the blog is still alive – I’ve just been a little swamped by thesis and article writing, various curating duties and five weeks in China. There’s been a lot going on in Chinese film, so here’s a quick round up of news over the past month or two (apologies for the fact that some of this is quite old!)

Chinese Delegation Pulls Out of Sheffield Doc/Fest

Earlier this week the Chinese diplomatic service launched another offensive in its campaign to confirm the image of the Chinese government as repressive, censorial and generally uptight by demanding that Sheffield Doc/Fest, one of the world’s best known documentary festivals, drop Alison Klayman’s Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry from its program. RealScreen reports:

Call for Participants in Sydney Workshop on Chinese Documentaries

Dr Jenny Chio and Professor Wanning Sun of the UTS China Research Centre in Sydney, Australia, have put out a call for participants for an exciting workshop planned for June. The organizers are looking to attract a broad range of participants, including academics from various fields, filmmakers and journalists. Guests will include Dr Yi Sicheng, the curator of China's regular Yunfest film festival in Yunnan, and Dr Luke Robinson, Lecturer in Film and Media Studies, University of Nottingham, and author of some of the best recent academic work on Chinese documentaries.

The program also includes some public screenings, which I'll provide details for when they are finalised.

The call for participants is reproduced below - contact Jenny Chio if you'd like nay more information at: Jenny.Chio@uts.edu.au

Flashback – Zhang Yuan’s "Crazy English"

Li Yang, China's most infamous English teacher, works the crowd in Zhang Yuan's 1999 documentary Crazy English.

Flashback posts look back over older titles in Chinese cinema.

Like an airforce plane coming in on a bombing run, the scream of jets builds over the opening credits until Li Yang explodes onto screen. “Crazy English! Crazy Life! Crazy Work! Crazy study! Be crazy every minute! Everywhere! I love this crazy game!”

Welcome to the crazy world of Li Yang, China’s most famous English teacher, captured at the early peak of his fame in Zhang Yuan’s 1999 documentary Crazy English (Fengkuang yingyu).

Frontline Policing in Guangzhou – Zhou Hao’s "Cop Shop" and "Cop Shop II"

Police on duty at Guangzhou Railway Station in early 2012. Image eChinacities.

Zhou Hao is one of the most prolific of China’s current crop of documentarians, having churned out six films since his debut Houjie Township in 2003. Among his recent works are Cop Shop (Chai guan, 2009) and Cop Shop II (Chai guan II, 2011), two documentaries about the daily operations of the police station at Guangzhou Railway Station, one of the busiest public transport hubs in China. Unlike Using (reviewed here), Zhou’s truth-bending 2008 film about his relationship with a Guangzhou junkie, the Cop Shop films take a straight-forward observational approach.

Where Can Chinese Indies Be Purchased or Viewed Online?

The DVD cover for Zhao Dayong's The High Life, now available through Lantern Films.

Readers of Screening China often write to me and ask where they can obtain copies of the independent Chinese films I write about. Unfortunately it's not easy to get many of the titles, but some are now available on DVD for online purchase, or are available for viewing online, so I thought I'd do a post with a couple of tips on where these sites can be found. Please note I have no affiliations with any of the companies or websites listed and take no responsibility for their products or services. All the sites I've listed provide copies of films with English subtitles.

Flashback: Air Rifles and Male Ennui - Hu Xinyu's "The Man"

In the course of researching my thesis and book on China’s independent documentary movement I’ve been watching a lot of older Chinese films. I’ve decided to blog about some of them in a series of “Flashback” posts.

First up is the domestic drama of Hu Xinyu’s documentary The Man (Nanrenmen) from 2003.

A typically lackadaisical moment from Hu Xinyu's ode to male ennui, The Man (2003).

Air Rifles and Male Ennui - Hu Xinyu's "The Man"

No matter what culture you’re in, placing members of the same sex together in close quarters for prolonged periods is always a bad idea. Yet it’s the painful dynamics of watching a trio of bored, unfulfilled men cooped up in a tiny apartment in a provincial Chinese city that makes Hu Xinyu’s film The Man such a hypnotically discomforting experience – like a slow-motion train wreck played out over two hours.

Zhao Liang Now “Celebrated” by the Chinese Government Claims New York Times

Zhao Liang (second from right) and Gu Changwei (far right) at a press conference about Zhao's documentary Together in Beijing earlier this year. The others pictured appear in the documentary.

Chinese documentarian Zhao Liang has been in the U.S. news recently with a somewhat critical profile of the director in the New York Times entitled, “Chinese Director’s Path From Rebel to Insider.” The long article by Edward Wong details Zhao’s supposed “evolution from a filmmaker hounded by the government to one whom it celebrates.” Zhao’s new “insider” status is said to be the result of his last documentary, Together, which was backed by China’s Ministry of Health and approved for release in Chinese cinemas.

You Can’t Build on an Emptiness – IFChina Original Studio

Earlier this year I was privileged to spend a few days staying with filmmaker Jian Yi in Ji'an, Jiangxi Province, at his IFChina Original Studio. The studio is an exciting initiative recently launched by Jian Yi and his wife Eva. The following is an article I wrote for RealTime magazine in Australia about IFChina's work.


Originally published in RealTime arts magazine.

You Can’t Build on an Emptiness – IFChina Original Studio

IFChina Original Studio founder and filmmaker Jian Yi, outside the studio on the campus of Jinggangshan University. Photo: Dan Edwards

Ji’an doesn’t look like the most auspicious place for a groundbreaking experiment in China’s budding civil society. The town doesn’t appear in any English language guidebooks, the local station platform is just a low-slung slab of concrete and, in early spring when I visited, a bone chilling mist hung over the town. Yet this minor Chinese city is home to IFChina original studio, a bold attempt to generate community participation in the arts and oral history in the heart of one of China’s poorest regions.

Xu Tong's Relentless Gaze – Shattered

This is the last of my posts reviewing Chinese work from this year's Hong Kong International Film Festival - apologies that it has taken so long to get all of these up online.

Old Tang and his daughter Tang Caifeng, in Xu Tong's latest documentary Shattered.

Independent Chinese documentaries are not known for their easy, upbeat tone, and few present a more confronting vision of China's lower depths than director Xu Tong. Last October I wrote about his Fortune Teller, a grueling look at the life of a crippled itinerant fortune teller and his deaf, mute, mentally impaired wife as they wandered around China's north. Among that film's cast of characters was a tough brothel owner named Tang Caifeng, who disappeared at the end of the film following her arrest during a crackdown on the sex trade. Fortune Teller's sequel, Shattered, which premiered at this year's Hong Kong International Film Festival, catches up with Tang Caifeng a year later, as she returns to her father's home in China's far northeast.