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What's on at the cinema, plus reviews of the latest movie releases
While preparing to turn to history with two period film projects (respectively set in 1949 and at the end of the Qing Dynasty), the distinguished chronicler of contemporary China talks to Edmund Lee about his latest documentary, Useless.
Useless is – after Dong (2006) – the second entry in your planned documentary trilogy about artists. How did you decide on your subjects?
[The origin of these films] is a little different than [that of] my other documentaries. Back in the early 1990s, I went to an exhibition of painter Liu Xiaodong – I liked it a lot, and we became friends. I’ve always wanted to make a documentary about artists, so I made Dong about Liu at the same time as I made Still Life (2006).
On the one hand, the contemporary art scene in China has become especially vibrant; on the other, we’re lacking a channel to let the wider public know about these artists’ works and ideas. I decided to make a film trilogy on them, because these artists have a lot of opinions and feelings towards China’s development, and because film is a medium that can reach out to more people.
I’ve decided to make a film about architecture. China has been undergoing rapid urbanisation, always tearing down older buildings and building new ones. Instead of focusing on one architect, I’ll likely look at a group of architects in Shanghai, to explore cultural issues through them.
In Dong, the narrative focus spontaneously shifts from Liu to the model he paints. And now in Useless, the POV also randomly flows from one person to the next. What’s the significance of the arrangement?
This reflects my admiration for a special quality of China’s contemporary artists: they don’t retreat from social issues, and they relate their creation intimately with the environment they live in. China is at a stage where the old is constantly replaced by the new, and memories are constantly being erased.
Actually, the roadside encounter between Ma Ke [the fashion designer] and the rural worker is arranged as if this was a fiction film. I finished filming their parts separately before letting them cross paths. What I want to emphasise is that, despite our different backgrounds, people working inside and outside the artistic sphere are interconnected. Due to the rapid commercial development in China, we’re all living in our little circles nowadays, in a state of inertia. I want to break the deadlock and raise people’s curiosity towards those living outside their own worlds.
Your films generally display little nostalgia for the past, while seemingly mocking modern China for its desire to quickly become Western. Why is that?
This stems from my personal concern. My films since 1998 have been following the transformation of China, the purpose of which is for the country to become modernised. For me, the ultimate aim of modernisation is to give more freedom, respect and happiness to the individual. The wellbeing of many people – especially the less privileged ones – has often been sacrificed amid rapid development. This is both a regret and dilemma that I’d like to draw attention to.
It sounds like you have so much to say, and yet there’re even fewer words in your documentaries than your fiction films…
This has something to do with my understanding of film. It’s not that we don’t know about the reality, it’s only that we don’t feel anything about it. People often comment that my fiction films are more like documentaries, and vice versa. [Laughs.] When I think about it, I want to feel for the situations of others, and I want my audiences to interact with [my characters] according to their own experiences – despite the distance separating all of us.
Useless is now screening at The Grand in Elements mall: www.thegrandcinema.com.hk