Chinese films – ALLIANCE OF WOMEN FILM JOURNALISTS

DEEP SEA (Tribeca 2023) Review by Leslie Combemale

June 8, 2023June 9, 2023 Leslie Combemale 3d animation, Chinese films, Chinese ink painting, Deep Sea, Tian Xiaopeng, Tingwen Wang, Tribeca Film Festival 2023, Xin Su

CG artist and animation director Tian Xiaopeng spent seven years on Deep Sea and almost 1500 people worked to create this film, which is meant for audiences to experience like a dream. Xiaopeng wanted to give the 3D animated Deep Sea traditional Chinese aesthetics, and was particularly inspired by the look of Chinese ink painting. He actually invented new techniques to mimic the ink painting art style. He definitely achieved his aim. Visually, the film is nothing short of exquisite.

Reviews

STONEWALLING – Review by Diane Carson

May 21, 2023May 31, 2023 Diane Carson Chinese films, Huang Ji, Ryûji Otsuka, Stonewalling

Chinese Huang Ji fortuitously met Japanese Ryûji Otsuka while Otsuka pursued independent filmmaking in China. Director Ji’s focus on Chinese women’s predicaments resonated with cinematographer/producer Otsuka. Their harmonious real life and on-screen partnership is on full display in their co-directed work Stonewalling in which twenty-year-old Lynn, training as a flight attendant, grapples with an unexpected pregnancy.

Reviews

STONEWALLING – Review by Nadine Whitney

March 20, 2023March 21, 2023 Nadine Whitney china gig capitalism, Chinese films, Honggui Yao, Huang Ji, Liu Long, Ryûji Otsuka, Stonewalling, westernized china

Writer/director Huang Ji and cinematographer Ryûji Otsuka’s Stonewalling forms part of a loose trilogy of narratives that investigates contemporary China’s social and cultural mores under ‘gig’ capitalism. Centered on a young women’s struggle for independence, it’s a slow-burn that’s rich in metaphor but gets to the point: Can people attain autonomy in capitalist China? Does the gig economy allow their success? What chances do women have to escape patriarchal strictures of a society that was supposed to be built on equality — but is not.

Reviews

AWFJ Presents: ELECTRIC SHADOWS – Review by Susan Wloszczyna

February 13, 2023February 19, 2023 Susan Wloszczyna awfj presents, Chinese films, Electric Shadows, Film Movement, Qi Zhongyang, Xia Yu, Xiao Jiang

Set during China’s Cultural Revolution, female director Xiao Jiang’s 2004 feature debut, Electric Shadows, is akin to Italy’s 1989’s Oscar-winning Cinema Paradiso as it focuses on how a makeshift outdoor theater brings together a village of cinema lovers. When we first meet film addict Mao (Xia Yu), he is footloose and fancy free. He earns a living by toting water jugs from place to place on his bike. He especially loves action movies, as an image of a Blade Runner poster with Harrison Ford’s face materializes on screen. But by accident, he tumbles into a wall of bricks and is conked on the head with a brick by an angry woman named Ling-Ling (Qi Zhongyang). When she gets arrested, she gives Mao the keys to her apartment and tells him to feed her fish.

Movie of the Week

MOVIE OF THE WEEK December 9, 2022: HIDDEN LETTERS

December 3, 2022December 4, 2022 Jennifer Merin betsy bozdech, Cate Marquis, Chinese films, documentaries, He Yanxin, Hidden Letters, Hu Xin, jennifer merin, leslie combemale, liz whittemore, loren king, Marilyn Ferdinand., motw, Movie of the Week, Nushu, Pam Grady, Qing Zhao, sandie angulo chen, susan wloszczyna, Tiebin Feng, Violet Feng, Wei Gao

A secret written language shared among Chinese women, empowering a centuries-long legacy of covert sisterhood, is at the heart of Violet Feng’s thought-provoking, insightful documentary Hidden Letters. Known as Nushu, this language is an incredibly important part of China’s cultural history — but now that it’s no longer secret, can it retain its purpose and power? And are Chinese women really free of the circumstances that led to its creation in the first place?

Reviews

HIDDEN LETTERS – Review by Liz Whittemore

November 28, 2022December 3, 2022 Liz Whittemore Chinese films, documentaries, He Yanxin, Hidden Letters, Hu Xin, Nushu, Qing Zhao, Tiebin Feng, Violet Feng, Wei Gao

Nushu was called “the words of ants.” Poems and prose appeared on fans and handkerchiefs and often ended up buried

Reviews

HIDDEN LETTERS – Review by Susan Wloszczyna

November 28, 2022December 3, 2022 Susan Wloszczyna Chinese films, documentaries, He Yanxin, Hidden Letters, Hu Xin, Nushu, Qing Zhao, Tiebin Feng, Violet Feng, Wei Gao

The documentary Hidden Letters, directed by Violet Du Feng, digs deep into Nushu, a traditional secret writing system used by women in Jiangyong County in China’s Hunan province. For thousands of years, Nushu has been a unique script used exclusively by local women. It is somewhat like calligraphy in that the figures are written with a brush and ink. Originally used in poems and songs, it not only provided women with a coping mechanism against the patriarchal hardships experienced before 1949 but gave them hope and allowed them to leave a legacy for future generations. The last descendant fluent in Nushu may have died in 2000, but efforts have been made to prolong its history.

Guest Posts Reviews

LOVE BETWEEN FAIRY AND DEVIL – Review by Dana Ziyasheva (Guest Post)

October 12, 2022October 16, 2022 Jennifer Merin Chinese films, chinese tv, Dana Ziyasheva, Love Between Fairy and Devil, netflix, Wang He Di

The Chinese show Love Between Fairy and Devil is such a carefully choreographed ballet of emotions and thoughts on the nature of love, power, and society — hammering home its points with an impossibly attractive cast and a highly addictive soundtrack — that I, a bone-weary middle-aged woman with grown-up kids, found myself pledging all my time (and the entirety of my soul) to it.

Reviews

AWFJ Presents: ELECTRIC SHADOWS – Review by Susan Wloszczyna

September 2, 2022February 18, 2023 Susan Wloszczyna awfj presents, Chinese films, Electric Shadows, Film Movement, Qi Zhongyang, Xia Yu, Xiao Jiang

Festivals Reviews

HIDDEN LETTERS (Tribeca 2022) – Reviewed by Marilyn Ferdinand

June 6, 2022December 3, 2022 Marilyn Ferdinand (Archived Contributor) Chinese films, documentaries, He Yanxin, Hidden Letters, Hu Xin, Nushu, Qing Zhao, Tiebin Feng, Tribeca 2022, Violet Feng, Wei Gao

In their very moving documentary, Hidden Letters, directors Violet Du Feng and Qing Zhao show how generations of Chinese women found cracks in their oppressive, patriarchal society and created a way to find a small ray of sunshine in an otherwise bleak existence. Their strategy? Nushu, a private language they invented to write letters to each other to share their pain and gain comfort in communion.

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