Pingyao International Film Festival
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Spectacle, Controversy and the Septic: Pingyao International Film Festival 2019
This is a strange place to have a revelation. I’m sitting in a movie theatre in Pingyao, Shanxi Province, China. I have shrunken into a cosy corporate space which, once the house lights are put out, is soothingly anonymous. I’m briefly hidden from the startling and imposing hubbub of the Pingyao International Film Festival, a “boutique” film festival founded by the great Jia Zhangke in 2017; hiding, as it were, in plain sight. All this festival’s state-sponsored glitz, its overproduced sleekness, the ubiquity of its many, many attendees, the drone of voices in the street, the scooters caroming by—all of […]
by Christopher Small on Nov 27, 2019 -
“I Chose to Yell, You Chose to Whisper:” Zhang Yimou and Jia Zhangke at Pingyao International Film Festival
I was loitering around the ticket office of the Pingyao International Film Festival, waiting for the day to begin. This was the second morning of the festival and, like all international delegates, I was still adjusting to being in China. That adjustment is at least threefold: to the time zone, to the food and to the place. Already I had seen Jia Zhangke, festival founder and one of the greatest of all directors, mobbed by legions of fans. I had seen Zhao Tao standing tall and beautiful in the queue for the opening film, apparently invisible to those around her. […]
by Christopher Small on Nov 26, 2019
