Datong, the mining capital of the Shanxi province. Bai Budan interviews miners, the invisible auxiliaries of Chinese society in the throes of change.
Social & External
Li Shouwang is the leader of a blind storytellers team, learned storytelling at the age of 19. His childernare living hard in other cities. Li's money amost goes to his children's pocket every year. But with urbanisation, the storytellers have lost almost all their audience. As the conflict between the storytelling team and the village team intensified, his son, who was far away from home, became the only spiritual sustains... When he was excited that his son would be taking his family home for Chinese New Year, what's await is a sigh.
In Yuncheng County, Shandong, there is a girl born in the 90s named Han Wenjing who was paraplegic in a car accident in her childhood. As Han Wenjing gets older and older, she is worried about her future life. Marriage has become the biggest concern of parents. Han Wenjing got acquainted with a soldier online, but finally broke up under his father's opposition. The younger sister-in-law also had a dispute between the two over her marriage. When Han Wenjing was depressed, her father proposed to carry her to Liangshan. First, fulfilling Han Wenjing's wish was also compensation for Han Wenjing. Later, Han Wenjing met a dumb while studying e-commerce sales. The dumb liked her very much. Both parents were satisfied when they met. However, Han Wenjing felt that she still couldn't accept the disabled and wanted to try to combine healthy people, even if it failed. Under the pressure of her parents and sister-in-law on Han Wenjing, Han Wenjing still insists on her choice
A microcosm of China past and present flows through Xu Tong’s intimate docu “Shattered,” in which the maverick indie filmmaker continues to refine his techniques and concerns shown in his previous “Wheat Harvest” and “Fortune Teller.”
Yuguo, from Mongolia, lost his father when he was very young. His mother Liuxia was not able to raise him as a heavy drinker. With social support, she sent Yuguo to Wuxi for free education. Liuxia is depressed all day long, and she finds sustenance of missing Yuguo in reindeer and wine. One winter holiday after many years, Yuguo returns to his hometown, the Evenki settlement deep in the Greater Khingan mountains. At that time, he is no longer the boy who just left home, but a thirteen-year-old teenager. Facing alcoholic mother, poetic uncle, pure people from the tribe, familiar yet strange forest, Yuguo, who grew up in the city, doesn’t know what to do. In the snow-laden mountains of Aoluguya, northeast of Inner Mongolia, the film chronicles their brief time together. Yuguo and His Mother is the second documentary of Gu Tao’s Evenki trilogy.
Seedlings protection rite (also called the parade of big rice dumplings) is a spring agricultural festival of Hakka people in Western Fujian, China. People worship the God of Grains (Shennong) in the rite. People collect thousands of fresh bamboo leaves, sew them together and make a pair of big dumplings filled with 120 kilograms of rice each. They also make tens of thousands of finger-sized rice dumplings for believers to take home. On the 15th day of the 2nd lunar month, villagers carry out the statues of the God of grains and big dumplings. Followed by flowers cars, eight sheds carry children chosen from every clan name in the village who are dressed up as ancient heroes, as people parade around the village. After the rite, villagers believe that farmland is awakened and that disasters are averted. A new agricultural cycle begins.
In the mountains of western Fujian, mushrooms emerge in large numbers after rain. Hakka people pick mushrooms up the mountain with baskets at three or four o 'clock in the morning. The process of picking mushrooms is also the process of harvest.
In 1978 Deng Xiaoping set up Shenzhen as a Special Economic Zone in China, and this decision led to the rapid development of Guangdong economy. Numerous factories have been established, millions of people are attracted because of gold rush. Over 30 years later, young people who were away from their home have already stepped in the midlife. Guangdong has become a representative of job hunting and has been drawing a newly young generation who has faith and uncertainty to the future. This video revolves around three working-class boys who are the 90s generation.
The Check Fun Store is an innovative business model. Every store is divided into hundreds of small checks to display and sell a wide range of creative products provided by people who rent these checks. Thanks to its risk diversification nature, the Check Fun Store business model proliferated in Taiwan when the financial crisis hit in 2007 to carry people through the global economic downturn.
Two families' oral history of the Cultural Revolution and their current life.
In the sound of rice huller, the rice falls to the jar; and in the booming sound of thunder, the rain drops falldown on the ground. Witha shovel on shoulder, we're farming under the sky. -- This is a children's folk rhymes used to be very popular among the Hakka people lived in the westernpart of Fujian Province, China. While farming is not an easy work, rice hulling is an even more laborious work. Rice-huller is a tool used by the peasants in southern China to hull the rice for thousands of years in theirfarming history. This documentary films the making of probably the last rice-huller ever made by mankind.
Yulin, once the poorest region of Northwest China, has rapidly become "China's Kuwait" for the mining industry launched in recent years. People rush into the coal mine and other coal-related businesses, hoping to get rich overnight. They are possessed by anxiety and restlessness. However, it seems they have no other choices…
In northern Shaanxi, those three-wheeled trucks who came to the city from rural areas came to be suffering. They talked hard and finally sent their children to distant universities. Four years have passed, the big children can't find a job, the future is uncertain, the smaller children have come to the age of the university. It seems to be in the instinct, a family is still like a hen hatch, waiting for the new hope to break out.
The documentary, “JIAYI”, adopts a particular position from where it objectively and non-discriminatingly uncovers a real world of these left-behind kids in rural area in China, which overthrows the social stereotyping towards this special group existing in the remote and underdeveloped regions.
Different veterans, different memories of the Anti-Japanese War, and different lives. The oral narratives of 7 veterans show you the pictures of the Anti-Japanese War in that year, and take you to understand the current situation of the veterans of the Anti-Japanese War in Guangdong.
Class 172 is a key class for their excellent students of an ordinary secondary school in Hunan province, from which the kids’ main goal is to upgrade into one of the best province-level high school – No.1 high school of the county. In the recent few years, the school’s enrollment rate to high school was not quite satisfying, and this year, the newly promoted class in charge teacher – Mr. Xiang, who’s only graduated a few years ago, became their brightest hope to teach the students and raise the enrollment rate for school.
The documentary film, The Road, reveals the status of 22 students who study in a private village school in Hunan Province. Through in-depth interviews, the inner world of these “left-behind children” who are lack of parental love has been explored. We hope that through this film, we could hear the responses and actions from our society.
Record the entangled experience for changing the genealogy. Record the experience for engraving movable type, hand-printed.
Aoluguya, Aoluguya is the first film in Gu Tao’s Ewenki Trilogy. A tale that unfolds in the Aoluguya forest, featuring such unique characters as a mother who dulls her sadness over the absence of her son, Yuguo, with alcohol; her brother; and Maria, the tribal chieftain who watches over them.
Hyacinthine Scar condenses the undigested emotions in me while traveling from Hong Kong to my brother’s wedding in Guam. Presences and gazes of all sorts, to look and to be looked at, repetitive camera work of the hired videographers, the vow that is rehearsed over and over again by the priest, all the uncontrollable clickings of the shutter from all us (including myself), and the endless sightings of different sides of the fragmented Western Pacific. The many spots I visited appear as though they belong to passersby. They are as real as they are dreamy.
Zhang Ming went back to his hometown Wushan to record the last images before it being changed forever by the upcoming Three Gorges Dam.
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
A purely observational non-fiction film that takes viewers into the ethically murky world of end-of-life decision making in a public hospital.
In the Realms of the Unreal is a documentary about the reclusive Chicago-based artist Henry Darger. Henry Darger was so reclusive that when he died his neighbors were surprised to find a 15,145-page manuscript along with hundreds of paintings depicting The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glodeco-Angelinnian War Storm, Cased by the Child Slave Rebellion.
This character-driven film considers the evolving sex trafficking landscape as seen by the main players: the exploited, the pimps, the johns that fuel the business, and the cops who fight to stop it.
In a crime-plagued neighborhood near Miami, brutal, bare-knuckled backyard fights give young men a chance to earn money -- and self-respect.
Daniel Craig candidly reflects on his 15 year adventure as James Bond. Including never-before-seen archival footage from Casino Royale to the upcoming 25th film No Time To Die, Craig shares his personal memories in conversation with 007 producers, Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli.
From the heights of her modeling fame to her tragic death, this documentary reveals Anna Nicole Smith through the eyes of the people closest to her.
JB Smoove and Martin Starr host a celebration of 20 years of "Spider-Man" movies, from the Sam Raimi trilogy to Marc Webb's movies and the trio from Jon Watts.
SEDUCED AND ABANDONED combines acting legend Alec Baldwin with director James Toback as they lead us on a troublesome and often hilarious journey of raising financing for their next feature film. Moving from director to financier to star actor, the two players provide us with a unique look behind the curtain at the world's biggest and most glamourous film festival, shining a light on the bitter-sweet relationship filmmakers have with Cannes and the film business. Featuring insights from directors Martin Scorsese, 'Bernando Bertolucci' and Roman Polanski; actors Ryan Gosling and Jessica Chastain and a host of film distribution luminaries.
A documentary about the life and films of director John Ford.
Interviews with leading authors, philosophers and scientists, with an in-depth discussion of the Law of Attraction. The audience is shown how they can learn and use 'The Secret' in their everyday lives.
A detailing of the rise to prominence and global sporting superstardom of six supremely talented young Manchester United football players (David Beckham, Nicky Butt, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes, Phil and Gary Neville). The film covers the period 1992-1999, culminating in Manchester United's European Cup triumph.
With unprecedented access to the official archives and intimate recollections from the band, both current and past, Iron Maiden: Burning Ambition invites fans to experience one of the most iconic journeys in music history. Spanning five decades, this electrifying documentary charts the band’s rise from the pubs of East London to the world’s biggest stadiums. Featuring exclusive interviews with band members and contributors such as Javier Bardem, Lars Ulrich and Chuck D, as well as all-new animated sequences of the band's legendary mascot, Eddie, the film offers a rare and intimate look at Iron Maiden’s uncompromising vision and unwavering connection with their truly global army of fans.
Documentarian Ross McElwee originally set out to make a travelogue of sorts tracing General William T. Sherman's infamous scorched-earth march through the Confederacy in the latter stages of the Civil War. Instead, haunted by a recent breakup with a girlfriend, McElwee ends up documenting his progress -- or lack thereof -- in starting a new relationship. His journey then becomes one of self-reflection and self-discovery rather than a historical/sociological exploration.
The film follows adventurer Jeff Johnson as he retraces the epic 1968 journey of his heroes Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins to Patagonia.
A night of drunken chaos rocks a quiet Dutch town in this shocking documentary about a teen's birthday invite that accidentally went viral on Facebook.
Police pull over a woman who claims she just gave birth. But the baby — and the blood — aren't hers. Twisted lies unravel in this true-crime documentary.
In this documentary, recovering addict and amputee John Wood finds himself in a stranger-than-fiction battle to reclaim his mummified leg from Southern entrepreneur Shannon Whisnant, who found it in a grill he bought at an auction and believes it therefore to be his rightful property.
Alexander McQueen's rags-to-riches story is a modern-day fairy tale, laced with the gothic. Mirroring the savage beauty, boldness and vivacity of his design, this documentary is an intimate revelation of McQueen's own world, both tortured and inspired, which celebrates a radical and mesmerizing genius of profound influence.
Documentary sequel that offers a close-up look into the personal lives of the legendary porn stars who've survived the test of time and influenced popular culture. Blends rare interviews with erotic clips and additional appearances by Whoopi Goldberg, Steven Soderbergh and a host of adult stars, directors and trendsetters.
