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The Little Old Lady Killer: Senior Citizen Against Chinatown Mob—‘Lucky Grandma’, dir. Sasie Sealy, 2019

Packed with dark humor, visual delights, and action, this film is a diaspora gem with an incomparable heroine who defies all conventions you might have about cinematic portrayals of advanced age

November 24th, 2020|Country: China, USA|

Small Business Owner Against the City Authorities in Pre-Epidemic Wuhan—‘City Dream’, dir. Weijun Chen, 2019

A close look at the law enforcement systems in the Chinese city of Wuhan through the story of a street vendor who decides to battle gentrification in a very flamboyant fashion

July 28th, 2020|Country: China|

Gasping at the Horrors of Past Internment Camps, as We Build More Prisons—‘Dead Souls’, dir. Wang Bing, 2018

An exhaustive, gutting look at a Chinese internment camp allows us to learn from the survivors first hand. However, what exactly are we as a carceral society taking away from it?

May 31st, 2020|Country: China, France, Switzerland|

Queerness, Gender Discrimination, and Cults on the Margins of the Chinese Dream—‘A Dog Barking at the Moon’, dir. Lisa Zi Xiang, 2019

A taut, inventive drama dissects how preoccupation with gender fulfillment and marriage in the Chinese society can lead to alienation: an expectant mother rediscovers the misery in her childhood home

April 7th, 2020|Country: China, Spain|

Film: Last Sunrise, dir. Wen Ren, 2019

When the sun goes out in the world reliant on solar power, an unlikely team of loner astronomer and bubbly student with hidden issues have to try to survive in this very human debut sci-fi feature

October 20th, 2019|Country: China|

Film: The Rib, dir. Zhang Wei, 2018

A transgender woman looks for acceptance, while her devout Christian father has to reconcile his faith and love for his child in China's first film centered around the transgender experience

September 23rd, 2019|Country: China|

Film: Long Day’s Journey Into Night, dir. Bi Gan, 2018

Visionary second feature from China's most exciting young filmmaker that merges feverish noir storytelling with 3D technology: a revolution in immersive cinema that seeks to reinvent the industry

September 10th, 2019|Country: China|

Film: A First Farewell, dir. Lina Wang, 2018

Two small children growing up in an Uyghur village in China come of age amidst the eradication of their culture: a tender, stunning feature and an ode to her heritage from an Uyghur writer/director

August 27th, 2019|Country: China, Uyghur Nation|

Film: Complicity, dir. Kei Chikaura, 2018

A nuanced, deeply original take on the toll that immigration takes on individuals, centered around an undocumented Chinese migrant in Japan who starts working in a soba shop under a stolen identity

July 30th, 2019|Country: China, Japan|

Film: Red Amnesia, dir. Xiaoshuai Wang, 2014

Dark secrets that nice people hold are the most horrifying thing in the world, as director of "Beijing Bicycle" portrays in his moody thriller about the effects of the Cultural Revolution

July 27th, 2019|Country: China|

Book: Gaston Dorren, Babel, 2018

A book of wildly entertaining and illuminating essays on the world’s top 20 languages that celebrates the planet’s differences and similarities in a new way and makes you want to learn a new language

July 11th, 2019|Country: Brazil, Cameroon, China, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Malaysia, Netherlands, North Korea, Pakistan, Portugal, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Suriname, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tamil Eelam, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom, USA, Vietnam|

Book: Su Wei, Invisible Valley, 2006

A glorious novel of magic, politics and polyamory set in Cultural revolution era rural China

May 25th, 2019|Country: China|

Art: Xu Beihong, Three Ducks, 1938

February 7th, 2019|Country: China|

Film: A Touch of Sin, dir. Jia Zhangke, 2013

January 21st, 2019|Country: China|

Film: From Its Mouth Came a River of High-End Residential Appliances, dir. Jon Wang, 2018

December 5th, 2018|Country: China, Hong Kong, USA|