About the Series
BACCS Cinema is proud to roll out this vital four-film, decades-spanning survey traces the expanding social consciousness of world-renowned indie auteur Jia Zhangke, a leading light of China’s “Sixth Generation” underground directors.
Featured Films
Xiao Wu (Pickpocket, 1997)
One of Jia Zhangke’s great debuts. This film is a searing first expression of his signature theme: the disillusionment of people left behind by a society modernizing at whiplash speed. Shot on 16mm with nonprofessional actors and without state approval, Xiao Wu enfolds its critique within a subtly ironic study of a cocky, aimless pickpocket who, as those around him advance thanks to the opportunities of the new market economy, finds himself increasingly alienated.
Still Life (2006)
Winner of the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 2006, Still Life is an empathetic portrait of those left behind by a modernizing society. Great changes have come to the town of Fengjie due to the construction of the Three Gorges hydro project: Countless families that had lived there for many generations have had to relocate to other cities.
24 City (2008)
A masterful documentary that recounts the dramatic and thunderous fall of the state-owned Factory 420, exploring both its physical demolition and its powerful symbolic echo of a half-century of communist rule. Constructed around eight dramatic interviews, punctuated by snippets of pop songs and poetry, 24 City excavates the debris of collective memory.
A Touch of Sin (2013)
A “brilliant exploration of violence and corruption in contemporary China” (The Atlantic). Winner of the Best Screenplay at Cannes Film Festival, this daring, poetic and grand-scale film focuses on four characters, each living in different provinces, who are driven to violent ends.
Film Information
- Director: Jia Zhangke
- Language: Mandarin with English subtitles
Co-presented by Roxie Theater, San Francisco.