Emergent Visions: New Independent Documentaries
Emergent Visions presents screenings of exceptional independent documentary films produced in China and Taiwan, followed by scholarly discussions led by faculty and students. The films selected range from the just released to classics and evince distinct, compelling cinematic visions; yet they all share a commitment to serving as witness to the rapid changes taking place in China today.


Thursday, October 22, 2009     7:00 pm
(please note: Location has been changed to the Tsai Auditorium, S010)

Petition 上訪 (Shangfang) 2009           
Directed by Zhao Liang

Since 1996, Zhao Liang has filmed “petitioners” who come from all over China to make complaints in Beijing about abuses and injustices committed by local authorities. Gathered near the complaint offices— around the southern railway station of Beijing, living, in most cases, in makeshift shelters—the complainants wait for months or years to obtain justice. Peasants thrown off their land, workers from factories that have closed, small homeowners who have seen their houses demolished but received no compensation—all types of petitioners are represented. Faced with the most brutal intimidation from the local authorities, the complainants who stubbornly continue despite everything find that their hopes are often in vain. Zhao Liang has accompanied several of them, particularly a mother and her daughter, whose full story we follow over ten years. The film takes us right up to the start of the Olympic Games showing China’s persistent contradictions in the midst of powerful economic expansion. Official selection of the Cannes Film Festival. (123 mins.)

Discussants: Xiaohong Yu, PhD, Political Science, Columbia University; An Wang Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University


Location: CGIS South, Tsai Auditorium S010
1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA
Contact: jieli@fas.harvard.edu