Be a Woman

Six life stories of German, Austrian and Russian Jews which intersect in exile in Shanghai. Out of narratives, photographs, documents and new images of the biggest and most contradictory metropolis of the Far East an entity develops in which the historic exile takes and turns on a completely current power and appeal.

The location of Hunan's southwestern Hunan, the local economy is not active, the people either go out to work or go up the mountain to mine. Due to the constant mining disasters, despite the government's efforts to rectify and regulate, many people still illegally mine. Miners often do not pay attention to the protection of mines. Many years later, many miners have pneumoconiosis. The film started shooting in 2010 until 2018, with a filming period of nearly ten years, until the death of Zhao Pingfeng, the protagonist of pneumoconiosis, leaving young children and mentally handicapped wife.

In rural China, the job of enforcing the Communist Party's one-child policy falls on government bureaucrats tasked with imposing fines, birth control, and forced sterilizations. Xu Huijing documents this process in his native village of Ma, following the tenacious efforts of the local birth control chief during an increased sterilization quota period, revealing the absurd and tragic local consequences of high-level government policy. (Chicago International Film Festival)

Taiwan's democracy is the envy of Chinese people all over the world. At the same time, when this two-party system-'blue' and 'green'-get at each other's throats, it seems to cast a dark cloud over this beacon of advancing democratization. How does the young generation, many of them first time voters, feel about the political environment they've inherited? Will they allow for their political differences to drive a deeper wedge into the Taiwanese society? A year and a half before Taiwan's 2012 Presidential Election I gathered a group of young people from across the blue and green spectrum to participate in a political dialogue. Although they're from opposing parties, they were willing to talk politics. Through these deliberately arranged dialogues, what sparks will fly?

Xiayao Village, Youyu County, Shanxi ProvinceThe 7-year-old and big-footed Bai Nu and Liu Buhan, both of whom died because of their loved ones, were brought together with their three children more than 40 years ago. (Bai Danu 2 Men 1 Women) (Liu Buhan 3 (Daughter) Nowadays, the children have become grandparents, and most of them are not next to Bai Bainu and Liu Buhan. The children of both sides have differences over the old age of raising the two elderly people ... so despite the two They are all in their eighties, and still need to get up and return to the field to farm in the morning and night, and the old lady Bai is more because of her little feet, she has to stagger in the wind and rain, kneeling in the fields ... A foot-binding old lady faces the camera and talks to her little feet ...

After 30 years of cold war, Taiwan and China finally opened cross-strait trade and tourism in 1980. However, through decades of political and educational vilification of their counterparts by the KMT and CCP, and despite close economic and cultural ties, what lies beneath the diplomatic relations is a disconnect and mistrust that cannot be denied. KE is a failed business in Taiwan who hopes to start over as a 'Taiwanese Expat' in Shenzheng, China with a Taiwanese company. Lili, a laborer from China, meets her Taiwanese husband online and moves to Taiwan in hopes of a better life. Both KE and Lili cross the straits in hope of achieving what they cannot find in their homeland. But how much do they really know about that country across the straits?

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

This film is a realistic record of a sixty-year-old couple living in a remote village (Gurenay) in the Badain Jaran Desert of Alashan, Inner Mongolia plant thousands of mu of ammodendron and euphratica to fight against expanding deserts.

Nicknamed "Mayor of the Night Market", Ninth Uncle has been a temporary worker managing the night market for over 30 years. Despite of his success in the night market, his family life appears quite the opposite. Almost 70 years old now, he continues his life in the night market. As the night falls every evening, Zhong Shan Road and its hundred years of history are now facing reconstruction and the night market full of yummy food venders [sic] is soon to be gone. Ninth Uncle helplessly watches the empire he worked his whole life for slowly fall apart.

A large majority of LGBT people in mainland China remain in the closet. Most of these closet doors are kept tightly shut by pressure from friends, family, and society itself. This documentary hopes to explore the experience of coming out in China through a series of interviews with out homosexuals. The interviews touch upon the discrimination, suppression, and even violence they have endured as well as the touching moments where they experienced compassion and understanding. The documentary also covers gay rights activist and proud mother of a homosexual, Wu Youjian, who stands strongly by her son and other gay men in full support.

In a cold mountain village in northeastern China,when a peasant gets sick they invite the local shaman to do trance healing. In the village there is Shaman XU, a renowned shaman in the area who is almost 70-year-old. He had been a teacher in his youth and an accountant for a factory production team. In his later age, serving as a spirit medium became his profession. He beats his donkey-hide drum and sings ancient melodies, inviting all kind of spirits to come.

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.

The "Wugong sutra" is also known as "Transfer to the Sky". A prophecy written by the people since the Five Dynasties Northern Song Dynasty is said to be the proverb of the Tiangongshan Zhigong, Huagong, Yigong, Tanggong and Baogong Wugong Bodhisattvas. The salvation people were robbed at the end, often used by rural secret social organizations, and also banned by the imperial court rulers. The belief in the "Five Annals" in the rural society of northwestern Yunnan has abandoned the function of politics, and only pays attention to the practical effect of the Wugong sutra curse on treating and saving people and protecting one side. This film is a field survey of the Wugong sutra as a folk belief in rural society in northwestern Yunnan.

The arrogant Hua Pozi, the first-time brother who is full of joy. Even the seemingly greasy, exaggerated, and gaudy drum art seems to be unrelenting in the villages and villages.

Geomancy is to say hinding winds to gain water. The earth is mother , burial brings peace to the deceased, symbolizing reincarnation. So the name of this story in English is “Revive”, which means getting into the cycle of reincarnation. The documentary is going to tell a story contains several elements such as Geomancy of compass, Hakka funeral and interment culture, General om teach, Seance. Moreover, it also porse deeply on the floating life with fleeting time- the sanguine life of a wise man in countryside. This is an old man whose life is full of hardships, he possesses real learning and stories, owns peace after overcoming severe difficulties, and has the special graciousness as being in such an age…

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 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.

Record the entangled experience for changing the genealogy. Record the experience for engraving movable type, hand-printed.

As a kind of traditional handmade paper in the area of Ninghua in western Fujian Province, Yukou paper is named after its soft and delicate quality as well as white and jade-like color. It is the best of handmade papers and needs to go through several complicated and elaborate processes. In a small village deep in the Wuyi Mountains, Xikeng, there were once more than five hundred paper mills, but now only one remains, still struggling to survive. The film crew focused their camera on the paper maker Hu Lanshan's family, quietly recording the process of making Yukou paper, the joys and sorrows of the paper maker’s family, and the changes of the whole era...