Complete Wang Bing Trilogy Pass
$40 for Public • $35 FilmScene members • $25 for students
"Pointed and purposeful, both in its scope and its techniques... Along the way, Wang captures the kind of camaraderie and interpersonal drama that makes it worth the wait."—Siddhant Adlakha, Variety
"Wang’s work has never shied away from criticizing a modern, consumerist nation for failing to live up to the supposed socialist ideals of its revolution, but rarely has one of his films so nakedly called out... collusion between state and commerce."—Jake Cole, Slant
"Delivers a thorough cinematic vision with a precise political edge."—POV Magazine
In his monumental Youth Trilogy, filmmaker Wang Bing cements his status as "the most fearless chronicler of contemporary China" (Beijing Contemporary Arts Foundation). Over the course of his decades spanning career, Wang has become known for his expansive and muralistic documentation of China's dispossessed. Wang's curiosity explores the labor forces whose ambitious, but exploitative efforts, fuel the feverishly expansionist dreams of the national economy. For this trilogy, Wang amassed 2,600 hours of footage of young garment workers whose lives are seldom celebrated. Shot between 2014 and 2019, Wang points an unflinching camera at the unfair and predatory world of textile labor in the factories of Zhili province to create a titanic ten-hour trilogy.
In the second part of the trilogy, life seems hard, but stable. Then, a workshop owner brutally beats an employee and flees. With no boss and no pay, the workers organize to sell the shop’s sewing machines and pocket the money. Wang captures young workers at the mercy of the forces of capital and the state, who are all too aware that those forces won't hesitate to crush them if they step too far out of line.
To honor his dedicated work, FilmScene will present Wang’s complete Youth Trilogy on three consecutive days. For anyone interested in contemporary observational cinema, the work is essential, and true devotees will have a rare, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see his verité saga in a cinema.
