147 minutes / Color
Burmese; Mandarin; English / English subtitles
Release: 2017
Copyright: 2016
Director Wang Bing brings his careful eye to the mountainous border-region of northeastern Myanmar in Ta’ang, a powerful and revealing observational documentary that follows members of the Ta’ang minority as they flee to China to escape an ongoing and escalating civil war. In a pair of refugee camps, those displaced by the war attempt to create reasonably safe living conditions, while others go deeper into China where they may find work in sugarcane fields or try their luck in urban areas. Meanwhile, those still in Myanmar must journey across the mountains, belongings and livestock in tow, as the sounds of gunfire and artillery echo around them.
Ta’ang captures the constant insecurity, instability and disorientation that come with life as a refugee, the complexities of the choices the Ta’ang face, and the emotional toll they take.
"A masterpiece depicting dignity in the face of dehumanizing displacement."—Artforum
"Wang Bing zeroes in on the lives of refugees living on the war-torn borderlands between Myanmar and China."—The Hollywood Reporter
"Brilliant! Jump cut to the harsh realities facing approximately 100,000 Ta'ang, Han, Dai and Burmese refugees fleeing across Myanmar's northern border into China."—Fandor
"An urgent account of a refugee crisis that Western media so far has rarely looked at."—Film Comment
"A remarkable visual document...more real and raw than most documentaries on exodus and refugees. Eerily beautiful and deeply touching."—Toronto International Film Festival
"Unforgettable. Wang's cinema unearths the Prometheus in all of us: we give ourselves fire, we give each other fire, and life becomes liveable."—Cinema Scope
"Sublime...A striking documentary on the migrant condition."—Liberation
"Channels the destitute yet hopeful no-man's (and woman's) existence of the refugee experience."—Mubi
Select Accolades
Documents China's rapid economic and social transformation by following the rural workers who leave their Yunnan hometown to move to the city of Huzhou to work in its textile factories.
Wang Bing | 2017 | 152 minutes / Color | Mandarin / English subtitles
Three little sisters live alone in a small village in the high mountains of the Yunnan region. The little girls don't go to school, spending their days working in the fields or wandering in the village.
Wang Bing | 2016 | 153 minutes / Color | English; Mandarin / English subtitles
The daily lives and isolation of a group of men locked on one floor of a Chinese city's psychiatric institution.
Wang Bing | 2016 | 238 minutes / Color | English; Mandarin / English subtitles
