NYC Happenings: "Cinema On The Edge: Best Of The Beijing Independent Film Festival" Brings Banned Works To U.S.

In the U.S., and in most countries for that matter, making independent films is a common and relatively unremarkable practice, mainly meaning creating works that are the opposite of studio and big-budget films. 

Usually, filmmakers go this route because they wish to make films that are more personal, more artistic, more daring, and less beholden to commercial considerations and constraints. Sometimes you can see these films playing in your local theater; increasingly more likely these days, you can catch them on VOD, via your computer or your cable provider, or even on your smartphone. 

But usually, film festivals are the most likely places you'll get to see independent films. Here in the U.S., especially in major cities like New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago, you can't swing your arms without hitting an independent film festival of some kind or another. 

Making independent films and putting on film festivals, then, are for the most part occasions for checking out and presenting interesting movies. What they usually aren't, are activities that are considered politically dangerous, or can get you in trouble with the police or governmental authorities. Unfortunately, this is currently the situation in China.

What makes this situation even more unfortunate is that in the last decade or so, China has been the source of some of the most provocative, innovative and artful independent fiction films and documentaries being made today. The rapid and dizzying changes that have occurred in contemporary Chinese society have driven filmmakers and artists to express their reactions to these changes in works that challenge viewers with their radical approaches to cinematic forms.

However, independent films cannot be legally shown in China, because they are made outside of the official film system and without approval by government censors, which all films in China must have in order to be shown in regular movie theaters. Independent film festivals, organized outside the official systems, are the only venues where independent films have a chance to be seen by the public.

By many accounts, the most important venue for the screening of unauthorized films is the Beijing Independent Film Festival, which started in 2004. The festival is organized by Li Xianting, a prominent art critic and curator, and festival artistic director Wang Hongwei, an important figure in China's independent film scene (and sometime actor in the films of Jia Zhang-ke). Based in Songzhuang in suburban Beijing, the festival was the rare pocket in China where unencumbered artistic expression flourished, not only with the festival, but with a film school and a valuable archive of Chinese independent film.

However, in recent years, the festival has come under fire by the authorities, clearly threatened by the burgeoning artistic and documentary film movements brewing under the festival's aegis. Things came to a head in August of last year, where in the midst of Chinese president Xi Jinping's increasingly punitive crackdown on freedom of speech and mass media, the 11th edition of the festival was completely shut down by police on the day it was set to begin. Electricity to the venue was shut off, audience members were made to disperse, and organizers Li, Wang, and Fan Rong were detained by police and forced to sign documents promising not to hold the festival. Also, authorities raided the offices of the Li Xianting Film Fund, the organization overseeing the festival, seizing computers, files, and its archive of independent films and other materials. (The above poster illustrating this article was made for the canceled 11th edition of the festival, appropriately picturing a power generator.)

Happily, there is a silver lining to this terrible situation. In August and September, the Beijing Independent Film Festival will be revived in various venues in New York with the film series "Cinema on the Edge: Best of the Beijing Independent Film Festival 2012-2014," which runs from August 7 through September 13. The series is organized and curated by producer and distributor Karin Chien, critic and curator Shelly Kraicer, and filmmaker and anthropologist J.P. Sniadecki. 

Organized with the full cooperation of the festival, the series consists of 29 features and shorts, encompassing dramatic features, documentaries, experimental films, and animation. It's a vibrant snapshot of some of the most important work being done in Chinese independent film today, and it will include some of the films that were set to be screened at last year's aborted edition of the festival. 

The series includes films by such acclaimed filmmakers and artists as Ai Weiwei (Ping'an Yueqing), Hu Jie (Spark), Li Luo (Emperor Visits the Hell), Zhu Rikun (The Dossier), Yang Mingming (Female Directors), Cong Feng (Stratum 1: The Visitors), and Huang Ji (Egg and Stone). The venues where the films will screen are Anthology Film Archives, Asia Society, Maysles Cinema, the Museum of Chinese in America, UnionDocs, the Made in New York Media Center by IFP, and Columbia University.

"Cinema on the Edge" was funded by a successful Kickstarter campaign that is now seeking additional funds to bring more filmmakers from China to meet with audiences and participate in talks around their films, as well as allow the series to travel to other cities. As I write, this extended campaign is in its final few days, so there is still time to contribute. For more information, check their Kickstarter page, as well as the film series' website. This series is a rare opportunity to see films and meet filmmakers who represent the cutting edge of some of the most vital work currently being made in world cinema.

Below is the full schedule of the series, as well as the Kickstarter campaign video which provides some background information.