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The Cultural Revolution in China lasted from 1966 to 1976. In that decade, Mao Zedong's wife Jiang Qing commissioned eight model operas. For years, these works were the only entertainment allowed in China; people saw nothing else. In the operas, workers and soldiers glorified Leader Mao and the communist body of thought. Director Yan Ting Yuen visited the leading men and ladies, dancers, actors and composers of yesteryear and talked with them about their enormous fame at the time and their life afterwards. The interviews are alternated with fragments from the eight model works, with contemporary performances, a fictitious conversation with Qing and images of the modern-day Chinese streets. The Yang Ban Xi have not sunk into oblivion. The older generation of Chinese remembers the works out of nostalgia, the younger generation considers the operas droll, old-fashioned amusement.

Credits

Executive producer
Sound Design
Production company
Scarabeefilms
TV company
VPRO TV
Distributor NL
A-Film Distribution

Title: Yang Ban Xi, de 8 modelwerken
Year: 2005
Duration : 1 hour, 27 minutes
Category: Long Documentary
Edition: NFF 2005

NFF Archive

You are now in the NFF Archive. The archive contains contains information on film, TV and interactive productions that were screened at past festival editions. The NFF does not dispose of this material. For this, please contact the producer, distributor or broadcaster. Sometimes, older films can also be found at the Eye Film Museum or the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision.

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