SWYC

A CCTV-commissioned, 8-part series shot between 1988 and 1990, but barred from being released after the events of June 4th. A production of the Structure, Wave, Youth, Cinema Experimental Group, an informal collective of young filmmakers founded in 1989 and devoted to the production of documentaries, that includes: this series' two directors, Shi Jian and Chen Jue, as well as Wang Guangli, cinematographers Wang Hongyou and Zhao Baohong, and others like Meng Weidong and Wang Fei. The series documents various aspects of life surrounding Tiananmen: survivors of the imperial era, street performers, grandmothers cooking for their families, fledgling entrepreneurs, fashion school students, foreigners marrying Chinese nationals, and so forth. Each episode starts with a close-up of a giant portrait of Mao hung over the Square, and proceeds as a hybrid of archival footage, direct cinema, and cinema verité, weaving a permanent dialectic between the present and the past, daily life and history.

In the first 30 years of the PRC, in order to maintain and consolidate CCP’s rule, political campaigns were frequently launched. Landowner Liu Wencai’s home in Sichuan province became the "Landlord Manor Exhibition Hall," serving to educate people about the class struggle. Tens of thousands visited daily. The cluster of sculptures entitled "Rent Collection Courtyard" was the subject of a documentary film and the prototype for copies of statues exhibited across the country. The overwhelming media publicity turned Liu Wencai into the representative of the "heinous crimes" of the landlord class and he became a household name, influencing several generations. Liu Xiaofei, grandson of Liu Wencai, has suffered from injustice since his childhood and began his interviews and investigations into this catastrophe for his family twenty years ago, in order to “clear” the charges against his grandfather and restore the historical truth.

A group of chinese students talk to the camera about love, sex, career prospects, decisions to stay or leave the country, and the impact events in Tiananmen had had on their lives.