​​University City Savages 

 

Inspiration

Synopsis​

The price we pay for progress(A review of Dimsum magazine / london)​

University City Savages Movie Review(Screening at the 2012 Chinese Visual Festival, London)​

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​​It is an in-depth, investigative video documentation exposing the story of a land-eviction and the fight back from the evicted residents, mainly the local farmers, in a vast indigenous region that had been renamed as Canton University City. 

 

I started making the film in early 2006. For the Chinese commoners, there was little novelty in such an event. It had been happening everywhere in China throughout the entire process of urban development since the late 1980s. Most people struggled to see the predatory nature of this movement due to the lack of transparency regarding the size of the land, compensation, and legal procedures. However, for the residents who had lost their land, it could be the most catastrophic event in their lives. They didn't just lose a piece of land; they had lost their livelihood, their ancestral temples, their burial ground, and the indigenous culture and language that used to be the foundation of their identity.

 

Despite the failure to raise publicity, the film was my first socially engaged practice. It couldn’t have been done without the support of a very courageous community. It helped me to realise the importance of working with people during hard times, especially when lives are scrambled with precarity. 

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