Jia Zhangke's New Documentary Debuts At Cannes Film Festival

Jia And Actress Zhao Tao Attend Screening Of "I Wish I Knew" This February, the Chinese director Jia Zhangke ("The World", "24 City") spoke to Jing Daily about his forthcoming Shanghai documentary, "I Wish I Knew" (海上传奇). Jia told us that his interest in Shanghai stemmed from his early years at art school in Beijing, and that "I Wish I Knew," which was inspired by Andre Malraux's novel La Condition Humaine, was 10 years in the making. From our interview: I started learning about and studying Shanghai during my sophomore year of college. I’ve put about ten years of preparation into this documentary, and always hoped to shoot it, and since this year the Shanghai World Expo will take place I was able to get funding for it...If I had started shooting earlier, I think I would’ve preferred to deal with 1920s Shanghai, but ten years after I first thought of doing this project, lots of people [who lived there at that time] have since passed away. In the new documentary, we start from the 1930s, talking to people who are still alive who remember that time. To me it’s a bit late, but that’s fine. At least we can look at the 1930s onward. This week at the 63rd annual Cannes Film Festival, Jia's hard work finally paid off with the official debut of "I Wish I Knew," which was selected for the festival's Un Certain Regard section. While reviews range from generally favorable ("Jia unravels the complex and abstract historical vocabulary [of Shanghai") in the Chinese-language press to comparatively tepid ("The film suffers from information deficiency") in the English-language press, "I Wish I Knew" -- much like the Shanghai Expo for which it was commissioned -- is likely aimed more at a domestic, rather than a foreign, audience. Photos (via Sina) of Jia Zhangke and actress Zhao Tao at the premiere of "I Wish I Knew" at Cannes yesterday:

Jia Zhangke's New Documentary Debuts At Cannes Film Festival

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Published May 17, 2010

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Jia Zhangke's New Documentary Debuts At Cannes Film Festival