THE SQUARE
(广场)
dirs. Zhang Yuan and Duan Jinchuan, 1994
100 mins. China.
In Mandarin with English subtitles.

TUESDAY, JUNE 4 – 7:30 PM
MONDAY, JUNE 10 – 7:30 PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 18 – 7:30 PM
SATURDAY, JUNE 29 – 10 PM

Never before screened in New York City and long-suppressed in China, this documentary by the renowned Sixth Generation filmmaker Zhang Yuan (MAMA, SONS, BEIJING BASTARD) sprang from an innocent-enough idea in the years after the June 4 Incident: Tiananmen Square was a public space, so who was to stop Zhang (with Duan Jinchuan) from filming day-to-day mundanities in the guise of working for state TV? It’s a fascinating (and sometimes, dryly funny) glimpse at China on the eve of sweeping economic transition, with accoutrements of the Mao era perhaps uncanny present. Largely emptied out in the years after the Incident, this Square is defined by its absences, and the unease of its own legacy.

“Anyone who knows about Chinese history understands that whatever huge historical changes play out, Tiananmen Square is often the stage – for instance, the June Fourth Incident in 1989, Tomb-Sweeping Day in 1976 when crowds came out to mourn Zhou Enlai. In 1966 it was there in the square that Mao Zedong received more than six million Red Guards. If we go back even further, there is the 1949 ceremony to celebrate the founding of the People’s Republic of China and, if we like, we can go back even further to the May Fourth Movement and beyond. On one level, Tiananmen Square can be said to be a political symbol; at the same time, it is like a massive stage… Especially in the years following the June Fourth Incident, I noticed how quiet it had become. I would see people there flying kites, peddling things, going for strolls, and I would see so many policemen, plainclothes officers… I felt the pressing need to pick up my camera and record some of those more interesting people and attempt to capture that feeling of the square.” – Zhang Yuan