Film Screening: “Self Portrait: 47KM 2020” (Zhang Mengqi, 2023)

^{Mengqi Zhang, 2023, 190 min, China, Chinese w/ English subtitles}

Professor Guo-Juin Hong (AMES) will introduce the film and moderate the post-screening conversation with director Zhang Mengqi.

This is the newest addition to the film series shot in the homeland of the director’s father, a village called “47KM” in a mountainous region of China. During the COVID pandemic, farmwork continues across four seasons as it does each year.

Director's film note:

In 2020, the sudden outbreak of COVID-19 swept the globe with panic and death, keeping the whole world hostage in fear and isolation. 220 kilometres from Wuhan, China, villagers in 47KM lived through the turmoil guided by ancestral prophecies and lifestyle, continuing their ordinary existence in those extraordinary times.

About the director:

Zhang Mengqi was born in 1987. She is a filmmaker and choreographer, as well as a founding member of the Folk Memory Project. She curated and co-organized the “Film For Mother” festival in 2021.  

Mengqi has made 11 feature-length documentaries, known as the “Self-Portrait series.” Her films have been selected by Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival , Cinéma du Réel, Visions du Réel, BFI London Film Festival. Her films have been awarded the White Goose Award at the DMZ International Documentary Film Festival, the BIFF Mecenat Award at the Busan International Film Festival, the Jean Vigo prize for best Director, the Youth Prize for best film at Punto de Vista, Best Feature Film at Festival Internacional de cine independiente de cosquín, and the International Competition Award of Excellence at the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival.

Her choreographic work has been performed in Foundation CULTURESCAPES (Switzerland), Rencontres chorégraphiques internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis (France), ImPuls Tanz (Vienna), Eurokaz (Croatia), etc.  

About the series:

This screening is part of the 2025 Living the Pandemic Film Series by AMES Presents, featuring new works from The Folk Memory Project, Caochangdi, China.