Jia Zhang-ke (Ash is the Purest White, A Touch of Sin) filters a prismatic contemplation of twenty-first century China’s seismic shifts through two decades of his own films, anchored by regular collaborator Tao Zhao.
As if to prove there’s no finer cinematic chronicler of modern China, director Jia Zhangke repurposes his monumental oeuvre as a single entity. Blending documentary, previous features, musical numbers and multiple incarnations of regular star Zhao Tao, it’s an elusive love story and allusive national portrait, charting the path of a woman and a country through the ebb and flow of history’s tides.