China From the Inside
I would love to see this new 4-hour documentary about China made for Granada-KQED-PBS-BBC entitled China From the Inside.
From the article:
The footage is vast. Cameras traveled to Tibet; Xinjiang, home to many Muslims; the Kazakhstan border; the Gobi Desert; and the Yangtze River. There are interviews with women activists trying to instill self-confidence among rural women (to try to help stave off a high suicide rate); a National People’s Congress delegate comparing communism with U.S. democracy; a Catholic priest practicing religion in an atheist country; and residents who’ve been displaced by the gargantuan construction of the Three Gorges Dam. …an environmental activist talks about the polluted Huai River, its cancer-inducing contaminants ravaging the lives of villagers whose photos he displays. In the segment about women, a factory worker in Guangdong Province talking about her day-to-day life: Working the assembly line and prohibited from talking between 6:08 a.m. and 6:08 p.m.
It’s no surprise that the Chinese government was a little concerned about the making of this documentary, but it sounds as though the government minders assigned to this project deserve much respect for making excuses and leaving the set when sensitive topics were being covered. The fact that the documentary’s director had previously made a 4-part documentary entitled “Hell in the Pacific” about the Nanjing massacre by the Japanese probably helped him get reasonably free access to cover sensitive locations, people, and topics.
Thanks to <shamus> for the link.
