The Phantom Image. The Filmmaker Wang Bing and the Archeology of the Memory in China

The majority of Wang Bing’s (born in 1963) filming locations are situated in rural regions, often on the countryside like the Dongbei (north-east), the Gansu (North-west), or the Yunnan (south-west). The filmmaker meets with “little” people. Workers, former political prisoners, alienated and farmers: all explain the professional , familial , social, material, or moral precariousness, the forced loneliness, sometimes linked to political persecutions , or the choice of a complete detachment towards society. All of these themes constitute the main subjects of his movies. The specificity of Wang Bing’s realism, compared to his contemporaries’ one , lies, at the same time, in the total absence of every writing work before the filming and the use of the camera . The recording tool, directly in the extension on the body (to the shoulder, single-handedly, on the knee), build the image at the same time as the movie takes shape and scripts itself. Wild filming method in the style of a Godard; the revolution brought by the use of a numerical camera multiply, moreover, the technical possibilities. This wandering of the lens, in turns qualified of “advanced principles” or of following the camera, substantiates on the screen the artist’s desire to understand. The filmmaker pursues the reality of his subject; accompany it, without any other form of preparation…