Mouthpiece (dir. Guo Xizhi) This week we are spotlighting the Reel China Documentary Biennial, which held its Fifth edition last October with a showcase of nine recent documentaries produced by independent filmmakers in China. To commemorate the event, we are posting a handful of reports by attendees of the festival. By Christopher Campbell Guo Xizhi’s Mouthpiece is part of the recent “vérité” tradition in Chinese documentary that continues to be partly inspired by the work o

The Festival announced its awards for the following films (with citations by the jury in quotes): Independent Spirit Award Spiral Staircase of Harbin (dir. Ji Dan) A Harbin apartment complex is home to two broken households and fragile relationships between parents and teenage children in this pensive study of cross-generational conflict. “Through her unadorned, everyday visual angle, the director shows us ordinary real life in China. In its conciseness and depth, the film t