Houjie Township

Houjie Township

Zhou Hao • 2002

Duration: 01:31:59
Language: Mandarin, Sichuan dialect
Subtitles: English
Country/Region: Mainland China

Houjie, a town on the Pearl River Estuary, rapidly transformed from an agricultural village into a labor-intensive industrial hub through Taiwanese and Hong Kong capital and cheap mainland labor. Migrant peasants from China’s poorest regions rent rooms near factories, building second homes. The film documents their little-known lives.

AWARDS & FESTIVALS

Black Pottery Award

Yunfest

China

2003

DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT

Zhou Hao

Zhou Hao

Director

This is my first feature-length documentary. It was filmed in Houjie Town, Dongguan, which was one of the earliest areas where Taiwanese businesses entered mainland China. Guided by a sharp journalistic instinct, Zhou Hao moved into a rented apartment with his camera. Within those walls, babies were born, bloody murders took place, and love unfolded—at once deeply mundane and profoundly intense. When Houjie Township was completed and it came time for the credits, I refused the title of ‘Director.’ To me, the word carried a derogatory connotation back then; I firmly believed that a documentary is something that grows organically out of life itself, not something that is ‘directed.’

TRAILER

Houjie Township - TRAILER

FILM STILLS

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