The bleakness of the harsh rural landscape is impressively captured.
| Director: | Miaoyan Zhang |
| Screenplay: | Miaoyan Zhang, Yang Zhihong |
| Music: | Andy F. Butler, Anette Bauer |
| Cinematography: | Miaoyan Zhang |
| Editing: | Miaoyan Zhang |
| Cast: | Danhui Mao, Mengjuan Liu, Yingyang |
| Awards: | Nagroda NETPAC – MFF w Rotterdamie / NETPAC Award – IFF Rotterdam (2011) |
Miaoyan Zhang — born in Manchuria in 1964 and growing up during the Culture Revolution, ZHANG Miaoyan barely had a chance to see movies. In the 90s he got an opportunity to study art at UC Berkeley which enabled him to watch foreign movies nonstop. Miaoyan started writing stories about contemporary China. None of them were published due to state censorship.
They both fall victim to an incurable disease. Xiaolin and his wife Xiaojuan are only two of many thousands that are infected with HIV each year, selling their blood. As the couple fight for their lives, Xiaolin goes from door to door to try and get their daughter Ying adopted. Finally, Xiaojuan passes away, leaving Xiaolin with an deserted blood collecting station and a hungry daughter. But life still goes on...
Miaoyan Zhang’s beautifully shot bitter drama Black Blood is a simple, but grippingly absorbing, story of an impoverished Chinese family in remote northwestern China who resort to selling their blood as the only way to try and survive. The film, which premiered at the Rotterdam Film Festival, is Zhang’s second film and received post-production support from the festival’s Hubert Bals Fund.
Plot
As the dark smoke of the factory hits Xiaolin’s throat, he knows he is getting close. Up ahead he sees the rattling old truck, at the edge of the crumbling Great Wall and the queue of villagers, eager to sell their blood. Xiaolin decides to returns to sell his blood in order to pay for his daughter's tuition. And soon his wife joins him. They decide to start a blood collecting business named Ali-Baba. They start to make considerable profits and their once empty courtyard soon becomes the bustling home to a large herd of sheep. Although their lives appear to be going well, it is a matter of time before disaster strikes.They both fall victim to an incurable disease. Xiaolin and his wife Xiaojuan are only two of many thousands that are infected with HIV each year, selling their blood. As the couple fight for their lives, Xiaolin goes from door to door to try and get their daughter Ying adopted. Finally, Xiaojuan passes away, leaving Xiaolin with an deserted blood collecting station and a hungry daughter. But life still goes on...
Review
By Mark Adams
Shot in widescreen black-and-white – apart from two atmospheric colour sequences of factories billowing out smoke and fumes – the film is structured in a simple linear fashion, but Zhang makes great use of his set-ups, allowing the strange eroded landscape and the dusty village locations to tell the story as much as his protagonists.
Couple Xiaolin (Danhui Mao) and his wife Xiaojuan (Mengjuan Liu) are struggling to make ends meet, with water in short supply and needing money to pay for their daughter’s tuition. Xiaolin decides to sell his blood to try and raise funds, and before long both husband and wife are selling blood.
They decide to start a blood collecting business – named Ali-Baba – and before long he is wearing a suit and making the grand gesture of buying a toilet for the house. But when both become infected with HIV their dreams crumble around them, with Xiaolin eventually even going from door to door to try and get their daughter adopted.
The bleakness of the harsh rural landscape is impressively captured, as is the harshness of the life the family lead. The actual blood-giving is never explicitly captured on film – instead Xiaolin simply wanders towards a road where he patiently waits for a man driving a tractor to arrive. It is here – in the middle of nowhere and with no medical backup – the blood is bought and sold.
Trailer
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