Unspoken Cinema

  A RIVER RUNS, TURNS, ERASES, REPLACES (2021/Shengze ZHU/USA-China) Séances spéciales du festival des 3 continents OPENING SEQUENCE Right away we notice these first two images are from a CCTV surveillance camera. A rough resolution, with bright RGB colours, as if it didn’t belong on a cinema screen. There are writings burnt into the screen, with a date (April the 4th 2020) and a clock marking the passing of time. A high angle point of view, from a building a few stories high, or from a street post. The shot frames the intersection of two streets, with cars, a couple motorcycles and pedestrians (who were absent from the previous shot). When suddenly an emergency horn blasts the painful sound of a one-note siren out of nowhere. Everybody pauses and looks around. The city is Wuhan, in China (epicenter of this worldwide pandemic). The siren lasted for several minutes. The event was a « carefully orchestrated national day of mourning ». We ignore how the lockdown affected the inhabita...