email Join our email list! divider Register Login cartCart
Icarus Film
Films from independent
producers worldwide.
32 Court Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201divider(718) 488 8900
From The dGenerate Films Collection
Outcry and Whisper
Directed by WEN Hai and ZENG Jinyan
 Text Size  Increase Font Size   Decrease Font Size   divider Printable VersionPrintable Version

A performance artist approaches a dais with a quiet formality, then proceeds to slowly and deliberately slice a series of cuts into her face with a razor. A doctoral student/filmmaker, under house arrest and constant surveillance, walks up to a vehicle following her and holds up a sign saying, “Shame to insult a woman.” Female factory workers describe being arrested and harassed when they stand up for their rights.

Shot over eight years, OUTCRY AND WHISPER is a highly personal and sometimes uncomfortably intimate documentary chronicling women’s oppression and resistance in mainland China and Hong Kong. One remarkable and tumultuous sequence is shot in the midst of Hong Kong pro-democracy demonstrations.

Co-director Jinyan Zeng—the filmmaker who confronts those tailing her—records striking acts of resistance while also sharing excerpts from her own video diary, in which she talks about her separation from her activist ex-husband and the different kinds of sexual abuse she faces. Female workers—often from rural provinces, who have come to big cities to work—share their stories of being placed under surveillance for organizing, and being arrested by police working in concert with factory owners.

Zeng and Wen previously collaborated on WE THE WORKERS, a verite documentary about the struggles of largely male union activists organizing workers in China. With OUTCRY AND WHISPER, their focus on women broadens the scope beyond labor. From factory workers gathering to demand collective bargaining to women gathering for a feminist film group, they highlight the common struggles women face, and their inventive and powerful means of fighting back.

"Collects together a diverse array of female voices raised in protest in Hong Kong and China. There is no denying the cumulative power of these accounts of the female experience of oppression, in all its many guises." —Wendy Ide, Screen Daily

World Premiere, Visions du Reel Documentary Film Festival 2020
Jean Rouch International Film Festival 2020
Special Jury Award, Seoul International Women's Film Festival

100 minutes / Color
Mandarin / English subtitles
Release: 2020
Copyright: 2020

For individual consumers (home video)

This title is available online from:

For colleges, universities, government agencies, hospitals and corporations

This DVD is sold with a license for institutional use and Public Performance rights.

Subject areas:
dGenerate Films Collection - Documentaries, China, Economic Sociology, Asia

Watch the trailer:

Related Titles:
Home | New | Titles | Subjects | Ordering   
About | Best Sellers | Filmmakers | Screenings   
address
  Follow Us! On...
Facebook Follow Icarus Films on Twitter Instagram Vimeo YouTube
Copyright (c) 2024, Icarus Films
Last Updated January 25, 2024 [Build 3.0.a060-d7]
Privacy Policy