Jia Zhangke takes I Wish I Knew to Toronto
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Chinese director Jia Zhangke's documentary "I Wish I Knew" has been added to an elite line-up at the 35th Toronto International Film Festival, which opens on September 9.
The film has been included in the Masters program, which is reserved for "the most influential directors living today," according to the Toronto Festival Web site, which calls 40-year-old Jia "one of the youngest masters of cinema."
"I Wish I Knew" chronicles the modern history of Shanghai through interviews with people of all ages. The film was also shown by invitation at the Cannes Film Festival in May.
Jia's films have long been popular among fans of art-house genre but not mainstream audiences. His films "Still Life" and "24 City" have won him international awards and professional accolades.
"Still Life", about the giant Three Gorges Dam project and its influence on ordinary people's lives, won the Golden Lion for Best Film at the 2006 Venice International Film Festival.
In 2009, Richard Brody, movie-listings editor at "The New Yorker" magazine, put Jia's semi-documentary film "24 City" 7th on his top 11 movies of that year. The film follows three generations of characters whose working lives in a factory in the southwestern Chinese city of Chengdu reflect the city's modernization process.
Among other films also included in the Toronto Festival's Masters program are Lee Chang-Dong's "Poetry", Takashi Miike's "13 Assassins" and Jerzy Skolimowski's "Essential Killing".
Canadian moviegoers will also be able to enjoy more Chinese films during the festival. On the screening roster are Feng Xiaogang's tearjerker "Aftershock", the newly crowned best-selling Chinese-language film of all time; Andrew Lau's action film "Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen"; Ann Hui's homosexual love film "All about Love"; Tsui Hark's suspense film "Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame".
The festival runs until September 19.
