“The Land of Many Palaces” (2014) follows a government official whose job is to convince these farmers that their lives will be better off in the city, and a farmer in one of the last remaining villages in the region who is pressured to move. The film explores a process that will take shape on an enormous scale across China as the central government has announced plans to relocate 250 million farmers to cities across the nation over the next 20 years. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with the production team.

Monday, December 8, 5:30-7:15pm
“The Land of Many Palaces: Film Screening + Q&A”
Adam James Smith, Co-Director/Co-Producer
Song Ting, Co-Director/Co-Producer
Wang Qihan, Co-Producer
Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China
Embassy of France | 80 RMB | Registration

In Ordos, China, thousands of farmers are being relocated to a new city under a government plan to modernize the region. “The Land of Many Palaces” (2014) follows a government official whose job is to convince these farmers that their lives will be better off in the city, and a farmer in one of the last remaining villages in the region who is pressured to move. The film explores a process that will take shape on an enormous scale across China as the central government has announced plans to relocate 250 million farmers to cities across the nation over the next 20 years. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with the production team.

Adam James Smith is a Stanford-educated documentary filmmaker from England. His films focus on characters experiencing rapid change in their lives. To date, he has produced, directed and edited four short documentaries in America — “The Diner”, “Love & Allegiance” (co-directed by Tijana Petrovic), “Shangri-La” and “Role Play” — and one feature documentary in China, “The Land of Many Palaces” (co-directed by Song Ting).

As a director and cinematographer, Song Ting’s short films have screened in many international film festivals. She was selected for the Asian Film Academy of the Busan International Film Festival in 2011 and the Golden Horse Academy at Taipei Golden Horse International Film Festival in 2011. Ting produced the feature film “Her Love Story” in 2011, directed by Gu Qiao. She earned her MFA degree in Film Production from the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University and holds dual BAs in English Literature and Finance from the University of International Business & Economics in Beijing. She has worked on films in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the US, Singapore, Korea, Japan and Indonesia.

A bilingual producer/director and a graduate from Beijing University’s History Department, Wang Qihan has more than twenty years of experience in both documentary and narrative fields in China. Currently, she is producing “Born in China”, a wildlife movie jointly funded by Disney and SMG. Prior to that, she has produced a series of documentary projects that have been broadcast on China Central Television, BBC, Channel 4, National Geographic and CBC Television.

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