Storm under the Sun (English Version)
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Release Year:
2009
Story:
This is the first feature documentary concerning Mao’s purge of writers and focuses on the 1955 Anti-Hu Feng Campaign, where set a precedent for larger scale and better-known persecution of intellectuals in 1957 (Anti-Rightist Campaign). The film’s intriguing plot spans the period from 1929 to 2009 and offers an in-depth look at the tumultuous changes in recent Chinese history. The film’s first English version was made in 2007 and is 156 minutes long. A newly revised 139-minute version is currently available in both English and Chinese. At the request of a Japanese sinologist and NHK, a Japanese version, which runs 20 minutes longer than the 2009 version and includes interviews with four Japanese sinologists, was completed in 2012. It will be screened in Tokyo in December 2012. While alive, Chairman Mao Zedong was looked upon as “the Red Sun” in China. Many regarded him as the “God” who saved the Chinese people from years of war and suffering while remaining ignorant of the fact that his god-like position was achieved in part by destroying the autonomy of Chinese intellectuals through the implementation of a series of violent and tumultuous political campaigns. Storm under the Sun follows the persecution of Hu Feng, a renowned writer and literary theorist of the 1930s who founded the magazines July and Hope and nurtured a generation of talented poets and writers. Hu Feng was the first intellectual to be singled and directly condemned by Mao. He suffered several rounds of harsh criticisms from 1944 to 1955, followed by 24 years of imprisonment. Mao personally initiated the “Anti Hu Feng Counter-Revolutionary Group Campaign” in May 1955, which resulted in the imprisonment of 78 Chinese intellectuals, mostly poets and writers, and led to the incrimination of more than 2,100 people. This documentary is the first to revisit these events after half a century, inviting survivors of the “storm” to reveal the cruel truths that lie beneath China’s official history.
This is the first feature documentary concerning Mao’s purge of writers and focuses on the 1955 Anti-Hu Feng Campaign, where set a precedent for larger scale and better-known persecution of intellectuals in 1957 (Anti-Rightist Campaign). The film’s intriguing plot spans the period from 1929 to 2009 and offers an in-depth look at the tumultuous changes in recent Chinese history. The film’s first English version was made in 2007 and is 156 minutes long. A newly revised 139-minute version is currently available in both English and Chinese. At the request of a Japanese sinologist and NHK, a Japanese version, which runs 20 minutes longer than the 2009 version and includes interviews with four Japanese sinologists, was completed in 2012. It will be screened in Tokyo in December 2012. While alive, Chairman Mao Zedong was looked upon as “the Red Sun” in China. Many regarded him as the “God” who saved the Chinese people from years of war and suffering while remaining ignorant of the fact that his god-like position was achieved in part by destroying the autonomy of Chinese intellectuals through the implementation of a series of violent and tumultuous political campaigns. Storm under the Sun follows the persecution of Hu Feng, a renowned writer and literary theorist of the 1930s who founded the magazines July and Hope and nurtured a generation of talented poets and writers. Hu Feng was the first intellectual to be singled and directly condemned by Mao. He suffered several rounds of harsh criticisms from 1944 to 1955, followed by 24 years of imprisonment. Mao personally initiated the “Anti Hu Feng Counter-Revolutionary Group Campaign” in May 1955, which resulted in the imprisonment of 78 Chinese intellectuals, mostly poets and writers, and led to the incrimination of more than 2,100 people. This documentary is the first to revisit these events after half a century, inviting survivors of the “storm” to reveal the cruel truths that lie beneath China’s official history.
Casts & Crews:
Peng Xiaolian
Directors
S. Louisa Wei
Directors
Runtime:
136
minutes
Language:
Reference:
Official Selection, International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, The Netherland, December 7, 2007
Official Selection, The 33rd Hong Kong International Film Festival, Hong Kong, March 31 and April 5, 2009
Official Selection, Chinese Film Festival, Nottingham, UK, January 2010
Forum Screening, Chinese Documentary Special Series, Michigan, USA, October 2010
Forum Screening, Chinese Film Conference, University of South Carolina, USA, October 19, 2012
Forum Screening, The Fringe Festival, Shenzhen, China, December 12, 2012
Forum Screening, School of Marxist Studies, Renmin University of China, Beijing, March 5-19, 2014
Official Selection, AAS Film Expo, Philadelphia, USA, March 27, 2014
Forum Screening, Hong Kong Independent Writer’s Society, June 7, 2014
Special Screening, “Literary Dissent under the Chinese Communists: The Hu Feng Affair”—an event organized by The English Pen and Verso (publisher), London School of Economics and Political Science, UK, November 6, 2014
Official Selection, International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, The Netherland, December 7, 2007
Official Selection, The 33rd Hong Kong International Film Festival, Hong Kong, March 31 and April 5, 2009
Official Selection, Chinese Film Festival, Nottingham, UK, January 2010
Forum Screening, Chinese Documentary Special Series, Michigan, USA, October 2010
Forum Screening, Chinese Film Conference, University of South Carolina, USA, October 19, 2012
Forum Screening, The Fringe Festival, Shenzhen, China, December 12, 2012
Forum Screening, School of Marxist Studies, Renmin University of China, Beijing, March 5-19, 2014
Official Selection, AAS Film Expo, Philadelphia, USA, March 27, 2014
Forum Screening, Hong Kong Independent Writer’s Society, June 7, 2014
Special Screening, “Literary Dissent under the Chinese Communists: The Hu Feng Affair”—an event organized by The English Pen and Verso (publisher), London School of Economics and Political Science, UK, November 6, 2014
Director‘s Statement:
On March 17, 1967, poet Ah Long died in prison of bone marrow cancer. On April 2, 1968, my father Peng Boshan was whipped to death by the Red Guards.
The two men never met each other and had no connection. Being involved in the same case, they both died for being members of the “Hu Feng Counterrevolutionary Clique.”
In those years, death was a daily matter. Even when facing my father’s death, As a 14-year-old, I seemed quite rational. I do not know how we were so “strong.” Many years later, after I had studied and lived in New York for seven years, I began to learn about the value of a human being and to realize the meaning of family and the importance of my father to me. Looking back, it is shocking that I was once so “strong.” We were brainwashed to the extent that we did not value our lives. I had the urge to reflect upon the past. This is perhaps my initial motivation to make Storm under the Sun with S. Louisa Wei.
- by Peng Xiaolian
During the past five years, I have witnessed the damages of the Hu Feng Incident on the families involved in the Case. I have gradually come to understand why my parents wanted to keep me away from the arts: in China, art has often been crushed by politics. Storm under the Sun, through its archival footage and creative materials, aims not only to present the cause and effect of a significant historical event but to document stories of these families on the margin of history.
- by S. Louisa Wei
The two men never met each other and had no connection. Being involved in the same case, they both died for being members of the “Hu Feng Counterrevolutionary Clique.”
In those years, death was a daily matter. Even when facing my father’s death, As a 14-year-old, I seemed quite rational. I do not know how we were so “strong.” Many years later, after I had studied and lived in New York for seven years, I began to learn about the value of a human being and to realize the meaning of family and the importance of my father to me. Looking back, it is shocking that I was once so “strong.” We were brainwashed to the extent that we did not value our lives. I had the urge to reflect upon the past. This is perhaps my initial motivation to make Storm under the Sun with S. Louisa Wei.
- by Peng Xiaolian
During the past five years, I have witnessed the damages of the Hu Feng Incident on the families involved in the Case. I have gradually come to understand why my parents wanted to keep me away from the arts: in China, art has often been crushed by politics. Storm under the Sun, through its archival footage and creative materials, aims not only to present the cause and effect of a significant historical event but to document stories of these families on the margin of history.
- by S. Louisa Wei
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Casts & Crews
Peng Xiaolian
Director
S. Louisa Wei
Director
