Educational Media Reviews Online

A note at the beginning of Female Directors explains the ostensible premise: Ah Ming and Yueyue are two young women who have graduated from film school in China but can’t find work, so they decide to make a film about themselves. We see the two film each other as they talk about their lives and relationships with men, including what is gained materially in a relationship. The discussions are frequently profane. The rough camerawork and use of blackouts as transition devices gives the feel of a homemade project.

But this approach may have been deliberately crafted by director Yang Mingming. Since she receives the credit, we can surmise this isn’t necessarily a “true” story of the two young women. How much of the video is carefully scripted?

For Western viewers used to Mandarin-language films from directors such as Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige, with their lush settings and gorgeous cinematography, the DIY approach of Yang Mingming might be off-putting. Was this intended as a rebuke of the “well-made” style that made Zhang and Chen internationally famous?

And is the explicitness of the talk an in-your-face rebuttal to conventional ideas of Chinese womanhood? It may be difficult to fully appreciate what Yang Mingming is getting at if the viewer lacks an in-depth understanding of Chinese culture. Viewers who don’t understand Mandarin are also at a disadvantage because the subtitles move very quickly.

This release from Icarus Films is part of The dGenerate Films Collection, “the leading source of independent Chinese film in North America,” as described on the video container. It’s important that current Chinese artists, perhaps not fully sanctioned by the government, get attention in the West, even if general audiences may not fully grasp what is intended in these films. Female Directors is recommended for universities with Chinese studies programs and libraries with large film studies collections.