Smile, With 8 Teeth Showing: Remarkable Portrait Of China Emerges In Oscar-Shortlisted ‘Ascension’
01.02.2022 - 18:23
/ deadline.com
In just a few days the Winter Olympic Games begin in Beijing, a massive event China will use to present an idealized image of itself to the world.
For a truer picture of China, in all its complexities and contradictions, ignore the Olympic pageantry and check out the documentary Ascension. The Oscar-shortlisted film, directed by Jessica Kingdon, creates a nuanced portrait of contemporary China, with emphasis on its increasingly stratified class system.
Ascension begins with aspiring workers pouring into cities in search of opportunity.
“A lot of it is migrant laborers,” Kingdon notes, “people from the countryside coming in.”
There are plenty of jobs, for those who don’t mind menial labor at less than munificent wages. Loudspeakers tout the advantages of signing up for one employer over another.
“Now recruiting, jobs at a foreign company,” one announcement says. “Factories and dorms with air conditioning. Standard uniform is required. Seated work available.”
If that doesn’t sound appealing, there are other options: “Hiring now, free ride to the factory!” “Dorm and food provided, no health test required.”
But would-be applicants often face restrictions: “No hair dye. No ear studs for men… People with color vision deficiency, or over 1.75 meters height (5’9”), don’t come.”
China’s vast supply of labor and low wage scale has made it the manufacturer to the world. It has also created a class of super-rich. Sandwiched in between is a growing middle class of professionals. The middle and upper classes are gobbling up goods at quite a clip.
“China has the largest consumer market in the world, competing neck and neck with the U.S., and it’s happened in the past 35 years, very quickly,” Kingdon tells Deadline. “So, I’m looking at what