the film director jia zhangke, whom i profiled earlier this year in the magazine, has pulled out of the melbourne international film festival to avoid appearing beside rebiya kadeer, the exiled uighur leader whom the chinese government has accused of instigating the recent riots in xinjiang. (kadeer is the subject of a documentary, “10 conditions of love,” which will also be shown at the festival.) jia and his production company, xstream productions, released a statement in chinese this week, portions of which i’ve translated:
1. we have no interest in meddling with the festival’s freedom of artistic exchange. withdrawing from melbourne is, rather, a kind of self-restraint. xinjiang history is not something i’m well acquainted with, but the recent urumqi violent incident was only two weeks ago, and i, at a minimum, should take a cautious approach. i don’t want to do anything that would tarnish those who died.
2. i have a sense that the political overtone of this year’s melbourne festival is getting more and more intense…in putting the documentary “10 conditions of love,” in which rebiya [kadeer] plays a key role, on the playbill, the organizers organized a series of publicity activities for her.
3. we feel that appearing with rebiya in a thoroughly politicized festival crosses the line of what our emotions and behavior can accept and is not appropriate. therefore, xstream unanimously decided to withdraw, in order to express our attitude and position.
the decision to withdraw has startled fans overseas, some of whom tend to view jia as a political rebel. but that portrait has always struck me as an oversimplification that fails to capture the nuances of his position in china. he is, emphatically, not a dissident director. he made an explicit choice years ago to submit his films to censorship in order to gain a broader audience. as he has told me, “marginalization can be a kind of pleasant stance—i really admire many of those people—but i would rather expend enormous energy trying to dance with the many levels of the era in which we live.” given the mood in china these days and the intensity of the official campaign against kadeer, there is little question in my mind that if jia had appeared at the festival with kadeer he would have run into political problems at home. it’s not impossible to imagine that his films might have encountered distribution problems or his funding sources would have come under more serious scrutiny. (see the experience of the gongmeng law firm.) whether his foreign fans like it or not, jia has decided that he would rather work within the system, and with his budgets reaching into the millions of dollars these days, it is understandable that he is more cautious than he once was about whether his films have a commercial future.
none of this is likely to assuage critics abroad who will interpret this as arguably china’s greatest living director bending to the autocratic demands of the government. but reading his comments today, i am reminded that the interpretation of the violence in xinjiang looks very different to chinese observers—even ones we think of as liberals—than it does to foreigners. as he has throughout his career, jia has read the political winds and arrived at a tough, polarizing decision.
今年年初我在《纽约客》里介绍的中国电影导演贾樟柯为了避免出现在热比娅·卡德尔身边而退出墨尔本国际电影节。作为东突厥独立运动领袖的热比娅被中国政府指控为最近在新疆发生的暴乱事件的元凶。（以热比娅为主题的纪录片《爱的10个条件》也将在电影节上放映。）贾樟柯和他的电影制作公司——西河制作公司——这周内用中文发表了声明，部分翻译如下：
“我们无意于干涉墨尔本电影节艺术交流的自由，退出电影节只是自我约束。对于新疆的历史我并不是非常熟悉，但是最近在乌鲁木齐发生的暴乱事件离我们只有两个星期之遥，出于谨慎的考虑，我不会去做任何会冒犯到死者的事情。
我感觉到本届电影节的政治意味愈发浓重。组委会不仅将热比娅主演的《爱的10个条件》列人放映节目单，而且为她组织了一系列的公开活动
我们觉得与热比娅同时出现在一个彻底政治化的电影节里超过了我们感情和行为所能接受的限度，这是不合时宜的举动，所以为了表明我们的态度和立场，西河制作公司一致同意退出电影节。”
退出电影节的决定让贾樟柯的海外粉丝们备感意外，因为他们中一些人将贾樟柯看成是政治反叛者。但是我觉得那样的评价过于简单化，没有抓住贾樟柯在中国所处地位的微妙之处。
贾樟柯显然不是与政府背道而驰的导演。几年前为了扩大观众群他明确地选择将电影作品送审。正如他跟我说的：“边缘化是非常好的姿态，我确实欣赏边缘电影的导演们，但是我宁可花精力与我们所生活的时代的许多阶层共舞。”
考虑到中国目前的局势和官方打击热比娅的呼声，我确信如果贾樟柯出席电影节他在中国国内会碰到政治麻烦。可以想象到他的电影会遇到发行的问题或者资金来源会受到更加严格的监督。不管他的海外粉丝们接受与否，贾樟柯已经决定要在体制内工作，而且如今随着他的电影制作的预算高达几百万美元，他比以前更加当心电影未来的商业市场。这一点也情有可原。
但是这些却不足以平息国外的批评之声——中国活着的最伟大的电影导演已经屈服于中国政府的专制要求。但是今天读到贾对此的评论，我意识到中国的观察家们（尽管他们就是我们所认为的自由分子）对新疆暴乱事件的看法与国外大相径庭。正如贾樟柯在他之前的导演生涯中做过的选择，这次他理解了政治风向并作出艰难决定，尽管这个决定让他的观众意见分化。