It’s a very sad film. I mean, sadly made and developed. Being the documentary real or fake, It’s evident that Wú Wénguāng states from the very beginning the condition that he won’t do anything for Wáng. It’s the old dilemma from documentaries: Do I help my character when I possibly know ways to help him in a consistent way? For example, Nanook the skimo pulling the fish and being in relative danger and the cameraman, being there, doing nothing to help is something that has always irritated me a lot. Wú Wénguāng is supposed to have experience specially in indepent filmmaking and doesn’t offer anything remarkable to Wáng. He’s like experimenting with a laboratory mouse, and making a documentary film out of a desfavorable situation seems to be above anything for him. Wú just reaffirms the status quo on average film production, no matter if it’s independent or industrial. It’s precisely with the fact of being there that his behavior and “neutrality” give the feeling that filmmaking depends on schematic industry/academy, “social connections”, or on having money and, judging by montage and point of view, there’s the impression too that for Wú no substance or deep motivation at all seems to be important (or defended?) when making a film. Here is not criticism, but apology from Wú. I feel the subtext somehow is: “only the rich boys in China (and in the whole world perhaps) can access to some knowledge”. For me, the sadest, lamest moments in the doc are the encounter with the graduated director (the boy with glasses) at the entrance of the studio (that studio is actually round the corner from the BFA, and some days it’s even more crowded with people who want to be film and tv extras), and the reading of Wáng’s diaries by the end. I agree with Wáng: Wú Wénguāng just exploited him. If it was an exchange of favors, then it was a very unfair one. That scene at Wú’s friends apartment, was a total humiliation for Wáng, in every aspect. It shows the filmmaker’s total affirmation of social connections as means for getting anything.
Could Mr. Wú Wénguāng at least make a little hint on what could probably be a deep cause(s) or context(s) for Wáng’s situation?