cover news reporter Li Yuxin
Jiang Nengjie (right) is filming "Village Children"
Low and old mud brick houses, winding country roads, rice fields that ripple in the breeze... Speaking of rural areas, you What comes to mind?
This is a vast and rough land, a countryside full of earthy atmosphere. It is also the birthplace of documentary director Jiang Nengjie. In this land, there used to be heard the low sobs of left-behind children, the suppressed coughs of pneumoconiosis patients, the helpless sighs of migrant farmers... and these sounds were all captured in the camera by Jiang Nengjie, and presented in or on the big screen. or on a small screen.
Since picking up a camera in 2008, Jiang Nengjie has been walking between the countryside and the city for several years, focusing his camera on disadvantaged and marginalized groups. So, he spent his youth in the countryside with vegetation and gravel, and in the narrations of the people he photographed.
Just before the May 4th Youth Day, the cover news reporter called Jiang Nengjie. At that time, he was finishing a shooting and took time out of his busy schedule to be interviewed. When his voice with a slight Hunan accent came out from the mobile phone, he talked about the separation from his parents in childhood, the tears of left-behind children he saw during filming, the inability to let go of the local complex, and the constant challenges he had to face when creating. economic pressure.
Childhood, hometown
"What do you want to do when you grow up?"
"Like your parents, go work."
These are a pair of clear and ignorant eyes, with endless curiosity about the outside world, and a childish and green face. Together, they appear in Jiang Nengjie’s shots. This is a scene from the documentary "Village Children", which records the story of three families of left-behind children who once lived deep in the mountains of Hunan. It is also the childhood that Jiang Nengjie experienced.
In the 1980s, Jiang Nengjie was born in a village in Xinning, Hunan. The childhood in my memory is the eagerness to let go of the cows on the way to herd the cows, the time when I used books to avoid farm work, the interest in reading developed in the lack of book resources, and the years of constant separation from my parents.
When he was 10 years old, Jiang Nengjie’s mother went out to work and became one of the first wave of migrant workers in China. When he was 15 years old, his father also went to work elsewhere. At that time, he didn't think there was anything special about this kind of life. During the years when his parents were not around, he lived with the elderly and younger brother in his family relying on each other. Later, when he was admitted to college and walked out of the mountains, he saw an article introducing left-behind children in a magazine in the school reading room, and then he realized that he was the first generation of "left-behind children." At the same time, he learned that there were so many children in his hometown whose parents were not at home all year round.
"Why I chose to photograph my hometown and the subject of left-behind children is related to my origin and experience." Jiang Nengjie said. In 2009, Jiang Nengjie, who graduated from college, picked up a camera and returned to his hometown of Guang'an Village, Xinning. He walked into the local village primary school and began to use his camera to record the daily life of a temporary school and 22 students, 17 of whom were left-behind children. Jiang Nengjie's first documentary "The Road" was also born. After that, he followed left-behind children for more than ten years and created a trilogy of public welfare documentaries focusing on left-behind children - "The Road", "Village Children" and "Plus One".
Jiang Nengjie (left) filming "Village Children"
Contemporary writer Fu Xiuying once said that a writer may write about his childhood throughout his life. Most of Jiang Nengjie’s works are based on the countryside where he grew up, with clear and strong imprints of his childhood and distinct attributes of the land.
In 2019, the documentary "Miners, Horsemen, Pneumoconiosis" shot by Jiang Nengjie sparked a lot of discussion on the Internet. The film recorded the story of a group of low-level miners in a private "mine" in Xinning, Hunan. In the film, the villagers who survive in the mines, the horsemen who transport ore and explosives, the miners who contracted pneumoconiosis under primitive conditions... these are all microcosms intertwined in Jiang Nengjie's childhood memories. Because when he was 11 years old, his father, second uncle, and third uncle, who were miners, all suffered from pneumoconiosis.Many years later, the experiences of his relatives became the stories told through Jiang Nengjie's lens.
"I am a person with a strong rural sentiment." Speaking of his hometown, which is always in his works, Jiang Nengjie said that he was born in the countryside, and his parents were also migrant workers. His childhood and adolescence in his hometown shaped his his life. "Because I often live at the bottom and have a lot of contact with the people at the bottom, I have a natural closeness to them. My hometown has also become the birthplace of my career and the earliest place of creation."
recorded, see
9, 2021 In August, the film "The Little Woman" directed by Jiang Nengjie landed in theaters and was officially released.
This is Jiang Nengjie's first attempt at creating a feature film, and it is also his first work to win the "Dragon Label". At this time, it is the twelfth year that he has paid attention to the subject of left-behind children. The starring role of "Short Woman" is exactly the protagonist in Jiang Nengjie's previous documentary, Jiang Yunjie, a left-behind child from Hunan.
Jiang Yunjie, who opened her eyes wide and said she wanted to go out to work when she grew up, was only 6 years old when she first appeared in Jiang Nengjie's lens. She was the subject of Jiang Nengjie's documentary debut "The Road" in 2009. . Then, in the story told in "The Village Child", we can also see the figure of this girl who stayed in the countryside and depended on the elderly.
Stills from the documentary "Children in the Village"
From the documentary "The Road" to "Children in the Village" to the movie "Little Woman", Jiang Nengjie has been rooted in the soil of his hometown for more than ten years and has continued to pay attention to the countryside in different ways. Left-behind children in a changing environment. Therefore, Jiang Nengjie, who is the first generation of left-behind children in China, used his camera to record the stories of the second and third generations of left-behind children.
Jiang Nengjie (first from the left) filming the movie "Dwarf"
"If I don't go to school, don't go out of the mountains, don't pick up the machine, don't jump out to observe, I will also be accustomed to the phenomenon of 'left-behind children'." Jiang Nengjie said. , when he went to a big city to go to school, and then looked back at his hometown, he began to wonder. He saw migrant worker families and the lack of attention and understanding among the left-behind children in his hometown. So, he picked up the camera and created his first work "The Road".
In 2012, Jiang Nengjie ended his two-year drift in Beijing, resigned from Guangguang Media, returned to his hometown of Guang'an Village, and began to record the people living in this land. Then, in 2014, the documentary "Village Children" that Jiang Nengjie had prepared for nearly 6 years finally came out; in 2019, "Miners, Horsemen, Pneumoconiosis", which took 10 years to complete, became popular on the Internet; in 2020, a charity documentary "Everything Will Happen" was broadcast, truly and objectively recording the stories of a group of "mentally disabled people"; in the early winter of 2023, "Sister Plus One" focusing on the growth of rural children was released...
Documentary "Children from Village Primary Schools" "Still
"They need to be seen." In the story told by Jiang Nengjie, those who need to be seen are not only the left-behind children who cry when their parents leave, but also the farmers and miners who suffer from pneumoconiosis due to illegal mining, and People with mental disabilities who "cannot control themselves" in daily life... "I care about this society. I hope that every 'marginal' group or vulnerable group can live with dignity. I hope that works that focus on social reality themes can Only by being seen by more people can we have a better voice, otherwise this kind of film will lose a lot of meaning. "
And in the mud of the countryside, in the rolling of the city, in the whispers of the people being photographed, Jiang Nengjie speaks. After my youth, more than ten years passed in a flash.
"I often use documentary methods to present issues, raise questions, and work hard to speak out, because many groups have difficulty speaking out, but they need attention." Jiang Nengjie said that his original intention of shooting documentaries was also to enhance the relationship between people. Understand and arouse empathy between people. "I want to eliminate some prejudices and have more kindness."
Countryside, city
When the movie "Dwarf" was released, it had been filmed for three years. This feature film, which started shooting in 2015, was released for 12 days, and the box office struggled to exceed 20 Ten thousand.
For public welfare documentary directors, the financial dilemma in creation seems to be a long-term one. "Making money to support the film" and "borrowing money to make the film" seemed to be the norm in Jiang Nengjie's early creation. In 2012, when Jiang Nengjie returned to the countryside and chose to shoot documentaries full-time, he had to take on commercial video shootings from time to time to survive.
In order to shoot the movie "The Little Woman", Jiang Nengjie couldn't find investment, so he raised and borrowed money to shoot, and spent the down payment of a house he planned to buy in Changsha. It was once rumored that Jiang Nengjie sold his house and car for filming, but he laughed and called this a "rumor". "I have never bought a house or a car, so how can I talk about selling it? But when I was filming "Short Woman", I did have a plan to buy a house in Changsha. I was already married and had children at the time, and the house price was not high. But when I was filming, I was short of money, so I misappropriated the down payment I had saved. Later, my plan to buy a house was shelved and has not been realized to this day.
Jiang Nengjie said that around 2014, he also fell into a state of confusion and helplessness. At that time, he had been engaged in documentary creation for five or six years. The shooting made him physically and mentally exhausted. He kept asking himself, what is the meaning of photographing these people and things, and what can it change? Fortunately, the reason why Jiang Nengjie persisted was not only "feelings" and "hometown", but also the broadcast of the documentary "Village Children", which earned him countless praise and recognition. This documentary, which Jiang Nengjie considers "rough", has been screened in many cities and universities. According to incomplete statistics, it has been screened more than 600 times.
"Because of this film, I began to understand that the value of a film does not lie in how beautiful its pictures are, how much money it costs, or how high-end equipment it uses. The real power of will not be diminished because of its roughness. ." With the reason to persevere, Jiang Nengjie has successively produced many works that focus on public welfare and record reality. Although financial constraints made the filming process difficult, his heart was unwavering.
"I am still working hard to make money, but the daily expenses for me and my family will not be very large, because I have no material desires, and my family understands and supports me." At the same time, during the filming process, Jiang Nengjie also found that his works have benefited the society The sound it makes is slowly having an impact.
is not just a documentary. In 2016, a rural charity library founded by Jiang Nengjie was completed in his hometown of Xinning, Hunan, and he named it Mianmiansha Library. Mianmiansha is the name of Jiang Nengjie’s birthplace and the location of the first library. Today, there are five Mianmiansha library houses scattered in different villages. All operating expenses and books for the library houses come from donations from all walks of life.
"I remember that when I was a child, as long as I read books, I didn't have to do farm work. However, there are few books in rural areas and reading resources are scarce. Even senior textbooks can be read as extracurricular books. It was under such circumstances that I cultivated My interest in reading and my 'literary dream' were also the source of my passion for documentary shooting."
Today, Jiang Nengjie and his family live in Guangzhou. Living between the countryside and the city, he sets his sights on the rural people living in the city. Some of the left-behind children he photographed during his youth have come to cities and become migrant workers like their parents, migrant populations and migrant children.
"I hope that whether it is a documentary or these library rooms, they can become part of the children's memories when they grow up, and I also hope that they can affect more people." Jiang Nengjie said, starting from the moment he picked up the camera , some things have never changed. He strives to pay attention to the times, individuals, and people through his works, and he also strives to speak "human language" .
This article is based on the interviewee
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