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The
first film, CHINA IN REVOLUTION describes
the epic upheaval that began in China with the fall of the last emperor
in 1911. Over the next four decades, the Chinese people were caught up in
struggles with warlords, foreign invasion and a bitter rivalry between the
Chinese Communist Party and the Nationalist Party. The film highlights the
two figures who came to shape events, Chang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong. First
they worked as allies to unite the country and then they fought a bloody
civil war that was won by the Communists in 1949.
The
trilogy continues with THE MAO YEARS, a look at the next period of modern
China’s history: Mao Zedong’s rule, from 1949 to his death in
1976. The film begins with the celebrations marking the establishment of
the People’s Republic of China, a moment of great hope for millions
of Chinese. But the quarter-century of Mao’s rule was as turbulent
as the decades which preceded it. Interludes of relative calm and increased
prosperity were interrupted repeatedly by violent campaigns, purges, and
a famine in which killed more than 30 million people. It culminated in Mao’s
colossal and tragic experiment, the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.
When Mao died in 1976, people were exhausted by the turmoil and longed for
stability.
What
happened next could never have been anticipated and forms the story line
for the final film of the trilogy; BORN UNDER THE RED FLAG examines China’s
remarkable transformation after Mao’s death. In just 15 years, under
Deng Xiaoping’s leadership, China raced forward at an astonishing
pace to become a never-before-seen hybrid of communism and capitalism. The
world’s most populous nation has reinvented itself, changing from
a relatively undeveloped and isolated nation into an economic giant and
a major player on the world stage. For many Chinese, this transformation
has brought unprecedented prosperity, but it has also raised troubling questions
of national identity and social inequality.
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