Petition (2009) Zhao Liang torrent

This is a documentary made as China was preparing for the Olympic games. It concerns the petitioners who gather in Beijing to petition for the justice they failed to receive in their home provinces.

The petitioners are fearless and determined, but lead utterly marginal lives, subsisting on found food and sleeping in improvised shelters. They show us what people are willing to endure when they fight for justice. The teacher who wants restitution after being fired for exposing corruption in the school administration, and the young man seeking a settlement after being beaten and hospitalized by thuggish police are typical of the people we encounter. Such people are the kernel of any future mass movement against the government.

In Mandarin with French and English subtitles.