Inspired by a photograph taken by a French soldier in the early 1900s of a ‘lingchi’ execution, Chen created a high-impact film that reconstructed this brutal form of punishment for criminals who had committed heinous crimes in feudal China. Lingchi – Echoes of a Historical Photograph opens with the gruesome execution of a condemned man in extreme slow motion. The crowd of witnesses eagerly await to collect blood and pieces of skin. Chen interweaves the event with images of the ruins of the Summer Palace after the second Opium War (1860), and also with remnants of abandoned factories and suffering workers. While the recurrent appearance of the haunting black wounds on the condemned man’s chest connects history with the present, it is also a provocative yet cruel metaphor for the cultural and political hegemony from imperialism to the current global context. Chen’s film opens a dialogue with viewers on the ruthless and barbaric events that happen in contemporary society.
Not only is Jessica Spencer the most popular girl in school -- she is also the meanest. But things change for the attractive teen when a freak accident involving a cursed pair of earrings and a chance encounter at a gas station causes her to switch bodies with Clive, a sleazy crook.
The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.
Xander Cage is your standard adrenaline junkie with no fear and a lousy attitude. When the US Government "recruits" him to go on a mission, he's not exactly thrilled.
Trapped in their New York brownstone's panic room, a hidden chamber built as a sanctuary in the event of break-ins, newly divorced Meg Altman and her young daughter Sarah play a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with three intruders - Burnham, Raoul and Junior - during a brutal home invasion.
Selling the world from the trunk of his worn and dented 1948 Tucker, James Frederickson travels across the American countryside with nothing but a car full of altlases and a sales pitch.
As Stitch, a runaway genetic experiment from a faraway planet, wreaks havoc on the Hawaiian Islands, he becomes the mischievous adopted alien "puppy" of an independent little girl named Lilo and learns about loyalty, friendship, and ʻohana, the Hawaiian tradition of family.
