Useless

Useless opens on a vast textile complex in Guangzhou, where thousands of unskilled workers labour on the globalisation of "made in China". Filmed with fluid camera movements, this first chapter depicts what we already know, without denouncing but underscored by Jia Zhang-Ke's characteristic organic elegance. The filmmaker articulates this chapter with two others. The first of the latter focuses on the work of designer Ma Ke, as she prepares her new all-handmade collection, exhibited as a performative runway during Paris Fashion Week. Contrary to the consumerism she criticises, the artisan-artist builds her legitimacy on the uselessness of her production, which no one will ever wear. The third part of the film, which is longer, returns to the director’s native region of Fenyang. There, in a modest sewing workshop, Jia Zhang-Ke meets a woman whose husband has swapped his job as a tailor for that of a miner, for financial reasons. After a moving sequence shot with the couple, Jia turns his attention to a clothing shop that is about to be demolished - thus standing, more than ever, alongside the "useless" people that a conquering China has left behind.
Emmanuel Chicon

Swimming Out Till the Sea Turns Blue, 2020
Ash is Purest White, 2018
The Hedonists, 2016
Mountains May Depart, 2015
A Touch of Sin, 2013
Yulu, 2011
I Wish I Knew, 2010
Stories on Human Rights, 2008
Cry Me a River, 2008
24 City, 2008
Our Ten Years, 2007
Useless, 2007
Still Life, 2006
Dong, 2006
The World, 2004
Unknown Pleasures, 2002
The Condition of Dogs, 2001
In Public, 2001
Platform, 2000
Pickpocket, 1997
Du Du, 1996
Xiao Shan Going Home, 1995