The cinema of Jia Zhangke: realism and memory in Chinese film

Despite his films being subjected to censorship and denigration in his native China, Jia Zhangke has become the country's leading independent film director internationally.

Seen as one of world cinema's foremost auteurs, he has been playing a crucial role in documenting and reflecting upon his country's era of intense transformations since the 1990s.

This book offers innovative scholarship and in-depth analysis of Jia's unique body of work from his opening act 'Platform,' to experimental quasi-documentary '24 City' through to the audacious addition of 'Mountains May Depart.' Drawing on classic and contemporary realism theory, it suggests that his particular expression of the realist mode is greatly shaped by the aesthetics of other Chinese artistic traditions.