Social Critiques and Sentimentalism: On Wang Xiaoshuai’s So Close to Paradise

As a key figure in the so-called “Sixth Generation” directors in China, Wang Xiaoshuai has attracted considerable attention in academics, both in China and in the West. His first “legal” film — a film that is officially authorized by the state-controlled filmmaking system in China — So Close to Paradise (Biandan guniang, 1996) deserves special attention. As a transitional film from the “underground” to “in-system” production, this film represents a salient transition in Wang’s filmmaking when he was facing the imperatives of art, state censorship, and commercialization. In this sense, it is also a locale where investigations of the problematics of Chinese film at the turn of the 21st Century can be fruitfully conducted.