My Next Step (2015) [N/A]
Directed by:
Cheung Cheuk
Release Date:
November 15, 2015
Original Title:
一個武生
Genres:
Documentary | Family | Music
Production Companies:
A Priori Image
Production Countries:
Hong Kong
Ratings / Certifications:
N/A
Runtime: 66
MY NEXT STEP follows a young Kunqu Opera artist YANG Yang(28 year-old) over the course of several years. It offers its audience a glimpse into the world of Kunqu, and a magnifying look into the ambivalence of a young man struggling to find a way out for a fading art.
Kunqu Opera, one of the oldest existing forms of performing art in China, has once again risen to people's attention after being proclaimed as an Intangible Cultural Heritage by UNESCO in 2001. MY NEXT STEP follows a young Kunqu Opera artist YANG Yang(28 year-old) over the course of several years. 15 years playing the role of wusheng (a martial hero), Yang has witnessed the diminishing glamour of the role of wusheng in Kunqu Opera and hence his fellows leaving the stage one after another. Now being the last wusheng of his generation left in the troupe, Yang is shaken to quit the profession as well. Shouldering the job of preserving and passing on this 600-year-old theatrical art form, he feels desperate but tries to explore other ways out. After working with avant-garde Hong Kong director Danny Yung, he develops an experimental Kunqu Opera play about the last Emperor of Ming Dynasty, which challenges the traditional art form. The documentary dissects down the complexities young artists face in the brave new world of contemporary China - how they perceive the tradition, the art, and one's own dream, own life and own self. Intersected with performance excerpts from both traditional and experimental forms of Kunqu Opera, MY NEXT STEP offers its audience a glimpse into the world of Kunqu, and a magnifying look into the ambivalence of a young man struggling to find a way out for a fading art.
