Sturm und Drang

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Creative Statement

This is an existentialist satirical fable with a melancholy tone. The protagonist, Wang Gede, is deeply flawed and caught in a moral dilemma. Under his own projections and social pressure he has to wear a mask, and amid the adulation around him he keeps playing a persona he cannot live up to. It is a self-mocking portrait of the only-child generation, raised under the weight of their elders' great expectations.

Synopsis

Wang Gede, a writer who became famous young, is facing the worst crisis of his life: the true author behind his previous works, his mother, suddenly falls ill, and his writing career, never backed by real talent, comes to an end. He then meets "the Fool", a gifted poet with a disability, locks him up at home and passes off the Fool's poems as his own, regaining his fame in literary circles. But shut indoors for so long, the Fool gradually loses the inspiration he found on the streets, and as Wang Gede exploits the Fool's talent, his own body begins to show behavioural disorders similar to the poet's......

Genre:

Drama, Comedy, Absurdist

Director:

Shen Wei

Screenwriter:

Shen Wei | Yang Zhiguang

Producer:

Li Lingcong | Zhao Na

Production Company:

Shenzhen Yiyi Yiyi Culture Media Co., Ltd. (Rao Xiaozhi Director Studio)

About the Director/Screenwriter

Shen Wei: lecturer at the School of Animation and Digital Arts, Communication University of China. He earned his bachelor's degree in philosophy at King's College London and pursued graduate studies at the USC School of Cinematic Arts and the Royal College of Art. He was selected for the Cité internationale des arts residency in Paris and Werner Herzog's filmmaking workshop in Peru. His feature screenplay How Much Is Life was selected for the Biennale College Cinema of the Venice Film Festival, and his feature screenplay Sturm und Drang was selected for the TorinoFilmLab. His short films have screened at dozens of festivals including Rotterdam and Tallinn. His stage production Ubu on Trial was performed at the National Centre for the Performing Arts, and Xi, which he wrote and directed, reached the final three of the Young Theatre Artists Competition at the Wuzhen Theatre Festival. Yang Zhiguang: PhD in education from the University of Washington, Seattle. His short film Kidnapping, which he wrote and directed, was selected for the International Film Festival and Awards Macao.

About the Producer

Li Lingcong: graduate of the USC School of Cinematic Arts. He produced and directed the mystery crime film Blood 13, screened at the 2018 Beijing International Film Festival, and co-presented The Cloud in Her Room, winner of the Tiger Award at the 2020 International Film Festival Rotterdam. Zhao Na: born in Beijing, a young film producer and currently director of investment and production at Shenzhen Yiyi Yiyi Culture Media Co., Ltd. Selected works: The Flying Fox of Snowy Mountain, Bath Buddy, My People, My Homeland, Escape from Youth and Happy Childhood.

About the Production Company

Shenzhen Yiyi Yiyi Culture Media Co., Ltd. (Rao Xiaozhi Director Studio): founded in 2012, a film and television content company built around director Rao Xiaozhi that develops original film, stage and other cultural projects. In 2016 it released its first film, Hello, Mr. Insane!, directed by Rao Xiaozhi and starring Golden Horse winner Wan Qian, veteran actor Chin Shih-chieh, known as a leading figure of Taiwan theatre, and Zhou Yiwei; the film was selected for the competition of the Macao International Film Festival. In 2018 it released A Cool Fish, directed by Rao Xiaozhi and starring Ren Suxi, Zhang Yu, Chen Jianbin and Pan Binlong, which grossed 790 million yuan, holds a Douban rating of 8.0 and was well received inside and outside the industry. In 2019 it released Lucky Sherlock on the Plains, the first film Rao Xiaozhi executive-produced, rated 7.8 on Douban, which won the Best Screenplay Award at the FIRST International Film Festival and screened at several international festivals. In 2021 it released Rao Xiaozhi's third feature, Endgame, starring Andy Lau, Xiao Yang and Wan Qian, which grossed 760 million yuan. In 2022 it released Home Coming, directed by Rao Xiaozhi and starring Zhang Yi, Karry Wang and Yin Tao, which has grossed over 1.45 billion yuan. Logline: A writer in a creative crisis finds a gifted poet with a disability to ghostwrite for him, believing this will save his career, only to fall into a deeper existential predicament.

Logline

A writer in a creative crisis finds a gifted poet with a disability to ghostwrite for him, believing this will save his career, only to fall into a deeper existential predicament.