Robert Hegel, Ph.D., professor of Chinese language and literature and chair of the Department of Comparative Literature in Arts & Sciences, will co-lead "The People of Russia and China Film Festival," which will feature films and discussion beginning at 1:30 p.m. on Tuesdays from Feb. 29 through March 21 at the Saint Louis Art Museum auditorium.
Sponsored by the St. Louis OASIS Institute and BJC Plus, the film festival is part of a national educational program for older adults. Hegel and co-leader Robert Ware, a professor at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, will explore contemporary Chinese and Russian culture through film and discussion.
The film program is free and open to the public, though registration is recommended. Seating is on a first-come, first-seated basis. The schedule:
Feb. 29, "Small Happiness: Women of a Chinese Village" -- an award-winning presentation of sexual politics in contemporary rural China, where a newborn son is called a "great happiness." In on-location interviews, Chinese women of various ages speak frankly about foot binding, the one-child policy, work, love and marriage.
March 7, "To Live (Huozhe)" -- Life through the eyes of one Chinese family across four decades of turmoil and change ... the terrors of China's civil war, the passions of the communist takeover, the betrayals of the Great Leap Forward and the tragic mistakes of the Cultural Revolution.
March 14, "Anna" -- 3 years in the life of director Nikita Mikhalkov's daughter Anna, surreptitiously filmed despite harsh Soviet restrictions. Asking her the same five questions each year, Mikhalkov documents remarkably one of the greatest historical events of our time as seen through Anna's sweetening eyes.
March 21, "Prisoner of the Mountain" -- The story of an oddball pair of Russian soldiers who are captured and taken prisoner by a Chechen father hoping to barter them for the release of his captive son. The two disparate hostages begin to develop an unexpected and frequently humorous bond of friendship.
For more information, call OASIS at 539-4555.
