Three Sisters

Wang Bing : 2012
San zimei

Three sisters, between four and ten years old, live alone in a small village family house in the high mountains of Yunnan Province. Their parents are nowhere to be seen. The mother has been missing for a long time, the father works in a city several hundred kilometres away. The three little girls spend their days working in the fields or wandering in the village. When their aunt finds it difficult to provide food for the sisters, the father returns to the village. He has come to take them with him to the city but he then agrees to leave the eldest, Ying, under the supervision of her grandfather. She alone remains in the open fields and in the darkness of her adobe house. Around her the beauty of the landscape is in stark contrast to the hard life of the child: the poverty, the monotonous daily routine, the harsh climate and the lack of human warmth. The film also tells of a village left behind by industrialisation. Now a place where only the very old and the very young live in isolation, while everyone else seeks their fortune in the city. Amidst China's economic rise, the film presents the reality of the forgotten lives of those who remain. Wang Bing's documentary won the Orizzonti award for Best Film at La Biennale di Venezia 2012.