Color/80min/DV/2009
Location: Yueyang, Hunan
By: Mao Chenyu

Program Note:
Filmmaker Mao Chenyu returns to his hometown to delve into the local culture and reconstruct the mythology and cosmology of a simple village through the study of its poetry and political life.
In the dual role as a group member and a writer, the filmmaker engages in an anthropological study of the Ximao clan, which consists of 11 village households and roughly twenty people. In addition to compiling their history and mythology, he inserts several objects into the group to see what kind of meaning they take on for them, and how that reflects their view of the universe.

Director:
Inspired by the slogan of the film auteur’s movement “Wherever I go, there is history,” I tried to create a self-celebratory epic poem. The self-determination is often missing in current historiography, but the realization that one exists is a great event in one’s personal existence. Here, I am trying to bring a group of ordinary individuals into the fold of living history. Though the Ximao clan occupies an obscure corner of history, it has a poetic connection to history. Now the Ximao clan is moving closer to the center of historical record, and is unleashing its unique and potent cultural symbols.
Ximaojia Universe was written to mirror the Nine Songs and provides a rigorous historical framework through which to memorialize the Ximao clan—like the structure of a mausoleum. Though the members of the Ximao clan will eventually die out, there is hope that they will leave behind more than corpses. That would include the self-celebratory epic poem, Ximaojia Universe.

Mao Chenyu (b. Yueyang, Hunan).
Mao Chenyu graduated from the Tongji University with a degree in engineering in 2000. He has been producing anthropological films since 2003.

Filmography：
Soul Mountain (“Lingshan”)
Human, Ghost, God (“Yinyang jie”)
The Tale of Dajiang Meeting a Ghost (“Dajiang qutong ji”)
The Tale of Two Sisters (“Guidu Jiemei Ji”)
The Tale of Making a Vow (“Xin zai huanyuan”)
The Tale of Zhenyuan City (“Dinghai Zhenyuan fengwu zhi”)