illusioNation

When one can't live with all the fears, would sadness be gone with the tears?
Or shall one laugh hard, as if fears would then get out of here.

"Do you think you have freedom living in China?"
"Yes if I don't do things that I'm not allowed to do."

We have this idea of recording individual stories of Chinese citizens when Chinese President Xi Jinping laid out his vision of the “Chinese Dream".

Whose dream is it? Could it be a Chinese peasant's dream? What do ordinary Chinese dream about?

Are they happy with their lives, or they laugh out loud because they are desparate to government, to their lives?

Our project is to take videos in different parts of China, recording different people's stories to explore how people live their lives (while some can only describe as survive) in today's China, a nation with stuffy air that you can hardly breathe freedom and find your own way. We especially chase after their dreams because everyone is a dreamer though some forgot.

Our first theme is about drifters from different provinces who flock into Beijing to fight for their dreams. Most of them want to get better job prospects in Beijing because the economic development in their hometown may be far worse than first-tier cities in China. And through looking into individual's stories, we want to have a glimpse on some social phenomena like underground dwellers and the unban-rural income gap and inequality in China.

About the crew:
Research, filming and production would be done by Joy, a girl from Hong Kong who studied English literature, and Will, a Chinese guy who is a photographer as well as cinematographer. Both of us are 80s and we had spent some time traveling around China together, including living in these air-raid-shelter apartments under Beijing.

Schedule:

We plan to spend 3 - 4 months on gathering information on this issue and getting in touch with our subjects to film their life stories. The filming process would begin on August or September for around half a year. In that case, we could cover how the subjects spend their Lunar New Year, in which most of these drifters would travel back home to be with their families. So, it takes around 1 year in total from preparation to production.

Budget breakdown:

$1,500 traveling fees for the crew and the subjects (like following the subjects to their hometowns for               Lunar New Year)

$1,300 rent for an apartment during the filming period in Beijing (probably an underground
             apartment)

$1,200 equipments and possible maintenance

$1,000 living costs and other expenses