Cities & Cinema: Shanghai
September 13–November 2, 2025
This city symphony series evokes periods of Shanghai’s history, as depicted in archival newsreels, home movies, documentaries, and fiction films made by Chinese and foreign filmmakers. Chinese film expert Paul Fonoroff joins us to introduce three of the films.
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Jia Zhangke: I Wish I Knew, 2010
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Ulrike Ottinger: Exile Shanghai, 1977
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Ang Lee: Lust, Caution, 2007
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Zheng Junli: Crows and Sparrows, 1949
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Lou Ye: Suzhou River, 2000
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G. W. Pabst: The Shanghai Drama, 1938
- Upcoming
Films - Past
Films - Past
Events
Past Films
I Wish I Knew
Jia Zhangke
China, Netherlands, 2010Saturday, September 13 6:30 PMView DetailsJia Zhangke explores the contested city of Shanghai, as witnessed by citizens, politicians, criminals, exiles, artists, and especially filmmakers. Both a historian’s and a cinephile’s dream, I Wish I Knew is as much about Shanghai in cinema as it is about Shanghai. Preceded by Nankin Road, Shanghai (1901).
Suzhou River
Lou Ye
China, Germany, 20004K Digital Restoration
Friday, September 19 7 PMView DetailsIn this atmospheric noir thriller, which doubles as a city symphony to Shanghai’s eternal mysteries, a videographer searches for work, and for a lost love. This is a landmark of Sixth Generation Chinese filmmaking. Preceded by Boat to Shanghai, a home movie from the early 1930s.
Exile Shanghai
Ulrike Ottinger
Germany, 1997Digital Restoration
Saturday, September 27 1 PMView DetailsFascinating and rich with wry humor, Exile Shanghai is an extraordinary cultural odyssey that affectionately conjures up the lost Jewish world of 1930s Shanghai.
Flowers of Shanghai
Hou Hsiao-hsien
Taiwan, 1998Digital Restoration
Thursday, October 2 7 PMIntroduced by Ziwei ChenView DetailsTony Leung Chiu-wai stars in Hou Hsiao-hsien’s period-piece reverie set in a Shanghai brothel circa 1890. “‘Surrender’ is the key to this visually ravishing masterpiece” (Phillip Lopate).
No. 89 Shimen Road
Shu Haolun
China, 2010Friday, October 17 7 PMView DetailsNo. 89 Shimen Road vividly recalls not only an era of Shanghai and the nation’s history, but also a crisis in values affecting its youth that resonates with the present. Preceded by a Hearst Metrotone Newsreel from 1935.
The Shanghai Drama
G. W. Pabst
France, 1938Sunday, October 26 4:30 PMIntroduction by Paul FonoroffView DetailsA sad-eyed cabaret singer finds herself swept up with a Russian refugee spy ring in Shanghai just before the Sino-Japanese War in G. W. Pabst’s reverse Casablanca, with exteriors shot in Saigon. A “minor masterpiece” (J. Hoberman). Preceded by three Hearst Metrotone Newsreels from the 1930s.
Crows and Sparrows
Zheng Junli
China, 1949Digital Restoration
Thursday, October 30 7 PMIntroduction by Paul FonoroffView DetailsA Shanghai apartment building serves as a microcosm of China’s class struggles in Zheng Junli’s striking urban drama, filmed during the last days of China’s Nationalist rule and already looking forward to “a New Society.” Preceded by three Hearst Metrotone Newsreels from the 1940s.
Shanghai Blues
Tsui Hark
Hong Kong, 19844K Digital Restoration
Saturday, November 1 6:30 PMIntroduction by Paul FonoroffView DetailsTsui Hark’s retro semi-musical look at the nightclub milieu is set against the backdrop of the Second Sino-Japanese War. “It’s impossible not to be carried along by the delirious rush of silliness in this knockabout screwball comedy” (Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian). Preceded by a Hearst Metrotone Newsreel from 1936.
Lust, Caution
Ang Lee
Taiwan, United States, Hong Kong, China, 2007Sunday, November 2 3 PMView DetailsAng Lee’s subtle World War II thriller is arguably modern cinema’s most gripping re-creation of old Shanghai, highlighted by the uninhibited debut performance of Tang Wei as an assassin aiming for imperious official Tony Leung Chiu-wai.