Film

1966, My Time in the Red Guards

1993 · 2h 20m · Documentary

More preoccupied with "history" than Wu's other works, My Time in the Red Guards is a record of his fascination with the missed moment, Mao's Cultural Revolution. In 1966, the Red Guards ironically represented the official avant-garde, a movement carried forward by youth determined to become heroes of the Revolution. Wu interviews people who had joined the Red Guards as high schoolers, most now successful professionals, some Party members. The miscalculations and cruelties of this extreme cultural campaign are spread out before us, detailed by personal recollection and further illustrated by old agit-prop newsreels. Misgivings and fond remembrance vie for position as the interviewees seem to confuse the nostalgia of youthful action with the excesses of historical fact.

• Wu WenguangDirector · Producer
• Qiao YanlinProducer
• Jinchuan DuanEditor

Release date

October 3, 1993

Status

Released

Original language

Chinese

Runtime

2h 20m

Genres

Documentary