An inside look at the COVID-19 outbreak
As a documentary filmmaker, Hao Wu has focused throughout his career on smaller, characterdriven stories that bridge the divide between his native China, where he grew up, and his adoptive home in America. In 2013’s “People’s Republic of Desire,” for example, Wu followed three young Chinese people as they pursued internet fame through live-streaming, while his 2019 Netflix film “All in My Family” chronicled his tradition-minded parents’ road to accepting his homosexuality.
When he was first approached in February about making a film about the growing COVID-19 pandemic, Wu wasn’t sure how to approach such an enormous, headline- dominating subject.
“Normally I tend to shy away from newsy topics,” he says.
“As a filmmaker, I don’t know what more I could add to a topic that’s being well covered by the news media already.”
Based in New York, where he lives with his partner and their two children, Wu began reaching out to reporters and filmmakers on the ground in Wuhan to find out what they’d been seeing. Poring through footage from overrun hospitals where health care workers heroically struggled to save as many lives as they could, and reflecting on his own family back in China — including a dying grandfather he was unable to visit due to travel restrictions — Wu quickly realized that even this massive, globe-shaking story ultimately boiled down to the sort of intimate human drama that had always fascinated him.
The resulting film, “76 Days,” offers an alternately harrowing and inspiring look inside four hospitals in Wuhan during the country’s 2½-month lockdown as it became the world’s first COVID-19 epicenter. Co- directed by Wu and two Chinese filmmakers — Weixi Chen and a state-runmedia reporter who is remaining anonymous so as not to run afoul of the government — the film premiered in September at the Toronto International Film Festival and will be released Fri
day in more than 50 virtual cinemas nationwide.
It will be screened at the
Smith Rafael Film Center in San Rafael on Dec. 11.
Dispensing with interviews with experts and commentators, “76
Days” instead zeroes in
A on a handful of individuals As I started editing, as they navigate the my view about the crisis, including a health politics shifted. At the beginning, care worker comforting an I think the entire old woman who is dying country of China was alone, a young couple who angry at the government. have been separated from There were a lot of questions their newborn baby and about how much did a weary nurse returning the government know, the cellphones of deceased how much did it try to patients to their grieving cover up, why was the situation families. so bad in Wuhan?
The LA Times spoke But as soon as the virus with Wu about how the traveled to other countries, film came together, what especially the U.S., it reveals about China’s and as the U.S. fumbled its handling of the pandemic response to the pandemic, and the messages he hopes everyone in China was viewers take away from it. shocked.
Once China decided to take this super seriously, it quickly got it under control. Right now in China, their lives have gone back to normal. Movie theaters, restaurants, bars — everything has reopened.
But here we just struggle with no ending in sight. That made me think more about my earlier intentions.
We did interview some whistleblower doctors who told the public about the early cases of the coronavirus. But by the time we approached them their stories were not that fresh anymore and on camera they were not compelling. When we put them next to the other footage it was jarring. So in the end I removed all these other characters. I found that less is more, the less I tell about what is happening and just let people observe, the more emotional power the film has.
Q
Throughout the making of this film you were in the U.S. while your co- directors were shooting footage in Wuhan. To this day, you’ve never met them in person. How did that collaboration work?
AI’d been following the news, but by midFebruary, very little video footage had come out of Wuhan. So when I started talking to reporters and filmmakers to see whether they would share what they’d been filming, my co- directors’ footage really jumped out at me. It was so striking to me that they were able to be so close to the action, to the human drama, the fear, the panic, as well as the patience of the medical workers and their efforts to comfort the sick. I talked to them and they were very gracious and started uploading their rushes.
Every day after their shoot, they would back up their footage onto the cloud and I was able to download it in New York. But because of the Great Firewall (regulating internet access in China), there was always a few days’ delay. Once I watched the rushes, I would try to talk to them at least every other day to discuss where they were at with certain characters. I tried to give them some advice about character focus and about coverage, but in general they made most of the decisions on the ground themselves because the situation was changing really fast. Whatever character we think is interesting might be transferred the next day to a different hospital or might refuse to participate. It was very chaotic.
Q
This movie is entirely free of politics. There are no talking heads commenting on the Chinese government’s handling of the crisis, just footage from the front lines. Was that a conscious decision early on?
Q
As someone who grew up in China and has lived in the U.S. for many years now, do you see cultural differences between the two countries that help explain how differently the pandemic has played out in each place?
A
First of all, the reason I made the film this way is I saw more similarities than differences in many places. At least during the Wuhan lockdown, everyone treated the virus as a common enemy almost like in a war, and people rise to the occasion in a time of war. I think that’s something we’ve seen everywhere: how health care workers have had so much courage
to stay on the job, how volunteers are helping each other out, how we all cheer our medical workers like we did every day in New York back in March and April.
In terms of differences, I don’t like to try to generalize, but I’ve been thinking about this issue a lot. I’m not a historian or a political commentator, but I feel like the relationship in China between the people and the state has always been different. In Chinese Confucian history, the state has always been acting sort of as a patriarch, so in times of crisis when the state asks you to do certain things people follow orders. That’s not limited to China; if you look at all the East Asian countries which have been under Confucian influence — Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan — they’re all like that.
Here in America, there is a strong belief in individualism.
In World War I and World War II, the American
government was able to mobilize the entire population to combat a common enemy. But this time I feel like it’s both the culture and a failure of leadership at the very, very top. I do feel like if we had a different administration and that administration was using consistent messaging and reminding the population we’re at war with the virus, maybe we would have had a completely different outcome.
Q
From early on, we’ve seen President Trump and many of his supporters blame China for this pandemic and call it the “China virus.” Is part of your aim with the film to push back on that and get viewers to see the Chinese people in a different light?
A
Any message like that is secondary because as a storyteller, as I was putting the film together, the motivation was emotional. It’s really about highlighting the common humanities. If anything,
about whether COVID is a hoax or not. Even right now with our third wave going on everywhere, people still think a mask mandate is a conspiracy theory. People’s willingness to disregard science baffles me. So hopefully I can do my tiny little part to show how bad this pandemic truly is.
Q
There are a number of scenes in “76 Days,” like sick people banging on the door to be admitted to a hospital that is being strained to its limits, that play like something from a horror movie. With the pandemic now entering its most dangerous phase, do you think this film may feel too raw for some viewers?
I feel like especially in the last couple of years with the increasingly toxic
A China-U.S. relationship, The reactions so far both sides tend to view the overall have been the other side as just a monolith. same: Most people would We take away the individuality say, “I have no interest and agency of in watching a film about the individuals. COVID.” But after they
When we’re talking watched it, they were either about “China virus” and shocked or incredibly “they started this,” we put moved. That reaction has that on the entire population been extremely common. of China as a whole. For me, to be able to But on the ground there finish this film given all are so many individuals the hiccups and obstacles making decisions on a in making it, whatever day-to- day basis whether comes I’m happy. I feel they want to be part of the like I want to save this effort to combat the virus, for posterity. This is such whether they can be a great front-line, firsthand nice to each other — those document about are tiny, tiny decisions. So what it’s like leading to with this film I wanted to a pandemic. So maybe restore the human agency more people will watch for these Chinese people it after the pandemic is who were trying to survive over. I’ll be very happy this. Otherwise they with that as well. I’ll be become like statistics and very pleased if a year news headlines. or two years or 10 years
Secondly, I just want from now people seek people to watch this and this film out to try to understand see that COVID is still really COVID-19. bad. I cannot believe there is still discussion going on even after the election