Out of Focus

虚焦

2014 | Documentary | 88 min | Color | China | Trailer

director: SHENGZE ZHU | producer: ZHENGFAN YANG & SHENGZE ZHU | cinematographer & editor: SHENGZE ZHU & ZHENGFAN YANG | sound mix: SIYA HUO

SYNOPSIS

In the summer of 2012, filmmaker Shengze volunteered to organize a photo workshop at an elementary school in her hometown Wuhan. The school was housed in a modest three-story residential building in a densely populated, maze-like neighborhood at the outskirts. With a rooftop repurposed as a playground, people called it “the rooftop school”. The photo class consisted of about twenty children aged 8 to 12 who had moved from rural areas to the largest city in central China, following their parents who sought odd jobs at factories, construction sites, and restaurants within the city.

Back then, smartphones were not as widespread and affordable in China as they are today. For many of the children who attended the workshop, it was their very first time using a camera and taking photos. They used these little machines to share glimpses of where they lived, what they did after school, or simply something they wanted to have, such as a pair of sneakers or an ice cream.

OUT OF FOCUS challenges the conventional portrayal of migrant children by empowering them through cameras and by incorporating their photos into the film. Through revealing the inner thoughts of the children and how they perceived and contended with urban life, the film creates a raw yet intimate sketch of a distressed neighborhood in rapidly urbanizing China.