Let's face it. Practically everything we wear, unless it's the high-end stuff from Europe, is made in China. We know our jeans come from factories somewhere in China, but what do we know beyond that? Well, one of San Francisco's own celebrated directors has brought us a rare human perspective of life in China's garment factories, the often-overlooked foundation of our consumer society.
Extremely popular, Micha X. Peled's new documentary China Blue sold out at both showings as part of the recent 24th Annual San Francisco International Asian Film Festival.
The documentary follows 16-year-old Jasmine Lee in her journey from her rural home to the city of Shaxi, Canton in hopes of financially aiding her family. There, like an estimated 130 million migrant workers on the move in China, most of them young women, she finds employment at a factory that assembles denim clothing for export to overseas companies.
Naïve and mentally unprepared, Jasmine falls headlong into the realities of factory hell. Sharing a room among 12 girls in an upper floor of the factory building, she and the girls make less than a dollar a day each, work overtime without compensation, and repeatedly suffer pay delays at the hands of their employer, who opts to cut costs to meet demands. Misdemeanors such as leaving the factory without permission or sleeping during work hours result in pay cuts and meal costs are automatically deducted from their pay.
Though this image is dark and heart-wrenching, Peled artfully provides comic relief with excerpts from Jasmine's diaries entries. Her unassuming and earnest nature draws on audiences' sympathy, rather than their resentment for her employer and the greed that drives him.
At times Peled follows the factory owner Mr. Lam through business meetings and his personal life. Self-justified and proud, he candidly relates to the camera his attitudes towards the workers, who he believes are taking advantage of him.
Peled and his crew spent a colorful three years in China for the production of this film, according to Peled at the first night of showing at San Francisco's AMC Kabuki Theater on March 20. They weathered arrest by government officials. They had snuck camera parts into the country separately and reassembled them after they found and convinced Mr. Lam, whom they said was to be a star of a "movie about the new generation of Chinese entrepreneurs." And after work was temporarily delayed due to the SARS outbreak in 2003, the crew lost contact with the worker they had originally been shooting with and had to re-shoot with Jasmine as the focal character.
The documentary was developed as a continuation of Peled's 2001 production Store Wars: When Wal-Mart Comes to Town, which explores the effects of a globalized economy. Whereas cheap labor and human rights abuses in other countries were hinted at in Store Wars, they were given faces and names in China Blue. With it, Peled hopes to raise consumer awareness of where their clothes come from and what those who produce them endure.
China Blue will be showing in the Amnesty International Film Festival and PBS Independent Lens next year. Broadcast times and details will be available at the AIFF website and the Independent Lens website. The DVD or VHS is also available at the producer's website at teddybearfilms.com.
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