Tiananmen

During the night of June 4th 1989 the Chinese People’s Liberation Army opened fire on a defenceless crowd of people demonstrating in Tiananmen Square, Beijing. There are still no reliable figures as to the number of people killed. Most were students who were campaigning for the democratisation of China. 20 years later, there have been a lot of changes in the country, but many of the problems from 1989 have not gone away. Those demonstrators are still defamed, persecuted and regarded as counter-revolutionaries. The film begins in the present day with five protagonists whose lives have radically changed since the massacre. From various situations in their everyday lives – in exile or within China – we reconstruct the events with the help of interviews, archive footage, private photos and pictures of present-day Beijing. This is the story of the protagonists’ dreams, their struggles, their suppression, their flight, their time in hiding and their imprisonment. How do they judge their efforts back then and the political situation in China today? This unique film brings June 4th 1989 to life again and reveals its impact on China and the Chinese today.

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