Behemoth (Bei xi mo shou)

ICA exclusive

"An ambitious bid at engaging the visceral potential of the cinema as a means of articulation for an otherwise silenced majority." Sight & Sound

A poetic protest against the destructive social and environmental effects of industrialisation in China.

Zhao Liang’s visually arresting and meditative film takes us to the heart of the Chinese mining industry, highlighting its toxic impact. Sheep farmers are driven from their pastures to make way for mines; sick miners with ruined lungs lie dying in local hospitals. A mountain paradise becomes an industrial wasteland surrounded by ghost towns of brand-new, deserted apartment blocks. In the Old Testament, the mountains are the domain of a monster named Behemoth; in modern times the vast mining industry has taken this monster’s place.

Drawing on Dante’s Inferno, this lyrical yet politically-charged film offers a moving portrait of a modern-day hell.

Behemoth screens across the UK and Ireland in the following venues: HOME in Manchester (from 19 August), the Irish Film Institute in Dublin (from 19 August), Duke of York’s in Brighton (on 22 August), Watershed in Bristol (from 26 August) and FACT in Liverpool (from 26 August), Barbican in London (on 27 and 28 August), Showroom Workstation in Sheffield (from 14 October), Pontio Cinema in Bangor (on 16 October), Filmhouse Cinema in Edinburgh (on 2 and 3 November), The Palace Kent in Broadstairs (on 22 November), and Richard Booth's Bookshop Cinema in Hay-on-Wye (on 1 December).

Behemoth, dir. Zhao Liang, China 2015, 95 mins