wait … NYFF has both new Hong Sangsoo films and TIFF has neither?

I have several “favourite films of all time” in my head at once, but on many days, Stanley Kwan’s CENTRE STAGE, his post-modern biopic of Ruan Lingyu and the glorious era of Shanghai modernism, starring Maggie Cheung, is at the top of the list.

J Hoberman@jhoberman.bsky.social · 18h ago

www.nytimes.com/2026/08/05/m... Less melodrama than meta-drama, the first movie to address the history of Chinese film — conflating the golden age of Shanghainese cinema (and Shanghai) w that of Hong Kong. Maggie Cheung proves herself a unique silent star — as contemporary as she is anachronistic.

www.nytimes.com/2026/08/05/m... Less melodrama than meta-drama, the first movie to address the history of Chinese film — conflating the golden age of Shanghainese cinema (and Shanghai) w that of Hong Kong. Maggie Cheung proves herself a unique silent star — as contemporary as she is anachronistic.

‘Center Stage’: A Star of Shanghai’s 1930s Heyday Is (Re)Born (Gift Article)

This 1991 film is at once a biopic devoted to the Chinese silent-film star, Ruan Lingyu, and a self-reflexive documentary starring Maggie Cheung.

nytimes.com

the first reporter to tell Trump 'how dare you treat someone like that' in defense of a colleague will be a hero

Elizabeth Spiers@espiers.bsky.social · yesterday

Imagine thinking so little of yourself that you just let this half sentient rotten potato talk to you like this. I don't care if he's president, have some self respect.

Sinophone films @ #TIFF2026 阿 Girl AH GIRL Ang Geck Geck 咒語 FIRE FLIES, Zhenglu Xinyuan 无名女孩 A GIRL UNKNOWN, Zou Jing 中場休息 INTERMISSION Yonfan 寒夜灯柱 LIGHT PILLAR Xu Zao 月宫 MOON PALACE Yu Jiaqi SPLITS IN TWO Simon Liu 我们不是陌生人 WE ARE ALL STRANGERS Anthony Chen 我們不得不如此 WE ARE BORN GOOD Yeung Leung-chuen

I’m reading Yevgeny Zamyatin’s 1920s dystopian rocket novel WE right now. And this picture appears here. Perfect.

MoMA Paintings and Sculpture @moma.bsky.social · 2d ago

Kazimir Malevich, Suprematist Composition: Airplane Flying, 1915 (dated on reverse 1914) https://botfrens.com/collections/14377/contents/1135144

Oh my goodness. I play her music to every one of my Chinese classes. Her Carmen is just jaw-to-the-floor awesome. www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqI4...

葛蘭 - 卡門 王天林電影《野玫瑰之戀》Carmen [GeLan / Grace Chang]

YouTube video by MrHuang HK

youtube.com

Dylan Cheung@dylancheung.bsky.social · 3d ago

It's been reported that Grace Chang, Hong Kong's preeminent Mandarin screen diva of the 50s, passed away this afternoon, one day shy of her 93rd birthday. Watch Mambo Girl and The Wild, Wild Rose to see her at the height of her powers.

Cultural figure Dunn Shio Yu initially broke the news on social media but then possibly deleted the post. Oriental Daily has run a story now, so I guess it's 100%. hk.on.cc/hk/bkn/cnt/e...

傳奇影星葛蘭離世享年93歲　《星星月亮太陽》成經典

影星葛蘭驚傳離世，享年93歲，文化人鄧小宇在社交網公開噩耗：「葛蘭今天下午安祥離世。」葛蘭是歌手和演員，1950年代至1...

hk.on.cc

It's been reported that Grace Chang, Hong Kong's preeminent Mandarin screen diva of the 50s, passed away this afternoon, one day shy of her 93rd birthday. Watch Mambo Girl and The Wild, Wild Rose to see her at the height of her powers.

Two stories on the New York Times front page online this morning, that set up an interesting dialogue. We can see, at least, how the European far right sets the tone for the NYT's coverage of Spain ("soft on migrants").

The schools that stood up to Trump thug demands—first Wesleyan and Princeton, then Harvard, then many others who were emboldened—have won in court and earned honor in history and support from alums. Columbia showed that appeasement always loses. It's never enough. Don't do it, Yale.

Gregg Gonsalves@gregggonsalves.bsky.social · 4d ago

Need to have some frank talk about #Yale President McInnis, General Counsel Alexander Dreier and the trustees. First, they keep saying that they are compelled to enter into a settlement with the #Trump administration. Untrue. 1/

Taipei‘s bicycling infrastructure along its urban river paths is just glorious. My new favourite thing to do in Taipei is to rent a bike and cycle along the rivers.

Fransglobal@fransglobal.bsky.social · 4d ago

Views from the new pedestrian and cycling Minquan East Road Bridge, Taipei 🇹🇼 They've done a fantastic job!

I loved Everyday Movement by Gigi Leung (translated by Jennifer Feeley) and its realistic exploration of how 2019-2020 HK protest, radicalism, and politics collide with the mundane everyday lives. It was almost too painful to read at times.

I’ve so far only read Gigi Leung’s EVERYDAY MOVEMENT (superb but tough) and I’m slowly savouring TAIWAN TRAVELOGUE (too rich to read in one go). I’ll look into the others.

YTSL@ytsl.bsky.social · 6d ago

The six books I bought this month. Anyone want to guess which ones I got at the Hong Kong Book Fair and which from an independent bookstore (that I don't think even bothers to get a booth at the Hong Kong Book Fair, figuring it'd get rejected for sure!)?

Why the Backlash Against Data Centers Is So Potent talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/why-t...

Fascinating article on issues surrounding the "force-unification blockbuster” (武統大片) THE BELIEF (aka the Naval Battle of Penghu) 澎湖海战, directed by the fine HK filmmaker Soi Cheang. This "main melody film" 主旋律片 was supposed to be released this week, but seems to be in limbo. 1/

Sean Gilman@theendofcinema.bsky.social · 6d ago

Taiwan Conquest Film Shelved

At the Austrian Film Museum in September: a retrospective of Early Chinese Cinema, 1922-1964. I was invited to write the introductory essay (linked below) and notes on the films (forthcoming). @filmmuseum.bsky.social www.filmmuseum.at/en/film_prog...

The New York Times is learning.

Important article.

James Leibold@jleibold.bsky.social · 6d ago

New in @ForeignAffairs: @tendor and I argue that China’s new ethnic-unity law does not abolish minority autonomy on paper. It does something more insidious: it gives statutory force to assimilation while hollowing autonomy out in practice. www.foreignaffairs.com/china/next-p...?

At the Austrian Film Museum in September: a retrospective of Early Chinese Cinema, 1922-1964. I was invited to write the introductory essay (linked below) and notes on the films (forthcoming). @filmmuseum.bsky.social www.filmmuseum.at/en/film_prog...

Just look at the logical meltdown in this sentence: "there is incontrovertible proof of a conspiracy to cover up and deny the possibility it may well be a lab mishap,". Carefully worded to mean absolutely nothing. A "conspiracy to deny the possibility": words that evaporate meaning into thin air.

Ernie Piper@whoisernie.bsky.social · 7d ago

Zeynep Tufekci is still completely insane over the lab leak idea. "There is a conspiracy to cover this up" is not evidence for "covid was a bioweapon that escaped from a lab". It could also be evidence for my theory, "please stop talking about this stupid idea"

ProPublica does a lot of very good work, but their publication and subsequent defence of this bullshit article remains a stain on their reputation. And makes me skeptical of anything they publish. Why wasn't there a process of admitting error & evaluating weaknesses in their editing that led to it?

BeijingPalmer@beijingpalmer.bsky.social · 7d ago

Covid supercharged this, though with lab leak stuff so did the *wild* irresponsibility of American media and know-nothing pundits. The ProPublica story remains a nadir, but there was malpractice across the board.

There’s something like a parody of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle within this cloud of assertions about COVID. If you can measure its hoax-ness with certainty, you can’t assess its lethality. If you can measure its lethality, the hoax coefficient evaporates.

Kid Presentable@spacedcoyote.bsky.social · 7d ago

Covid exists in a superposition where it is simultaneously a hoax, an overblown flu, and a bioengineered super weapon, and you can only determine its position at any given moment by asking which version is the most politically convenient

Things I learned from the online Tiananmen Massacre museum, #15: Wang Fei performed a protest duet with the guitarist from Beyond in 1989, called "An Unsettled Heart" 为平复的心： www.youtube.com/watch?v=JD-Q.... Source (the whole museum is terrific) here: 8964museum.com/art/en/a-c01....

王菲《王靖雯》專輯_未平復的心 [動態歌詞]

YouTube video by milly music

youtube.com

It’s hard not to remember what collaboration with Vichy France did to the reputations of the academics, intellectuals, and artists who accommodated themselves to the regime. Most never recovered their reputations (some politicians did go on to repress French subjects in France and its colonies).

James Fallows@jfallows.bsky.social · last wk.

Harvard is doing the right thing here.

Harvard is doing the right thing here.

Robert Reich@rbreich.bsky.social · last wk.

Yale is on the verge of cutting a deal with Trump to change its admission procedures. Reminder for any school dealing with Trump's extortion: You can't appease a tyrant. Surrendering to authoritarianism only invites more of it.

Shame on Yale. Humiliating for the university of this goes through. It will be a permanent stain on Yale’s reputation.

Robert Reich@rbreich.bsky.social · last wk.

Yale is on the verge of cutting a deal with Trump to change its admission procedures. Reminder for any school dealing with Trump's extortion: You can't appease a tyrant. Surrendering to authoritarianism only invites more of it.

“and all the food looks horrible” (my favourite line from @emilyrcwilson.bsky.social ‘s glorious review) seems like one of the worst things you can say about a film. Total downer. Fortunately, in my field, Chinese language cinema, all the food always looks amazing. Even in the worst films. 🥟 🥢

London Review of Books@lrb.co.uk · last wk.

‘Its narrative structure is gimmicky. The writing is abysmal. None of the characters has convincing motivation for their actions or words. There are no sex scenes, and all the food looks horrible.’ @emilyrcwilson.bsky.social reviews Christopher Nolan’s 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘖𝘥𝘺𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘺. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

The Hong Kong government is terrified of independent bookstores. If only lovely little bookstores actually wielded such awesome regime-threatening power. Ignoring the bookstores would make the HK gov't look confident and secure. Persecuting them does just the opposite.

The Japan Times@japantimes.co.jp · last wk.

A Hong Kong independent bookshop that national security police raided this month announced it would close after 50 years in business, while another shut down ahead of schedule.

Jamelle asks the question that, in retrospect, is the obvious and pressing one: why do we tolerate this? And it’s clearly not because we need his cars or even his rockets, which makes any plausible answer all the more disturbing.

Gregg Gonsalves@gregggonsalves.bsky.social · last wk.

"If there is a question to ask, then, it is this: Why does Musk get a pass? Why do politicians, journalists and commentators treat his far-right racist radicalism as a sideshow rather than the core of his political, ideological and industrial project..." www.nytimes.com/2026/07/29/o...