The Iron Ministry

From 2011 to 2013, the director and anthropologist J.P. Sniadecki filmed lots of different train journeys on China’s sizeable rail network, on slow old Communist trains and hypermodern high-speed lines. He edited his trips into one cinematographic train journey.
The images shot by Sniadecki as a one-man film crew veer between Impressionist shots of train interiors and simple documentary observations. They are supported by the soundscape of Karel Ernst, in which the squeaking and crunching wagons are used as musique concrète.
The film moves from wagon to wagon, swerving to the rhythm of the track with what it finds. From packed corridors filled with chunks of meat to almost empty wagons in very modern high-speed trains. The conversations between the travellers, in which Sniadecki occasionally intervenes from behind the camera, make the mood of contemporary China almost tangible: uncertain, scared, but also hopeful.