Chinese opera was almost destroyed during the Cultural Revolution when it was reduced from over 300 regional forms to just 8 model plays. Today it is an ongoing work of cultural reinvention. Lacuna cut, 2008, features a troupe of actors as they paint their faces and prepare to go on stage. The camera stops and lingers on small gestures, while incidental noise is magnified and collaged together with sounds from the mythical operatic plots and aspects of contemporary Chinese life. Neither document nor fictional narrative, the film restages this private ritual as a performative act. It offers moments of transformation and disintegration - a slippage between interior and exterior worlds, actor and character, preparation and performance.

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