HOOLIGAN SPARROW (Nanfu Wang). Subtitled. 84 minutes. Opens Friday (August 26). See listing. Rating: NNNN
In 2013, six girls between 11 and 13 were taken by their principal and an accomplice to a hotel in China’s Hainan province where they were raped.
But this raw and startling doc isn’t about young rape victims in China and the institutions that enable the culprits. Instead, it’s about the methods used to silence the activists who draw attention to those problems.
Ye Haiyan, dubbed Hooligan Sparrow, organizes protests to publicize the plight of vulnerable girls, and once worked without pay in a sex shop to shed light on the deplorable conditions of prostitutes in China. If she barely gets a chance here to speak to the corruption involved on the Hainan case, it’s because thugs and police are constantly chasing and intimidating her and director -Nanfu Wang.
The film takes the shape of a fugitive thriller, giving us glimpses on the run of the networked law enforcers and their helpers trying to keep things quiet, often resorting to assault and unlawful arrests. The surviving footage, smuggled out of China, is a victory for activism. Subtitled. 84 minutes.