Huahua’s Dazzling World and Its Myriad Temptations

82 minutes | 2022 | Documentary | Hebei Dialect, Mandarin | English Subtitles

Huahua, an eccentric and exuberant woman from Xiongan New Area, livestreams herself dancing, singing, and chatting with fans on Kuaishou for a living. Cell phone screens, beauty filters, and digital soundscapes reveal a world that Huahua creates with her own image.

Daphne XU is a Chinese Canadian artist and filmmaker exploring the politics and poetics of place. She received her BA in Anthropology from Brown University and a Master in City Planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is a fellow at the Harvard University Film Study Center and an associate of the Sensory Ethnography Lab. Her short film A Thousand-Year Stage, filmed also in Xiong’an New Area, Hebei, China, premiered at Visions du Réel in 2020. Her latest film Huahua’s Dazzling World and Its Myriad Temptations premiered at Cinéma du Réel.