Chronicles of Hulling Rice

Documentary

Year2011

Duration1h 4m

Watch Now

6.0

In the sound of rice huller, the rice falls to the jar; and in the booming sound of thunder, the rain drops fall down on the ground. Witha shovel on shoulder, we're farming under the sky. -- This is a children's folk rhymes used to be very popular among the Hakka people lived in the western part of Fujian Province, China. While farming is not an easy work, rice hulling is an even more laborious work. Rice-huller is a tool used by the peasants in southern China to hull the rice for thousands of years in their farming history. This documentary films the making of probably the last rice-huller ever made by mankind. The use of rice-hulling machine tells the tragic destiny of traditional rice-huller. It is hard to tell why Icontacted Mr. Liushui, a master of making traditional rice-huller, to help me make a rice-huller which maybe of no use at all in the real life. He is so scrupulous about every detail and is skillful, just a vivid reflection of his personality of being pure, humble, silent and even a little bit stuttering. As an honest villager from a bottom level of this society, he lives a calm and balanced life, just like the running water of river. I think the whole process of rice-huller making by Mr. Liushui is just to produce works of art. But can those artists be so pure and simple? Any works of art always needs some decoration, or tells a story of its own. I tried to talk with this farmer brother as much as possible, have some small chats, trying to make friends with him, hope I can calm myself down.