Film

In the first installment of Yang Fudong’s ongoing documentary about the young Chinese actress Ma Sise, the director captures her both on and off screen, creating an uncanny portrait of a performer at work and at rest. 

Sarah Abu Abdullah’s disarrayed diary of everyday life in Saudi Arabia darts from domestic tensions and fantasies of going to Japan to more cryptic performances enacted in the malls and apartments she has called home.

This “spooky and highly material” (J. Hoberman) portrait of a desolate former boom town in northwestern China documents the town’s eerie present while serving as a kind of séance for its former glory.