Behemoth

Zhao Liang's 2015 documentary presents mining in Inner Mongolia inside a structure taken from Dante's Divine Comedy: hell, purgatory and heaven. Hell is the open pits, where explosions turn grassland into dust, heavy machines dig at the earth and nomadic herders have to withdraw as the pasture shrinks. Purgatory is the iron works, and the faces and bodies of the men working in front of the furnaces are where the film looks closest. Heaven is a city built with these resources into which almost nobody has moved. There is next to no commentary; the account is carried by image, sound and poetic intertitles. The miners' lung disease becomes plainly visible by the end. It competed at Venice and was not released in China. Who it's for: viewers who like slow cinema and visual essays about the environment. Who it's not for: anyone looking for information and explanation; the film is deliberately silent.