Total Trust

The documentary is about the surveillance system in China. Cameras, face recognition and data collection are part of daily life. The film tells that system through a few families. Two households are fighting for justice through the courts. Wenzu Li’s husband Quanzhang Wang is a lawyer who was taken into custody. His family lives under siege inside their own flat. The journalist Sophia Xueqin Huang also appears. Huang is among the reporters who covered MeToo accusations. She was later arrested on a charge of inciting subversion of state power. The film looks at the relation between the watched and the watching. The camera shows both the pressure and the resistance. The documentary plainly takes a side. The state is given no room to answer. The account therefore runs as a case being argued. The director had earlier co directed a documentary on China’s population policy. Zijuan Chen and Wenzu Li appear in the ninety seven minute documentary. It is a German and Dutch production Zhang Jialing finished in 2023.