All filmsFilm 13 of 21
Canton la Chinoise
Canton, the Chinese City
Five people in Guangzhou watch their city disappear and rebuild itself, always through a pane of glass.
- Year
- 2001
- Runtime
- 52 min
- Direction
- Rob Rombout, Robert Cahen
- Countries
- France, Belgium
- Languages
- Cantonese, Mandarin, French
- Production
- CICV Pierre Schaeffer and others
- Availability
- On request
Guangzhou, the most Chinese of cities, is erasing its past under concrete. Rob Rombout and the video artist Robert Cahen follow five residents who watch the change through a window, a photograph, a painting or a foreign language. Neither travelogue nor reportage, the film asks how a city in upheaval shows itself to those who cross it.
Screenings
1 recorded
2022Focus Rob Rombout, Strasbourg, with both directorsRetrospective
Credits
- Direction
- Rob Rombout, Robert Cahen
- Editing
- Maureen Mazurek
- Sound
- Gilles Marchesi
Elsewhere in the work
1995 · 40 minLes Açores de MadredeusA band at the height of its fame searches the Azores for the roots of its sound.1999 · 52 minPerm-missionThe only foreigner at a documentary festival in the frozen Urals listens to Russian filmmakers argue about the truth.2000 · 40 minLe Piège de KerguelenOn the islands of desolation, scientists trap the descendants of an explorer's cats, and the cats look back.
Cite this pageRombout, Rob, and Robert Cahen. Canton la Chinoise. 2001. https://www.robrombout.com/en/films/2001-canton-la-chinoise/. Last verified 10 October 2026.