The Dying Rooms

The Dying Rooms
Directed by Kate Blewett
Brian Woods
Release date
  • 1995 (1995)
Running time
 38 minutes
Country United Kingdom
Language English

The Dying Rooms is a 1995 television documentary film about Chinese state orphanages.[1] It was directed by Kate Blewett and Brian Woods and produced by Lauderdale Productions. It first aired on Channel 4 in the United Kingdom and in 1996, was aired on Cinemax.[2][3] A follow-up film, Return to the Dying Rooms, was released in 1996.[4]

In 1996 the film won a Peabody Award.[5] It also won a News & Documentary Emmy Award.[6][7]

Synopsis

In the film Blewett and others travel to China to visit orphanages that they claim housed children that were abandoned as a result of the "one-child policy". The filmmakers stated that unwanted female and disabled children were left to die of neglect, which would enable the child's parents to have another child. While filming the crew used hidden cameras to collect footage and Blewett used a false name while visiting the orphanages.[3][8]

Reception

After its release the Chinese government refuted the documentary's claims, stating that Blewett fabricated the claims in the documentary.[9][10] A rebuttal to the documentary, The Dying Rooms: A Patchwork of Lies, was also filmed.[4] The documentary was also criticized by Irish charity Health Action Overseas. Two Irish aid coordinators for the charity traveled to China to visit the orphanages and reported that the claims in both The Dying Rooms and Return to the Dying Rooms were ""wholly exaggerated, and almost completely without substance"."[11]

In Patrick Tyler's review of Blewett's film, the New York Times stated that "Compelling images of neglect were captured on tape at this orphanage, and the rebuttal offered by the Government did not succeed in addressing the poor condition of the infants found on the day of the film crew's visit."[4] Walter Goodman also reviewed the film for the paper, stating that "Kate Blewett, Brian Woods and Peter Hugh have not made a balanced or polished documentary. But more important, they have raised international concern over the fate of the children glimpsed here, some of whom have already joined countless others in unmarked graves."[12]

References

  1. ↑ "Keep up pressure over "dying rooms", urges TV producer". The Irish Times. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  2. ↑ Thurston, Anne F. (1996-04-01). "In a Chinese Orphanage". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  3. 1 2 "British filmmaker KATE BLEWETT". NPR.org. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  4. 1 2 3 Tyler, Patrick E. "TELEVISION;In China's Orphanages, a War of Perception". New York Times. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  5. ↑ "The Dying Rooms". The Peabody Awards. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  6. ↑ "`Lost' childhood // Film shows cruelty to boys and girls". Chicago Sun-Times. 1998-06-11 – via Highbeam.
  7. ↑ "THE 17TH ANNUAL NEWS AND DOCUMENTARY EMMY AWARDS PRESENTED BY THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF TELEVISION ARTS AND SCIENCES" (PDF). NATIONAL ACADEMY OF TELEVISION ARTS AND SCIENCES.
  8. ↑ Volkman, Toby Alice (2005). Cultures of transnational adoption. Duke University Press. p. 186.
  9. ↑ "The Description and Accusations About China's Children's Welfare Institutions by Britain's Channel Four and the Human Rights Watch/Asia Do Not Hold Water". People's Daily Online. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  10. ↑ Hilsdon, Anne-Marie; Macintyre, Martha; Mackie, Vera; Stivens, Maila (2012-11-12). Human Rights and Gender Politics: Asia-Pacific Perspectives. Routledge. p. 98. ISBN 9781135117870.
  11. ↑ "CHINA'S CHILDREN". The Irish Times. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
  12. ↑ Goodman, Walter. "TELEVISION REVIEW;The Film at the Root of the Outcry Over Orphans". The New York Times. Retrieved 2018-09-14.
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