Mob Mentality: Gu Xiaogang Putting Final Touches on “Dwelling by the West Lake”

After quietly breaking out of Cannes back in 2019 with Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains – a Critics’ Week closing film, Chinese filmmaker Gu Xiaogang is wrapping up production on Dwelling By West Lake – the second film in his proposed trilogy. The production looks to have begun in March (press conference pic) of this year and then there was a pause (perhaps due to this being a seasonal or temporal element) and it was picked up again in September. Lei Wu and Qinqin Jiang are toplining. Shuli Huang is the cinematographer on the project – he directed two shorts that were recently part of the Critics’ Week section supported by programming teams of Charles Tesson and then, Ava Cahen.

Dwelling by the West Lake sees Mu Lian, a young man came to Hangzhou to find his missing father, and he needs to save his mother who mistakenly entered a crime organization. This is the second chapter of Shanshui Painting series from Gu.