From left: ZENG Xiao fei as ZENG Xiaofen and DENG Gang as DENG Gang in The Other Half / Ling yi ban. Directed by Ying Liang, China, 2006; 111m

The Film Society of Lincoln Center will feature the best in Chinese contemporary cinema with “On the Edge: New Independent Cinema from China 2009”, at the Walter Reade Theater from Friday, April 24 through Sunday, April 26, (Three Days). A weekend series of seven films, with directors in person at many screenings, this short but thoughtful compendium opens with Zhang Lü’s Chongqing, a panoramic, multi-generational portrait of the titular city and Ying Liang’s The Other Half, a highlight of the 2007 New Directors/New Films. This series follows up the 2007 edition which hosted auteurs Jia Zhang-ke introducing The World and Li Yang with Blind Shaft, amongst others.

Although privately financed cinema has been allowed in China since the mid-1990s, the nation’s films and filmmakers continue to face both strained relations with the government and limited opportunities to be shown at home. On the Edge offers direct, often controversial looks at a society undergoing an unprecedented transformation, taking international viewers to parts of the country that are almost never seen by foreigners. Though little known in China itself, these unique works have made an impressive mark on the international state, winning major festival awards.

Other highlights in the series include Peng Tao’s Little Moth (Sat, April 25), which, in the words of Robert Koehler of Variety, “melds the anger and storytelling scope of Dickens [and] the documentary-influenced immediacy and sensitive gaze of the Dardenne brothers”; Zhang Lü’s Iri, a companion to Chongqing (the two were originally to be a single feature) about the Korean city Iksan (known as Iri before a destructive 1977 train station explosion); and Ying Liang’s newest, Good Cats (both playing Sun, April 26).

In conjunction with this series, a panel discussion on new Chinese cinema will be held at Dodge Hall, Columbia University on Sunday, April 26. Speakers will include Richard Peña, The Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Program Director and co-curator of the series; Lydia Liu, Columbia Professor in the Humanities; and Zhang Zhen, Associate Professor of Cinema Studies at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.