Ikram Nurmehmet: Travails of Uyghur cinematography in the People’s Paradise

In Balancing What Can Be Said with What Can Only Be Implied, Shelly Kraicer explores the cinematic themes of young Uyghur filmmaker Ikram Nurmehmet, imprisoned in Xinjiang since 2023, likely due to having studied in Turkey:

It is always difficult for what China calls “ethnic minority” (i.e. non-Han Chinese) filmmakers to make the films they want to make inside China, where review by the state Film Administration is mandatory for all. Staying inside the system allows filmmakers to have their work shown publicly in China and, if they can get official approval, abroad. What may be surprising is that filmmakers from Tibet, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang have succeeded in making important and eloquent works of cinema that grapple, at least indirectly, with the particular situations of their communities in China, despite the constraints under which they work.

Since 2017, a new generation of Uyghur filmmakers, including Ikram Nurmehmet, Tawfiq Nizamidin, Emetjan Memet, Mirzat Abduqadir, and Pahriya Ghalip, has emerged. Most studied at the Beijing Film Academy, and all have made creatively challenging, formally interesting, socially engaged short films that carefully explore—with humor, passion, and a savvy sense of how to balance what can be said with what can only be implied—what life is like for Uyghurs in China today.

A close reading of Ikram’s four short films—from Elephant in the Car’s mysterious energy, through the absurdly dark comedy of Ridiculous Nurshad and rambunctious humor of Tu Cheshang Erbai (200 Per Puke), to the brilliant formal control of A Day by the Sea—can elucidate some ways that a filmmaker under systemic political pressure can navigate the closely regulated Chinese censorship system while preserving an articulate, sustainable, and authentically expressive voice.