The
combination of an authoritarian government and a strict religion ought to make
Musa a scrupulously law-abiding citizen. Unfortunately, he is one of many
disenfranchised Uyghurs impressed into pickpocket gangs. Filmmaker Chen Dongnan captures the tragic
human stories of those derisively referred to as “Xinjiang thieves” in the
documentary short The Trail from Xinjiang
(trailer
here), which
screens during the Enduring Encounters programming
block at this year’s Asian American International Film Festival in New York.
Like
many youths from Xinjiang, Musa was lured to the big city with false promises. Instead, he quickly found himself involuntarily
immersed in a world of petty thievery and drug dealing (by fellow Xinjiangnese). His friends Ali and Little Musa seem to have
a more natural aptitude for crime, but that is not exactly a blessing. Between the three of them, they will
experience the worst of nearly every imaginable urban pathology, including drug
addiction, AIDS, and violent crime—everything that does not exist in China
according to government propaganda.
Chen
set out to humanize the marginalized Uyghurs, so she largely maintains her
focus on Musa and his friends. Yet,
Jiaquan, the founder of the Anyang Anti-Pickpocket League, emerges as the film’s
most intriguing figure. Viewers might
initially see him as Anyang’s answer to George Zimmerman, patrolling the
streets with his twenty League volunteers.
However, as Jiaquan came to recognize Musa and his accomplices, he
started to sympathize with their exploitative circumstances. It is obviously a heavy commentary on Chinese
social services when the Xinjiang thieves’ vigilante-nemesis becomes the
closest thing they have to a social worker-advocate, but such is the state of
things. Frankly, his story seems ripe
for a full documentary follow-up, particularly in light of the film’s
concluding “where are they now” recap.
