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Drake International Film Series to show ‘Center Stage’

Drake University’s International Film Series will continue with a screening of “Center Stage,” a Chinese film with English subtitles. 

The film will be shown at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 11, in room 101 of Meredith Hall, 2805 University Avenue. This event is free and open to the public.

This semester, the series is showcasing films from China selected by Peiqin Zhou, a visiting Fulbright scholar from Nanjing University in China. Zhou, an associate professor of sociology, is spending this year teaching at Drake as part of her Fulbright Scholar program. She will introduce the film.

The film is a biopic of Ruan Lingyu, a legendary Chinese silent film actress. Lingyu starred in “Goddess,” a 1934 film about a mother driven to a life of prostitution. Her performance in that role is one of the most powerful and naturalistic in silent film history.

“Center Stage” is a groundbreaking film in the way it deals with its subject. Mixing archival footage, dramatization of scenes from Lingyu’s life portrayed by contemporary actors and interviews with Lingyu’s surviving collaborators and historians, “Center Stage” explores the boundaries between reality and fiction.

The International Film Series is sponsored by Drake’s Center for Global Citizenship and will conclude on Sunday, Nov. 15, with a showing of “Life Show.”

For more information on this film and other upcoming events, visit the Center on Global Citizenship’s Web site at https://wwww.drake.edu/international/cgc/ or call 515-271-2117.