Zhang Xianchi is a man thrown into the Cultural Revolution and its afterimage, plunged into the ideological deadlocks of the era and suffering its consequences beyond it. Born into a family that supports the nationalist Kuomintang, Zhang eventually became a leftist and joined the Communist Party. But his family’s background eventually catches up with him, and in a series of bureaucratic measures, he is labelled as a Rightist, leading to a slew of irrational yet life-affecting consequences. His story is told through an exhilarating hybrid of forms, blending documentary-styled interviews and spectral theatrical displays within an ever-mutating studio-space. Hypnagogic in its imagery and ironic in attitude, Mr. Zhang Believes is a tour-de-force treatise of a man caught within dogmatic political maneuverings, which it critiques indirectly with creative and stoic fervour.

On a 1980s evening, the topmost clown-actor of the 20th century Sichuan opera, Qiu Fu passes away in an accident and half-unwillingly sets off for the Ghost City under the escort of two underworld officials. Along the way, he meets old friends. As they recall the past, a history of the living is conjured up.