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Once Upon a Time in Shanghai

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Synopsis

Welcome to Shanghai. No, not the Chinese megalopolis full of neon and nouveaux riches, but precisely the opposite: an eponymous slum in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. In the distance, skyscrapers built with oil money tower above the city, but here dilapidated houses are packed along a single railway line. The slum is scheduled for demolition, and now and again a child is killed by one of the freight trains slowly chugging by. When the German director Veit Helmer arrives in Shanghai to make a feature film, feelings quickly run high. The locals are afraid that he wants to make them look ridiculous. The young Azerbaijani filmmaker Leyli Gafarova succeeds however in gaining the inhabitants’ trust and films a choppy, playful portrait of Shanghai in the margins of the feature film production. In the guise of a making-of, she shows intimate fragments of life in the slum, while it’s still standing.

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Frequently asked questions

What is Once Upon a Time in Shanghai (2018) about?

Welcome to Shanghai. No, not the Chinese megalopolis full of neon and nouveaux riches, but precisely the opposite: an eponymous slum in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. In the distance, skyscrapers built with oil money tower above the city, but here dilapidated houses are packed along a single railway line. The slum is scheduled for demolition, and now and again a child is killed by one of the…

How long is Once Upon a Time in Shanghai?

Once Upon a Time in Shanghai has a runtime of 35 min and premiered in 2018.

Where can I watch Once Upon a Time in Shanghai?

Streaming availability for Once Upon a Time in Shanghai changes by country and service. TasteRay tracks where it is available across Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, Max, Apple TV+ and 50+ other platforms — the current options for your country are shown on this page.