Documentary Films: The Silk Road

Screening of the film *The Silk Road: In the Footsteps of Marco Polo*, with director Patrick Mathé in attendance

Set out to discover the oases of the Silk Road with their enchanting names.
Who hasn’t dreamed of wandering through the grand bazaar of Kashgar, where Uyghurs, Kyrgyz, Tajiks, and Kazakhs mingle? Who hasn’t dreamed of gazing upon its imposing earthen walls, which for centuries sheltered Central Asia’s greatest treasures? Ella Maillart and Peter Fleming found there a taste of civilization after their arduous journey.
More than 2,000 years ago, the Steppe Empire was home to a multitude of Turkic tribes that regularly clashed and sometimes united...

Historically, this journey marked the beginning of the Silk Road, whose grand history this film recounts.

Patrick Mathé now lives in Lijiang, China. He discovered this city in northern Yunnan about twenty years ago while filming a feature-length documentary on the Yangtze River. His two previous documentaries, featured on *Exploration du Monde*, took us on “The Tea Road” in China’s Yunnan Province and “To the Far Reaches of China,” following in the footsteps of Joseph Rock, a National Geographic explorer.
He returns today with his latest documentary, titled “The Silk Road.”

Running time: 90 minutes