Zhang Jialing

Zhang holds a Master’s degree from New York University in documentary filmmaking. Her award-winning feature documentary debut Complicit (2017) follows the journey of a benzene-poisoned Chinese migrant worker who takes on the global electronics manufacturing industry. The film premiered at the London Human Rights Watch Film Festival in 2017. Her second feature film One Child Nation (2019) which she co-directed with fellow NYU alumna Wang Nanfu, won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize for Documentary Feature at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. Zhang has also freelanced as a local producer for various programs and media including “Vice” on HBO, Fusion TV and The New York Times.

Jialing Zhang's first documentary directed on her own was the German-Dutch co-production Total Trust (2023), about the all-encompassing surveillance apparatus in China and the individual people who defend themselves against it. After several international festival screenings, Total Trust opened in German cinemas in October 2023.