China

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For those interested in Chinese cinema, here is something a bit different.
Centre Stage is about the life of Ruan Lingyu, Chinese silent movie legend of the 1930s. She was without equal in the depiction of the emotions of a woman seeking independence. Students worshipped her as a cult symbol. Men looked at her with dreamy eyes, and women looked at her sideways and full of hate. Her roles were typically of characters like girl student, rustic maid, factory hand, prostitute, socialite, and authoress. Ruan’s personal life often mirrored those of the tragic characters she portrayed on screen.
The recreation of sets, costumes and inclusion of original footage from films that have survived in which Ruan appeared have combined to produce a high quality and stylish film, giving the viewer a docudrama about an interesting woman from an interesting period of Chinese film history.Read More »

PLOT: Jia Zhangke travels with painter Liu Xiaodong from China to Thailand as they as they meet everyday workers in the throes of social turmoil. Liu Xiaodong is well-known for his monumental canvases, particularly those inspired by China’s Three Gorges Dam project. Jia Zhangke visits Liu on the banks of Fengjie, a city about to be swallowed up by the Yangtze River. The area is in the process of being “de-constructed” by armies of shirtless male workers who form the subject of Liu’s paintings. Liu and Jia next travel to Bangkok, where Liu paints Thai sex workers languishing in brothels. The two sets of paintings are united in their subjects’ shared sense of malaise in the face of the dehumanizing labor afforded them.Read More »

An aimless film school student goes on an ambling road trip across China in a rickety old Jeep in this charming, deeply personal road movie.Read More »

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Back in the summer of 2004, a friend from a website I used to review for encouraged me to review Stephen Chow’s movie Shoalin Soccer. Biting the bate, I decided to purchase the disc and give it a shot. I was not disappointed one bit. It was one of the most entertaining movies I reviewed that year. When it was announced that another of Stephen Chow’s movies would be released in the form of Kung Fu Hustle, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it. After viewing this on DVD, I came to the conclusion this man is absolutely brilliant, in that he was excellent at using special effects and wire work in such a unique and interesting way. Instead of using special effects as an integral part of the story, he uses it to enhance the comedy, to create these outrageous scenarios that are silly and humorous, but at the same time interesting and ingenious.Read More »

Tenzin Banjue, a young Tibetan monk living in the temple, takes a long way back home for the first time to visit his brother who is in a vegetative state from falling off the cliff. Despite finding himself enamored by his brother’s fiancée, he refuses his mother’s offer to stay and marry her, who at the same time gets a marriage proposal from another man. Struggling between faith to his religion and truth to his heart of love, Tenzin, together with his brother and fiancée, takes on a soul searching journey of five thousand kilometers.Read More »

Humble, unassuming Ma and timid Cao have been cast off by their families and forced into an arranged marriage. They have to combine their strength and build a home to survive. In the face of much adversity, an unexpected bond begins to blossom, as both Ma and Cao, uniting with Earth’s cycles, create a haven for themselves in which they can thrive.Read More »

Shengze Zhu’s third feature shines a light on the curious world of live-streaming, a singularly contemporary form of human connection and commerce wherein “anchors” document their lives and interact with a virtual audience. Cobbled together from 800 hours of live-streaming footage, Present.Perfect. advances a fascinating documentary portrait of Chinese society by focusing on the most marginalized of these anchors: a chain-smoking burn victim, an uncoordinated street dancer, a man with growth-hormone deficiency, a cattle farm worker, and many others. What emerges is an indelible vision of the world we live in today, when the boundaries between the real and the virtual have never been more porous.Read More »

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In the sixth year of the War of Resistance Against Japan, the Japanese invaders were struggling to death and launched an autumn sweep in North China. The local heroes and children fought arduously with the Japanese invaders and the puppet army. Under the cover of the Eighth Route Army Armed Forces, the anti-Japanese people did not fear difficulties and dangers and grabbed food from the enemy’s eyes. Huzi, the child leader of Zaolin Village, is smart and brave. He cut off the enemy’s telephone line and made great contributions to grabbing food. Huzi wanted to be a glorious Xiao Ba Lu, but his age was too young to be approved by Captain Yang. Read More »

A middle aged woman oculist has a heart attack. Recalling her past, she feels sorry for not having been a dutiful wife and mother, but she consoles herself with the thought that she has saved many people from blindness.Read More »