Venice Film Festival: 老炮兒 (Mr. Six)

(Originally appeared in The Film Stage on Sep. 20, 2015)

From the late 80’s til the early 00’s, Chinese cinema has been a mainstay at A-list film festivals worldwide, picking up trophies left and right. Things changed, however, as the Mandarin film market experienced an exponential growth in the last decade, inspiring many award-winning “underground” filmmakers to go “mainstream”. While making movies for a mass audience is in itself a perfectly valid pursuit, the drastic decline in quality of these auteurs’ commercially-oriented work has been more than disheartening. Golden Bear (Red Sorghum, 1988) and two-time Golden Lion (The Story of Qiu Ju, 1992; Not One Less, 1999) winner Yimou Zhang, for example, has given us splashy CG-extravaganzas like House of Flying Daggers (2004) or Curse of the Golden Flower (2006) that are a far cry from his earlier work in terms of subtlety and insightfulness. Palme d’Or winner Kaige Chen (Farewell My Concubine, 1993) crashed and burned with the much-maligned Sacrifice (2010); and Cannes Granx Prix winner Wen Jiang (Devils on the Doorstep, 2000) also dropped to career low with his box office hit Gone With the Bullets (2014). And so one approaches Hu Guan’s latest effort Mr. Six, which closed this year’s Venice Film Festival, with understandable caution.

Guan certainly hasn’t struck gold internationally the way those mentioned above have, but he’s been quietly establishing himself as a distinct new voice in Chinese cinema over the past decade. Whether it’s the thickly atmospheric Design of Death (2012) or the kinetic, Tarantino-esque The Chef, The Actor, The Scoundrel (2013), his films display sharp personal, societal observations mixed with an unapologetic genre sensibility. With Mr. Six, traces of those attributes are still noticeable, but it’s sadly still a step-down that feels suspiciously market-driven.

The titular character (played by Xiaogang Feng) is an ex-gangster pushing sixty who no longer has money or turf wars on his mind but patrols his old neighborhood as a self-appointed magistrate. He doesn’t allow bullying, swindling or any such injustice and tolerates neither ill-mannered crooks nor bad cops. Because he’s been the boss of things for so long, people both sides of the law naturally defer to him and he gets to keep up the appearance of an authority figure. That changes as his estranged son Xiao Bo (Yifeng Li) is abducted for crossing über-rich heir of Party functionary, Xiao Fei (Kris Wu). A washed-up gang-leader who used to call the shots must now face a new generation of bad boys who don’t play by his rules anymore.

Sounds ripe for an exciting father-son drama, Taken-style. All the more surprising, then, to find a movie this tame, thoroughly unspectacular. On the action front, there’s very little happening except for a couple of car chases and modestly staged fist fights. The former, unimaginatively shot and heavily reliant on additional light and sound effects, fails to produce any convincing sense of speed. The latter, brief and scarcely choreographed, betrays a half-heartedness at odds with the film’s promised hard edge. Indeed, not much of the bold, fancifully theatrical camera work one associates with Guan’s films is on display here. There are striking shots of daily life along ancient Beijing hutongs or, signaling the final showdown, an old man trekking over the surface of a giant frozen lake, but the beauty is more of a more plastic, superficially pleasing variety that’ll probably sweep nobody off their feet. The editing is also underwhelming, cutting scenes into such short, digestible units they barely have room to breathe or build up a rhythm. Add to that a production design as sleek and posh as per modern Chinese blockbuster standards, and you get an overall visual impression of a carefully groomed teen idol who’s easy on the eyes but lacks depth, heft, personality.  

Speaking of teen idols, pop stars Li and Wu are both serviceable if unremarkable in their roles which, to be fair, aren’t terribly well written. Li can’t quite shake this doe-like quality from his big, pretty eyes to play an angry son living out his rebellion, while Wu simply can’t work up the venom or fury needed for the villainous part. There’s a brittle two-dimensionality to their performances that prevent them from registering on any emotional level. It falls on veteran director/actor Feng to bring the weight of screen presence that ultimately saves the picture from completely tanking. With tremendous poise and an oceanic calm that comes from decades of experience - in life as well as in film – he nails a character who’s seen everything, has life long figured out, and feels impatience above all else when imposing young chaps try to rattle him with bravado and threats. Paternalistic, fair-minded, loyal to a fault, Mr. Six is someone born in another time and who still fights for his values. As a metaphor for the endangered conscience in an ever more materialistic Chinese society it’s a bit obvious. But as a movie character it’s a fine creation, one that’s enhanced invaluably by Feng’s wonderfully aged star turn.

Plotted with limited imagination and directed with atypical flatness, Mr. Six features a strong central performance and shares its humanistic concern with Hu Guan’s previous work but is nevertheless an artistic underachiever. Altogether it’s not so much an outright disaster as a worrisome indicator of Guan’s readiness to compromise. Ironic then, how in a movie where the protagonist is constantly lamenting the good ol’ days, we also wish its helmer would go back to the way he used to do it.          

Roundtable interview: 趙濤 (Zhao Tao) (山河故人 (Mountains May Depart))

(Originally appeared in The Film Stage on Jun. 1 , 2015)

Some call "Mountains May Depart" Mr. Jia’s love letter to you.

I don’t see it that way. "Mountains May Depart" has actually been on his list of films to make for over a decade. The project just never came to be. When he told me he was going to make this movie last year, he described to me in very simple terms that it’s a love story spanning 26 years. Which meant of course that I’d be playing someone from her twenties to her fifties. This prospect really excited me. As an actress I think it’s a great fortune to come upon a role who lives through such a long period of time. It allows such breadth in a performance.

Was it a bigger challenge for you to play the younger or the older version of the character?

I think the hardest part was to put all three stages of this character side by side in one movie. In the 1999 segment, I had to come across as this guileless young girl. When she’s in her forties, I must look like a mother who’s already been through a lot. And in her fifties, I wanted to make the audience see an aged but happy lady. The character must seem real at every stage. Only when you can buy into her, would you be able to buy into her story. That has been the biggest challenge for me.

How did you go about achieving this goal?

To achieve that goal, I concentrated on many little details. For the 1999 segment, I conjured up and maximized the innocence in me. Act a little spoiled, let out squeals, break into running abruptly… When Jinsheng’s car was trashed, my character’s only response was: “Everything all right?” Watching it, I had to laugh and think: “What a foolish girl.”

In the segment 2014, this woman has just had the most painful experiences of her life. She lost her father and had to make a decision on the custody of her child, which she eventually gave up. At this time of emotional hardship, we’re looking at an entirely different person than the one from her youth. My hope was that the audience would be struck by their first look at this familiar but also new character, that they could tell this is somebody who has lived. To this end, I chose big, long hair for her look and had no make-up on. I hoped that, with all the spots and wrinkles plainly exposed on the big screen, it would be a face that touches you, one that tells a story; that when you see a face like this, you could feel the existence of the character. I also lowered my voice during this part of the story.

To give you an example of how I perceived the inner landscape of Tao: the scene where Liand’s sick and I went to visit him featured the same location with the same people, only 15 years have passed. Both then middle-aged and perhaps no longer sharing any romantic feelings for each other, but their friendship and their common past still bound them. So when Liand said; “I hope this is not asking too much of you,” my character replied; “No, it’s the least I can do.” The scene really moved me as I was playing it. I think this is what life and humanity is about. So the presence of Liand brought further complications to Tao’s emotional state in 2014, which ultimately led her to forego child custody.
Or the scene where she was standing by the river with her son and telling him; “Mom can’t give you much. It’s better for you to stay with your father.” That was a difficult scene to shoot because we were near a bridge with a lot of traffic we had no control over and I had to be in that complicated state. After the first day of shooting, I was not satisfied with my performance. On the second day, I finally sank into that feeling. I realized that, even though the lines weren’t long or epic, those were the hardest words for a mother to say. At the same time, she didn’t want to show her child the pain she was feeling. She wanted to keep up this strong, independent appearance in front of him.

For the segment of 2025, I took off my contact lenses. In my fuzzy view of the world, the sense of distance felt right to me for playing somebody that age, where you still see things, but not that clearly anymore. I also shrunk my eyes a little to portray the light aversion, hunched my back and dragged my steps a bit. But above all, I wanted to portray an old lady who’s happy and content. Even though she’s had a lot of misfortune and is now living in solitude, I wanted her to have a smile on her face. So in this whole late segment of the film, we see a smiling old lady, walking her dog in the snow, who suddenly hears a familiar melody from the past and can’t help but break into a dance. For that dance scene, my instruction from the director was simply “Stop crying”. Actually he was already shedding tears behind the camera when we were shooting the happy dance scene for the 1999 segment. So he knew that, after playing this character through these stages of her life, I would definitely be touched by the final dance sequence. And indeed, for the first couple of days, the tears just kept pouring out of me in the middle of the scene despite all my attempts at restraint. Through that final dance, as simply choreographed as it was, I hoped to convey all the joy, pain and loneliness of a woman’s life.

The movie seemed to really strike a chord with the Cannes audience.

On the night of the Cannes premiere, I watched the film on the big screen for the first time just like everybody else. I think the audience responded to it because this movie is about emotions that we’ve all experienced before or will experience at some point. It’s about something universal that we can all relate to.

You’ve worked with Mr. Jia Zhangke on many films by now. Was it any different this time around? 

The biggest difference this time – which I really appreciated – was that he finally shot the movie by the script. It never used to be that way. Usually he would only give me an outline of the story or the character and we would start filming. On "Still Life", for example, there was simply no time for screenwriting because houses were being torn down every day. So he would only tell me what my character’s name was, her age, what she did etc. We were literally fighting against time on that shoot.

This time around, he was able to shoot the film completely according to script. It was such good news to me, because it gave me plenty of time to prepare. I got to go to Fenyang, sit by the road and observe the people passing by. That I got to experience life in Fenyang was hugely important to my portrayal of this character. Also, I finally had time to discuss my character with the director face to face. It never happened on previous films because he was always too busy with other matters. This time we even had time for rehearsals! It was all just wonderful.

Has pop music, which is prominently featured in the film, informed you of your performance? 

Not really. I grew up learning classical dance in a very conservative environment. We were hardly exposed to any popular entertainment at all. So I never had much impression of pop music. Not until I first became part of Mr. Jia’s team – back in 2000 for "Platform" – did I suddenly realize I’d never heard of all these songs. I’ve only started to learn more about pop music through his films since then.

Some critics have noted that the movie “derailed” in the third part. Did you feel that way while watching it?

I didn’t feel that way. I knew going in that the movie wasn’t evenly divided between its three parts, but watching it at the premiere, I didn’t even notice the disproportion. That detail just completely went past me. For me there was no “derailing” in the third act. What it did was allowing me to imagine how we’ll live 15 years from now.

There are elements of melodrama in the movie. How did you make sure the performance didn’t become melodramatic?

By believing in the feelings of the character, I think. In the first segment, the key to portraying the young Tao is the fact that at she believes in what she feels. There are no ulterior motives to her choices. Back then the living standard was completely different from what we’re used to today. Actually Liand and Jinsheng were equals in 1999. They couldn’t have known that in 15 years’ time, their circumstances would become so drastically different. Tao couldn’t have known that either. She was won over by Jinsheng because he was a proactive guy and cared for her well-being, helping her get the CD back in time, for example. I think all young girls would be touched by such gestures. So I believe in her feelings.

Do you see Mr. Jia in the characters of the movie? It’s conspicuously set in Fenyang again. 

Not really. I understand why all his films are set in Fenyang. I also grew up in the Shanxi province. Our hometowns are about 1.5 hours apart by car. His description of Fenyang, the city, the people, the mentality, how it looks and sounds, all strikes me as authentic. He chooses Fenyang as background for his movies also because he has so many memories there.

Roundtable interview: 賈樟柯 (Jia Zhangke) (山河故人 (Mountains May Depart))

(Originally appeared in The Film Stage on Jun. 1 , 2015)

Some are calling Mountains May Depart your most ambitious project to date.

I think it might actually be the least ambitious film I’ve made so far. At the same time, I would also call it the most intimate. It’s the film that speaks to my own emotions and experiences the most closely since "Platform". Most of my other films like "Still Life" dealt with societal changes and what they meant for individuals, whereby the existence of the individuals was always on the line, so their personal feelings only played a minor role.

As time went by, I entered my forties and have accumulated more and more memories. With it came the urge to tell a story that’s more about my emotions. And I also needed to tell this story at this stage of my life, because it probably won’t describe how I feel when I’m in my fifties.

As you just said, this is an emotionally-driven movie, but did you intend to make certain comments on the Chinese society through it as well? 

Individuals still exist within the context of society – I’m not making a fantasy film that’s completely separated from reality. Every person is at once his own self and a member of a larger community. The character Jinsheng, for example, is someone driven by the need to become rich. Tao is a woman with her own background who gets caught between two different types of guys. When I approach their love story, I also try to offer some thoughts on the value system reflected therein, like the materialistic way in which our mind works these days. Take me as an example: I’m always busy working and don’t spend much time with my mother. Whenever I do get to see her, I compensate by giving her money before promptly leaving again. I regretted doing that and finally brought my mother over to live with me in Beijing, because I’ve come to realize that money is not of the essence, time is. This is the kind of sad realization I gained with age, and I wanted to project that into this film. So Tao forgoes custody rights of her son because she thinks he’d be better off with his father for his wealth. But where does that reasoning leave her? She ends up alone and her son grows up not even able to speak his mother tongue.

What I also wanted to talk about in the film are the basic human conditions that we all go through, from life, sickness, accidents to death. So Tao gives birth, Liand falls ill, Tao loses her father and, notably, everybody ages. These are all life’s lessons; lessons you start to learn once you hit middle age. My first major lesson was the death of my father when I was 36. Before then, such a thing didn’t even cross my mind – just like in the 1999 segment of the film, when everyone is young and alive, notions of pain and misfortune seem simply inconceivable. But the movie wouldn’t be what it is if one only looks at this segment. Instead it moves forward in time. where everything changes. And as time goes by, the decisions we make based on materialistic reasons might lead to even more regrettable outcomes in the future, as foretold by the 2025 segment.

There are voices in the Chinese media which criticize you for overselling the “Chinese element” with this movie; others find the subplot of the teacher-student affair a bit too sensationalistic. How would you respond to such criticism?

I am a Chinese director, so there’s no separating my work from the so-called “Chinese element.” Even when I travel to Australia to film [the 2025 segment], it’s still very much a Chinese picture. As for the latter criticism, I think it speaks right to the point I was trying to make, namely the question of personal liberty. Can you still stay hopeful and find romance when you turn old? There are many restrictions posed upon us in life. Are we allowed to love someone much older or younger? Can we love someone of the same sex? It’s all a matter of liberty.

What are the reasons for the prominent use of music in this movie?

It’s true that I haven’t used so much music in a film since "Still Life". One reason is the overall lower density of dialogue. For this movie, I didn’t want the characters to talk too much. I wanted more open space in which to develop the contour of these characters. For example, the opening dance number shows a body language of the young Tao that’s drastically different from when she’s in her fifties, chopping vegetables and walking her dog. I find this visual contrast more striking than words. And music happens to be a good support for these non-verbal sequences. Also, I think music brings out those feelings you know are there but can’t put into words.

Some observers say the reason for the international popularity of your films is that they deal with the changes in the Chinese society. Do you see it that way?

I think in order for a movie to be appreciated, it ultimately needs to be an aesthetic creation. Who would care for a film depicting a lot of social realities but devoid of a sense of aesthetics? If my movies have appealed to an international audience, I hope it’s because on a substantial level, they bring the contemporary Chinese experience to the big screen, and that at the same time, they have an artistic quality to them.

There’s a considerable amount of English dialogue in the movie. Has that been a challenge?

The way I approached it was I first wrote the dialogue in Chinese, which I then had translated by a British film critic. When we first began shooting this part of the film, I’d listen carefully and make sure every word was pronounced correctly. After a while, I realized you only needed to listen to the rhythm of speech. It’s the same with Chinese dialogue. If an actor messes up a line, the rhythm is definitely off. When they get it right, the rhythm would naturally sound good. From there it all went smoothly and English ceased to be a problem. These past days, I was even approached to direct English-language films, which I’d like to try someday.

Did you have to make any compromise filming this movie?

No. I’ve been making films for 17 years now and have never made any compromises.

Berlinale: 一步之遙 (Gone with the Bullets) / 醉．生夢死 (Thanatos, Drunk)

(Originally appeared in EXBERLINER on Feb. 11, 2015)

To be fair, a high-minded film festival like the Berlinale is scarcely the right place to launch a movie like Chinese competition entry "一步之遙 (Gone with the Bullets)". Its broad humor and mainstream sensibility are strictly targeted at the multiplex-goers, however insulting that might be to the intelligence of the film-consuming public.

Set in early 20th century Shanghai, the story starts with a money-laundering scheme in the form of a global escort competition. Glitzy song-and-dance numbers pile on one another before the awkward crowning of the best working girl in the world. What happens next just keeps topping your expectations of the least plausible and most cringe-worthy development possible, all written with breathtakingly bad humor and virtually zero sense of timing. It's essentially a parade of failed gags that proves tortuously unfunny and misfires in every way.

Celebrated director Jiang Wen made a name for himself by telling gritty tales of survival and human endurance ("鬼子來了 (Devils on the Doorstep)", 2000). Though he made an evident adjustment toward populist entertainment with his last movie "讓子彈飛 (Let the Bullets Fly)" (2010) – the spiritual prequel to this unqualified disaster – at least his directorial ambition and signature style remained intact. In this case his foray into the slapstick appears to be so misguided as to render him completely paralyzed. The embarrassing writing aside, the direction has no pulse or spark. The performances from the cast, which includes Jiang himself and long-time collaborator Ge You, are equally uninspired. The production design, which manages to make every automobile, house facade and street lamp look fake, and the costume design, which is low on texture and high on vulgar colors, give the obviously costly production a decidedly cheap look.    

Vision-less, art-less and tasteless, this is a catastrophe of monumental proportions that ensures the Golden Bear won't go to China two years in a row.

Across the Taiwan strait, there's no merriment insight in director Chang Tso-Chi's Taipei-set "醉．生夢死 (Thanatos, Drunk)". Screening in Panorama, the drama begins on a pretty suicidal note and ends in an even sadder place. Which is not surprising considering Chang's illustrious but consistently dark filmography. Only this time around the film itself is a lot less skillfully crafted and the moaning rarely feels justified.

Either jobless or working in the sex industry, all the main characters lead a somewhat marginalized existence. The young-ish Rat helps out at a vegetables stand to earn a few extra bucks but mostly just hangs around playing with ants or messing with the wrong kinds of people. His overachiever brother Shuo returns from the US seemingly unable to find professional or emotional fulfillment and jobs as a go-go dancer in the evening. Since the tragic death of their mother, the two have become estranged and have nothing left for each other but blame. As their affinity to another man from the red-light milieu deepens, more misfortunes follow.

The script is loosely structured, drifting from one incident to another with less elasticity than a simple lack of premeditation. Outbursts of rage, acts of debauchery, bouts of violence pepper the proceedings but seldom leave an impact in the absence of a sensible context. Ever the master of bleak, hopeless aesthetics, Chang shows in a couple of scenes that he can still make a lot out of very little. A dialogue-free sequence early on features images simmering with a yellowish sheen while some sorrowful jazz plays in the background. It's a lovely interruption whose poetry in design and execution is not repeated elsewhere in the film.

Acting-wise there's also little to salvage the movie. The three male leads don't have the charisma to sustain an underdeveloped screenplay. Supporting actress Lu Hsueh-Feng, who plays the alcoholic mother with tremendous authenticity and empathy, is the only highlight, but her role is too limited to really help matters much.

Filmfest Hamburg: 勝利 (Uncle Victory)

Chinese writer/director 張猛 (Meng Zhang)'s kindergarten-set gangster dramedy "勝利 (Uncle Victory)" is a positively squirm-worthy clunker where the gags fall short and the tearjerks turn sour, where efforts are put in all the wrong places and just about nothing works.

Following a brief, cheesily CG'ed opening sequence we meet the title character, a heavily tattooed ex-thug recently released from jail after a ten-year stint. His broad, exaggerated body language, heavily featured in the first scenes of the movie, suggests a lowbrow laugher in the style of Hong Kong comedic genius 周星馳 (Stephen Chow). Not long afterwards, however, the camera cuts to a gigantic construction site where an entire gorge seems to have been gutted open, and sentimental music starts to play as the ghastly sight is lamented by some other thuggy-looking people and hints of an unsettled score are dopped. Thanks to some rough editing, the movie already seems narratively confusing and tonally schizophrenic by then. Some additional, not especially plausible turns of events then motivate the protagonist to run his own preschool. Together with a dancer from a nearby club, these two unlikely educators start to recruit and take care of kids and theoretically, hilarity ensues. Theoretically.

Hilarity doesn't ensue for several reasons. Besides resorting to the obvious slapstick, the screenplay can't come up with jokes with a longer fuse or a deeper reach. The acting is subpar. Lead actor 黃海波 (Haibo Huang)'s willingness to engage in embarrassing acts of simplistic construct is respectable, but funny he's not. Lead actress 張歆藝 (Xinyi Zhang) performs on an even more superficial level and comes across terribly affected. This movie is also a case where defaults in the technical department undermines the storytelling. Except for a few isolated shots where one sees consciously composed imagery, the cinematography is drably pedestrian, dampened further by some gaudy art direction. The dialogue dubbing is conspicuously poor, diminishing the immediacy of the punchlines still more.

The biggest problem probably lies in the direction, though. Doggedly juxtaposing the kiddie humor and a deadly serious revenge plot without finesse leaves the film limping between comedy and drama, mainstream and hardcore. The supposedly crowdpleasing finale with the school performance and the blood-stained mascot backfires in so many ways it's sad to watch.

Venice Film Festival: 黃金時代 (The Golden Era)

Hong Kong filmmaker 許鞍華 (Ann Hui)'s "黃金時代 (The Golden Era)" is a visually sumptuous, directorially superior but substantially anemic biopic about early 20th century Chinese author 蕭紅(Xiao Hong). It looks stunning and unfolds in an unconventionally elaborate way. But with a running time of 3 hours, no amout of cosmetic, however smashingly beautiful or inventively applied, can disguise the fact that there's just not that much of a story to tell.

Relying heavily on in-camera self-narration, all major characters in the film address at some point the audience directly, either to introduce themselves or to provide the next clue about Xiao's life. Compounded by some tricky editing which scrambles the chronology of the account liberally, a piecemeal, eclectic picture of someone emerges, like a mosaic viewed from constantly shifting perspectives. It's a bold method that takes you off guard and, at least in theory, could best recreate the multifaceted quality of any personal history. The surprise wears off, though, as these testimonials pile up without corresponding pay-off and the formal experimentalism starts to feel more like a stunt than an altogether meaningful decision. Particularly detrimental is how, through this semi-theatrical approach, the movie attains a loosely episodic nature that further undermines character establishment, which is paltrily done in the writing department to begin with.

Reading like an accumulation of trivia, the screenplay details the many stations Xiao has travelled through in her short life and inserts quotes from her work at regular intervals apparently to mirror the internal changes she experiences. The problem is the tidbits gathered here are not really conducive to providing insights into the protagonist's psyche, they're not even always interesting. By soberly reciting the various challenges she's faced growing up and her encounters with other renowned writers of the time, it's often tediously factual, uninvolving. A significant part of the story, for example, is tangled up in the relationship between her and 蕭軍 (Xiao Jun), a seemingly on-and-off affair somewhat confusingly relayed through the aforementioned editing. By the end of which we're no closer to seeing this young woman or understanding her choices. The performance by lead actress 湯唯 (Tang Wei) also fails to make us relate, even if it's technically sound. Above all there's a lack of unpredictability and range that made her breakout star turn in "色，戒 (Lust, Caution)" so eye-opening and cut so close. As played by her, Xiao remains an elusive if soulful figure not necessarily worth discovering. Adequate but in no way revelatory, 馮紹峰 (Shaofeng Feng)'s performance as the man of her life is equally underwhelming. Within the large supporting cast, 郝蕾 (Hao Lei) probably fares best, bringing a spark of energy to an otherwise rather mute ensemble.

This is by no means a bad film, though, looking as exquisite as it does. Especially in its first half, literally every frame is a tableau, gorgeously designed, lit, and photographed. Fogged windows, smoky bistros and dilapidated walls fill up a screen that's permanently doused in the most atmospheric colors, be it the deepest of amber or the faintest of azure. Poetic around every corner, you can tell there's not a single accident in the picture's aesthetic realization. And as fussy as the film ends up being, there's no denying it's a graceful person sitting behind the camera overlooking this whole luminously cultured but superfluous enterprise.

Venice Film Festival: 闖入者 (Red Amnesia)

The editing on Chinese writer/director 王小帥 (Wang Xiaoshuai)'s dramatic thriller "闖入者 (Red Amnesia)" is decidedly off, so that on the one hand, the movie doesn't feel tight enough, meandering here and there; on the other hand, cuts at critical junctions of the story are often made less than ideally, missing that sweet spot only exact timing can get you and coming across as hasty or redundant when it's going for suggestive. That said, a layered, resonant script that takes the problem of an aging society as background to reflect on guilt and its repercussions is captivating throughout and largely redeems the picture.

Set in modern-day Beijing and around a mysterious domestic harassment case, the movie excels not in its technical achievements, looking mostly pedestrian and not thoughtfully lit. But the intrigue mounts steadily as the anonymous antagonization escalates and cutaways to a silent, seemingly parallel plotline further give rise to an air of malevolence. Even though nothing truly violent ever happens, as a viewer you feel your sense of security slowly breached, in part thanks to the utter unextraordinariness and frightening plausibility of the situations depicted. The eventual revelation of the source of all this bother is not particularly skillfully designed but, riding on a whole history of sentiments, its impact is nonetheless formidable.

Lead actress 呂中 (Lü Zhong) doesn't exactly hit it out of the park with this meaty role of a dedicated mother who would stop at nothing for her family and who now has to suffer the consequences. There are several extended monologues or scenes of pure physical performance that she doesn't perfect, but the ambivalent, tentative, slightly shameful look of someone with an unspeakable past she brings is priceless. Brilliant actors 秦海璐 (Amanda Qin) and 秦昊 (Qin Hao) are relegated to secondary parts here and don't have much to do except snap and pout but of course they are still brilliant snapping and pouting.

Altogether effective both as a home invasion mystery, which the original Mandarin title (lit: "The Intruder") alludes to, and as a drama with a broader concern for the human mechanics in times of emergency, which the English title aptly captures, this is an intelligently written, diligently performed film that uses a timely issue to deliver a timeless message.

Venice Film Festival: 殯棺 (The Coffin in the Mountain)

Unpolished in its technical aspects and having no name actors to boost its appeal, "殯棺 (The Coffin in the Mountain)" is nonetheless riveting work from Chinese first-time director 忻鈺坤 (Xin Yukun).

Opening with shots of a woman in mourning and a subsequent post-funeral banquet, the movie, befitting of is title, is centered around a handful of deaths and corpses, specifically around the remains contained in one coffin that ends up abandoned in the mountains. Told in three chapters that approach the case in question from different perspectives, the intricately structured script, also by Xin, starts off inconspicuously, although even in the economy of its groundwork and casual efficiency of its exposition there's plenty to like. But it's not until things are seen from another angle and secrets keep tumbling out that the wicked genius of the writing truly reveals itself. Each one of the large cast of characters, carefully linked together via a string of accidents, misunderstandings, coincidences and deceits, holds a little piece of the puzzle and carries a portion of the guilt. Their motives range from infidelity and greed to parental instincts and self-preservation, individually straightforward, but fatally complex when taken together. Not so much suspenseful as consistently intriguing, the story unfolds in such a way that always more curiosities arise as mysteries get answered, drawing you in with an almost comical honesty and a voyeuristic kick.

The actors form a naturalistic, dynamic collective, none of whom stands out to disrupt the vital equilibrium. Apparently shot on no budget, there's no showy element in the art or sound department either, furnishing the film with a plain, low-key style. Which isn't too much of a problem when the plot itself has as much juice as it does, delightfully squeezed out by some clever editing work.

Venice Film Festival: 親愛的 (Dearest)

At 135 min, "親愛的 (Dearest)" is a bit too long, but the burden of its bulk is only rarely felt thanks to a rich and involving script succinctly brought to life by a prime acting ensemble.

Child kidnapping and how in its wake grieving parents sink ever deeper into all-encompassing despair belong to the most established of formulas for a familial tragedy. This fictional recounting of a true case from southern China doesn't reinvent the genre so much as does an especially good job capturing the many nuances of the conflicts set free under such extreme circumstances. The screenplay is not above resorting to the usual tricks and milks sentimentality a little too hard from time to time, particularly in the first half of the film. But starting from an intense, well-orchestrated group chase scene halfway through that showcases Hong Kong director 陳可辛 (Peter Ho-sun Chan)'s instinctual command of dramatic action sequences, the story takes a left turn and introduces a new chapter that asks truly hard questions with a moral edge. How do you prioritize something as pure and natural as a parent's love when blood ties, emotional bond and legal entitlement all get into the mix? Is anyone at fault for something as absolute and undeniable as a child's attachment? Indeed, the power of this screenplay is most keenly felt when it shows you that the most heartbreaking situations in life are often also the most blameless.

Elsewhere, it's highly satisfying to watch three of China's top actors, 黃渤 (Huang Bo), 郝蕾 (Hao Lei), 趙薇 (Zhao Wei), act the crap out of one another. Hao's performance is probably the more wooden of the three, not quite bringing the paralyzing sorrow of a bereaved mother completely across. But it only takes a few calm, piercing, wonderfully ambiguous glances from her in the latter parts of the film for you to see this woman's still got it. Huang is strong as the stricken turned obsessed father, selling his character's naked inner struggles with every wrinkle etched into his face. Zhao only appears in the second half of the film but has the most interesting role. Probably not glammed down enough from her movie star looks, she nonetheless nails the simpleminded drive of her character, hitting you hard in a couple of heart-wrenching scenes that could conceivably be her ticket to the Golden Horse winner's club already resided by her co-stars.

The broadly weepy film score is an obvious weakness and the inconclusive ending may be a problem to some. But overall this is solid old-school storytelling that actually has a worthy story to tell.

Berlinale: She's Lost Control / 白日焰火 (Black Coal, Thin Ice)

German writer/director Anja Marquardt's New York-based drama "She's Lost Control" is a fascinating exposé on intimacy and loneliness in modern times through the portrayal of a young woman working as a sex surrogate. The direction shows great confidence and instincts, designing scenes with clearly defined, emotionally eloquent set-ups and observing them from daring angles. It also puts the characters front and center, exploring their faces and bodies in close quarters with open curiosity and incisive attention. The actors, especially lead actress Brooke Bloom, play their part in making all this exciting to watch as they bare their comfort, awkwardness, lust and pain under microscopic scrutiny to highly engaging effect. The camerawork is terrific, capturing the action in bold, geometrical compositions and bright, crispy pictures. Ultimately the limited focus and lack of a more resounding concluding remark give this film a slight feel of an extended short, albeit one that's beautifully performed and crafted, with an immediate, magnetic pull.

Chinese competition entry "白日焰火 (Black Coal, Thin Ice)" is a very solid detective noir with artistic aspirations and bursts of directorial flourish. The plot is not exactly labyrinthine but has enough twists and a savage premise to be consistently absorbing. The brilliant production design contrasts seedy lime green and loud neon pink against a mercilessly white snowscape, creating images that are visually arresting and evocative of desolation, lurking misfortune. The cast, headlined by 廖凡 (Fan Liao), is good if most of them are not given that much to do, like the somewhat wasted 桂綸鎂 (Lun Mei Gwei) in the role of the stoic femme fatale. In the end this film firmly belongs to writer/director 刁亦男 (Yinan Diao), though. The way he stages and choreographs the scenes, filled with spontaneity, sly dynamics and a volatile mix of gothic gruesomeness and dry humor, is wonderfully layered and keeps you right on your toes. An early episode in a hair salon that ends horribly wrong showcases that ridiculousness and scary realness wrapped in one. Styled and shot with such discerning eyes and vivid cinematic language, there's not one boring frame to be found.

Berlinale: 推拿 (Blind Massage) / Things People Do

Chinese competition entry "推拿 (Blind Massage)" tells the tale of a group of blind masseurs fighting for dignity and the chance to love in Nanjing. Through its thematic singularity, realist approach, compassionate tone and committed performers, the movie never loses your attention or sympathy. At the same time, it's just rather unspectacular in every way. None of the multiple storylines is particularly inventive or well-developed. The directness and honesty of its voice is slightly compromised by a whiff of sentimentality. And among its technical achievements, nothing really stands out. Which is why, even when there's a fair amout of sex and surprisingly copious blood spill, this has to be considered a soft offering from accalimed director 婁燁 (Lou Ye). Of the actors, 黃軒 (Xuan Huang) is the most effective, in no small part because of the most fleshed-out character arc. The sequence following a major incident that befalls him later in the film is also the one place where we get a peek at Lou's here largely suppressed visual pizzazz- furiously, kaleidoscopically shot with a strong dose of youthful energy, it's an invigorating but sadly rare breath of fresh air in a movie too preciously cautious for its own good.

Saar Klein is a two-time Oscar nominated editor, so it's no wonder there's a grace and suggestive power to the edits in his directorial debut "Things People Do". But that's the extent of the nice things I have to say about this misguided, ill-conceived, supremely stupid movie about a good-guy-turned-amateur-robber. So preposterous is the premise of the story, so far removed from reality or any common sense its development, one just can't stop the eye-rolling not long after it starts. In the third act, when the screenwriters attempt to put a cool spin on the traditional moralistic ending, the sheer implausibility and laughable simplemindedness of the twist they come up with make it backfire so badly it's embarrassing to watch. There are lovely images of the American southern sky scattered throughout the unlikely chain of events and you just don't have the heart to pan the cast's efforts for such a thankless job, but overall, this is another prime example of something that has no business being at a film festival.

Berlinale: 那夜凌晨，我坐上了旺角開往大埔的紅van (The Midnight After) / Historia del miedo (History of Fear)

Hong Kong sci-fi /horror comedy "那夜凌晨，我坐上了旺角開往大埔的紅van (The Midnight After)" is overlong and doesn't quite know how to wrap things up in a disorderly third act. The tricky note of creepy hilarity is not always struck perfectly, partly due to the uneven acting, the spotty dialogue dub and the music that's used a bit too heavy-handedly now and then. However, for a good chunk of time, the magic is there: a deliciously evil plot with a familiar but nonetheless irresistible hook, colorful characters carefully arranged in a constellation of surprise, marvelous veteran actors like 林雪 (Suet Lam), 任達華 (Simon Yam), 惠英紅 (Kara Hui) who can be relied upon to deliver their wicked lines with utmost precision at pivotal moments, and above all the zealous, unbridled commitment of director 陳果 (Fruit Chan) to scare and entertain. For well over an hour these pieces are in place and the devilishly funny movie hits that sweet spot time and again, hard. On a technical level, the cinematography is probably too polished for its own sake but the production design and the visual effects are ace- seeing one of the most densely populated areas of the world completely deserted is just so wrong in all the right ways.

Up until its very last 15 minutes or so, Argentinian competition entry "Historia del miedo (History of Fear)" consists almost exclusively of scenes where unrelated people do chores, play pranks, idle or be otherwise occupied, all with a wooden look on their face and never giving any hint at possible connections between the activities or why we should even care. Worse still, the scenes depicting these largely unknown characters carrying out tremendously unexciting tasks are often cut off mid-action, again without warning or explanation. The utter plotlessness and an overwhelming sense of pointlessness make watching the film a vastly trying experience. Starting with the late dinner scene with an- again, completely out-of-the-blue- game proposal, writer/director Benjamin Naishtat finally displays at least an inkling of interest in building something substantial, and in those ending moments one could vaguely sense the promise of tension or harm, but then it just concludes in yet another limp question mark. One must ask what such an underdeveloped, pretentious, stylistically anemic film is doing at the Berlinale at all, let alone in competition.        

Berlinale: 魔警 (That Demon Within) / Die geliebten Schwestern (The Beloved Sisters)

Hong Kong police thriller "魔警 (That Demon Within)" is an unqualified mess. In its 2-hour running time, somehow (poorly choreographed) mass shoot-outs, robberies, double-crosses, demonic possession, schizophrenic killer, repressed trauma all play a role in a loud, clunky, deadly humorless splatter-fest. Director 林超賢 (Dante Lam) fails at the most fundamental storytelling and shows nothing resembling an artistic vision here, jambling incoherent plotlines together with such panicky cuts under such unflattering guise that the film doesn't just bore the eyes but borders on the incomprehensible. 吳彥祖 (Daniel Wu) is a good actor but as the possessed/schizophrenic/repressed cop gone evil he doesn't seem to know what he's doing half the time. All-out genre fares could be welcomed riots at film festivals, but this movie has neither the polished craftsmanship nor the playful tone to be called entertaining.

It's a shame that German competition entry "Die geliebten Schwestern (The Beloved Sisters)" outstays its welcome by running that extra hour, because what it achieves in the first two is quite remarkable: a ginger, finely nuanced, Jane Austen-esque romantic comedy about the relationship between famed poet Friedrich Schiller and the two Lengefeld sisters. Classical in its visual design and verbal elegance but infused by director Dominik Graf with a sharp, contemporarized sensibility, the courtship and the ensuing game of hearts unfold with wonderful fluidity and infectious amorousness. All three lead actors are excellent, offering portrayals of three distinct personalities that are each lovable in its own way and together promise chemical reaction of every sort. The last third of the film makes itself felt not only for the sheer length, but also because the refreshing, post-modern take on ménage à trois regrettably gets crushed by the oh-so-conventional sentiments of jealousy and proprietorship aka human nature. Technical aspects of the movie are all pro, the score, especially, providing surprising, highly effective notes of uproarious joy and ominous gloom, is a highlight.

Filmfest München: 天注定 (A Touch of Sin)

Using four minimally connected stories with no happy endings, writer/director 賈樟柯 (Zhangke Jia) paints a relentlessly bleak portrait of modern-day China in "天注定 (A Touch of Sin)". While it's interesting to see a land consumed by its gluttonous pursuit of wealth and the moral collapse it entails dissected from within, the raw visual style coupled with the eventful but rather plain storytelling lent the whole picture an overall feeling of flatness. Not even the numerous acts of extreme violence and cruelty (with the possible exception of the third, female-driven tale), depicted with Tarantino-esque splashiness that at times give them a fable-like quality, really elicited any deep emotional resonance.

Berlinale: 一代宗師 (The Grandmaster)

The various storylines in Wong Kar-Wai's "一代宗師 (The Grandmaster)" don't necessarily make an organic whole, the bumpy cuts from one to another often compromise the flow of the narrative, a problem most acutely felt in the last part of the movie. Add to that some miscues in music choice, and people might start calling this a minor-Wong.

Visually, though, WKW proves he's still the irrefutable grandmaster of style, here staging breathtaking fights and observing gorgeous period details in exquisitely lit spaces, plunging the audience in stunning vistas from start to finish. As to the complaints about excessive use of slo-mo, moi thinks the director and his editing team actually managed to find the tricky balance for the many action sequences, allowing the change in speed, angles, distance to underscore the physicality, seismic force and balletic grace unique to martial arts, never missing the grandeur or the intimacy of the battle.

Both lead actors are outstanding, Zhang Ziyi shows tremendous poise and exercises great restraint, using the merest sneers and unwavering gaze to convey the resolve and inner turmoils of the heroine. Tony Leung delivers an even more fully internalized performance, acting at times solely on the strength of the slightest twitch of a muscle or every emotion left unexpressed yet commanding the entire screen with the weight of his focus and his sheer presence. Now THAT is what I call a movie star.

Berlinale: 白鹿原 (White Deer Plain) / Love

Historical, political context not readily accessible to the general public and a curiously thin plot with no driving theme dragged down the epic 3-hour+ family saga "白鹿原 (White Deer Plain)", set in rural China after the end of its imperial era. But the exquisite art direction and the gorgeously lit, framed, color-saturated images are pure marvels to behold; the script for the Taiwanese ensemble romantic comedy "Love" can't scratch beneath the surface of urban relationships with their modern complexities, but when the surface is decked out with such dreamy sets and extremely pretty people falling in and out of love with one another while cracking jokes, fun is to be had.