Saturday, August 13, 2011

Summer Palace

China

In many ways this was an impressive production...intense personal narrative set against the grand sweeping events which rocked Chinese society from 1988 to 2004. Our focus is a highly volatile young woman who goes away to university in Beijing, falls madly in love with a caddish guy, gets caught up in the Tiananmen Square craziness...and she then bounces between various men searching fruitlessly for peace of mind.

Many (too many) sex scenes. Dogme 95 aesthetic...including maddening camera swoopiness which never stopped...for 2 1/4 hours.

There was much to admire here and I wanted to love its bravery in confronting such a transformative period head-on...but its flaws were also great and it ended up being a mixed experience.

6

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