Yellow Earth

Life sucked before the communists came along and brought hope, but did they change much? That question seems to be all the film has to say, not even addressing the question, but simply posing it. The singing and nice cinematography are good and provide something to hang on to as a viewer, but on the whole the film is rather dry and unengaging.

The music in this film is pretty cool I think, but I may be one of the only ones. The photography of the "yellow earth" was also particularly pretty. Otherwise, it was alright. The dramatic story is fair but it wasn't quite as engaging as I would have liked.

The music is achingly beautiful.

I honestly don't have a whole lot to say about this. It's not bad, but it didn't do a heck of a lot for me. It's one of those movies where I might have appreciated it more if I was part of the culture that was the intended audience. Some of the photography is pretty.

#731

Not as grandiose as Chen's later film Farewell, My Concubine... this is a small-scale story about the problems of the poor, rural Chinese and Communism's failure to solve them. I thought it was generally very well done, and wisely keeps the running time short for such a simple story. The use of songs was quite nice, although I thought it was unnecessary to augment them with instruments. Good performances, too. Not a "rock your world" type of movie, but a solid and subtle one.

682

642

# 680