Caught in Time [除暴] (2020)

Far East Film Festival 24 Captain Zhong Chen [Wang Qianyuan] arrives in (fictional) Changpu (shot in Chongqing) and, before he has even got to the police station, he is kidnapped by a bunch of ruthless and heavily armed robbers. From there, the film becomes a battle of wits (and wigs) between the determined police captain…

Schemes in Antiques [古董局中局] (2021)

Far East Film Festival 24 At least the (English) title is original but it's more or less downhill from there. An unadventurous adventure movie directed by Hong Kong film-maker Derek Kwon aka Guo Zijian. Xu Yuan's [Lei Jiayin] grandfather allegedly handed over a priceless national treasure - the head of a buddha - to the…

Hi, Mom [你好，李焕英] (2021)

Far East Film Festival Hi, Mom and Sister - both directed by women - were two of the surprise hits of the 2021 Box Office with Hi, Mom ending up as one of the top-selling films in China (highest ever box office for a woman director) and getting 7.7 on Douban. The film starts in…

The Italian Recipe [遇见你之后] (2022)

Far East Film Festival Given the work which FEFF has done to bridge the gap between Eastern cinema and Western audiences, it seemed entirely appropriate that the opening film for FEFF 24 (back in the Teatro Nuovo Udine for the first time since 2019) should be this Chinese-Italian co-production. Peng [Liu Xun], a 'third-rate' pop…

Girl Dorm [少女宿舍] (2019)

Despite the generic title and some of the publicity material (below), this is more a psychological drama than a standard horror movie - unsurprisingly given that mainland censorship rules exclude paranormal activities. Unfortunately, however, the film is ultimately undermined by the lack of any clear storyline. Student Li Zhenxin [Chen Lin, the wife in Between…

Between Earth and Sky [一丈天地] (2020)

Set in a remote village in the north of Guizhou province, the main character Qin Lang [Chen Liang] is caught not so much between earth and sky as between tradition and modernity. The village is isolated and it is planned to move the villagers to a nearby town where they will have access to better…

Jet Lag [错落斑驳的] (2022)

East Asian Film Festival Ireland 2022 Director Zheng Lu Xinyuan's first feature The Cloud in Her Room (2020) (shown at least years EAFFI) was one of the most interesting and original Chinese films of the last two years. But the follow up is a major disappointment. Jet Lag is an overlong and occasionally pretentious home…

Ripples of Life [永安镇故事集] (2021)

East Asian Film Festival Ireland 2022 Ripples of Life (Tales of Yong'an Town in Chinese) opens in a town in Hunan province as a film crew set up camp to prepare to shoot a film of the same title. The film consists of three largely separate though related parts. First we see Gu [Huang Miyi,…

Lunar Eclipse [月蚀] (1999)

An important film from the 90s by writer and director Wang Quan'an (Tuya's Marriage). Wang is often described as a sixth generation director and indeed he completed his studies in 1991. However, this was his first feature film as director, well after the initial wave of sixth generation films and at a stage when directors…