Jia Zhangke’s Swimming Out Till the Sea Turns Blue

Imagine where China might be now if Mao hadn’t tortured and killed his best educated citizens during his various mass movements. Instead, the country lost decades of economic and intellectual development. However, those dark years provided artistic fodder for several novelists who lived through them. Jia Zhangke traces the course of Chinese history through the lives and work of four writers associated with his home province of Shanxi in Swimming Out Till the Sea Turns Blue, which opens this Friday in New York and LA.

The first writer under discussion happens to be the least interesting, perhaps because Ma Feng is long dead and most of those speaking of him remember him as loyal Communist village leader. Of course, the regime he helped build would eventually launch the infamous Cultural Revolution, which would sweep up Jia Pingwa’s father, a high school educator. His treatment was so unfair, the future novelist was eventually classified as “redeemable” and allowed to pursue an education, yet in subsequent years, he still found himself drawn to rural communities.

Yu Hua would also write about the Cultural Revolution in To Live (Zhang Yimou’s film adaptation would be pulled from distribution by the Party, which subsequently banned him and his star, Gong Li, from making films for two years). However, Yu started publishing under the relative freedom of Deng Xiaoping’s early reform years. In fact, he was surprisingly shrewd in his dealings with his publisher.

Liang Hong is a Gen-Xer who has written fiction, but she is best known for her non-fiction books about her native Liang Village and the migrant workers who still maintain their ties to home. Indeed, her attention to China’s “Great Migration” phenomenon makes her work particularly zeitgeisty.

Jia Zhangke’s I Wish I Knew

This is Shanghai, but not the glass and steel megapolis Chinese state media tries to project. It is a city of strife and toil—and immigrants from throughout the assorted Chinas. Independent Chinese auteur Jia Zhangke creates a multi-faceted portrait of the Mainland’s go-go financial capital that is part city-symphony and part oral history. Ten years after its initial screenings, Jia’s thoughtful ode to Shanghai finally gets a proper American release when I Wish I Knew opens this Friday in New York, at the Metrograph.

Technically, I Wish I Knew was commissioned to commemorate the Shanghai World Expo, but you can tell Jia will not be towing a party line when his first interview subject’s reminiscences primarily focus on juvenile street gangs and the hardships his family endured during the Cultural Revolution. He will return to the Gang of Four’s institutionalized madness later in the film, at even greater length.

Indeed, Jia is drawn to somewhat marginalized figures, like the daughter of one of Shanghai’s most notorious gangsters. Besides the Cultural Revolution, the Japanese occupation and Taiwan’s White Terror also loom large in the film. Although this is technically a film about Shanghai, there is clearly a sense the mega-city is intrinsically linked to Hong Kong and Taipei, which explains why Beijing is cracking down so hard on Hong Kong and why the Taiwan’s recent independence-affirming election induced a panic attack.

In between interview segments, Jia follows his wife and muse Zhao Tao as she strolls through the city, but instead of the glitzy shopping district, their perambulations mostly take us through docks, bridges, and post-industrial districts. You can tell the disparities of Shanghai just from Jia’s exterior shots.

Jia Zhangke’s Ash is Purest White

Perhaps no filmmaker is as attuned to the passage of time as Jia Zhangke. In his latest film, Jia incorporated footage he shot around the turn of the millennium, as he did in his previous film, Mountains May Depart. However, this time round, he went to great expense and effort to recreate that bygone era. His protagonist, Zhao Qiao is also keenly aware of the changing times. The years gone by do not do her any favors in Jia’s Ash is Purest White, which opens this Friday in New York.

Guo Bin is a low level “Jianghu” gangster in provincial Datong, but he has ambitions. His lover Zhao sees herself as the Bonnie to his Clyde. For her, their relationship is not just about the money and benefits he can offer. Zhao genuinely loves him, so when Guo is nearly beaten to death in an ambush, she is willing to fire off an illegal handgun to save him—and then take the rap for the gun entirely on her own.

After serving a five-year prison sentence for him, Zhao expects to find Guo waiting at the prison gate, but he is nowhere to be found. Feeling rather disappointed, she follows his trail to the Three Gorges area. Zhao is not an idea. She fully recognizes what’s what. She just wants to make Guo cop to it in-person.

Although Jia is not trying to outdo Johnnie To by any stretch, Ash is still the closest he has (and probably ever will) come to a straight-up gangster movie. Honest-to-gosh, the big fight scene culminating with Zhao’s gunplay is a slamming beatdown that can compare to anything produced in Hong Kong or Hollywood over the last ten years.

Of course, it is still a Jia Zhangke film, so that means there is also a great deal of trenchant social observation. It also features another remarkably sensitive and complex performance from his wife and muse, Zhao Tao. She is definitely a woman scorned, but there is absolutely nothing cliched or rote about her performance as Zhao Qiao. We definitely feel her pain and frustration, even when she scares us a little (or maybe more than a little).

By a similar token, it is enormously compelling to watch Liao Fan’s portrayal of Guo Bin start with a confident swagger that slowly gives way to insecurity and selfishness. However, it is her scene with Xu Zheng (in an extended cameo as a traveling companion) that will really haunt viewers’ memories.

Ash is maybe a tad inconsistent, but it boasts some of the finest crafted scenes of any of Jia’s films. It also probably ranks as Zhao Tao’s best performance since A Touch of Sin, which is saying something. Throughout it all, Jia takes stock of the evolving cultural norms and literally changing landscape of 21^st Century Mainland China. It is also nice to see the cut Cohen Media is releasing restored director-thespian Feng Xiaogang’s brief appearances as a doctor, even though he was axed from the Chinese release, solely because his name was bandied about in conjunction with the Fan Bingbing tax scandal, so international jet-setters should definitely see it here—and not in China. Highly recommended, Ash is Purest White, opens this Friday (3/15) in New York, at the Quad Cinema.

NYFF ’16: The Hedonists (short)

These working class guys are not so different than from the characters you know and love from The Full Monty. They are okay with working hard, but even better at playing hard. Unfortunately, the entire work force of their Shanxi coal mine is about to be laid off. That means they will be forced into job-searching mode in Jia Zhangke’s The Hedonists, which screens as part of Shorts Program 2: International Auteurs at the 54^th New York Film Festival.

Some of the three pals worked more diligently than others, so the manager (who should be feeling more embarrassed than he appears) takes varying degrees of satisfaction pink-slipping them. In between boozy hands of mahjong, they duly scroll through job listings on their smart phones. Even though they are middle-aged and out of shape they apply for a bodyguard position, protecting a nouveau riche “Big Boss,” played by Jia himself. When that misadventure fails to pan out, they apply for costumed performer jobs at a Ming Dynasty theme park, harkening back to Jia’s masterful The World.

Co-written by Jia and his muse/life partner Zhao Tao, The Hedonists is a slyly amusing, deeply humane examination of structurally unemployment in contemporary China. Jia proves he still has the masterful touch for short subjects he displayed throughout the elegant Cry Me a River, but in this case, the ending is so abrupt, it makes one wonder if there is a feature-length third act missing. Still, Hedonists is ironically notable as one of Jia’s most visually cinematic films, with more sprawling crane-shots stuffed into its twenty-five minutes than you will find in most of his features.

Conceived as part of the Beautiful 2016 anthology film project, The Hedonists is obviously also screening as a discrete short in its own right. It will not disappoint Jia’s admirers (although they will probably miss Zhao’s luminous screen presence), but it seems odd NYFF chose not to bring the entire anthology, considering it also boasts a brand spanking new Stanley Kwan film. Nonetheless, Jia certainly fits the International Auteur rubric (perhaps better than any of his program mates). Highly recommended in any screening format, Jia’s The Hedonists screens this Saturday (10/1) and Sunday (10/2) as part of Shorts Program 2, at this year’s New York Film Festival.

ND/NF ’16: Life After Life

Ghost stories have rarely been so matter-of-factly workaday, but this salt-of-the-earth family in provincial Shanxi can hardly afford to indulge in a lot of dramatics. Frankly, it will be quite sporting of Mingchun if he fulfills his late wife’s request to move a significant tree to more fertile ground. It will be a tiny step to counter the environmental devastation so obvious throughout Zhang Hanyi’s Life After Life, which screens during this year’s New Directors/New Films.

Mingchun has had a hard life, but his thirteenish son Leilei is not making it any easier. Like most kids of his generation, he has turned against the rural life and traditional values. However, after their latest row, Leilei’s body comes back possessed by the spirit of his mother, Xiuying. Mingchun accepts this claim at face value, but there will be no tears or kisses for their supernatural reunion. We quickly get the sense their union was one of convenience that sort of evolved into something like friendship, but that was about the best they could hope for on their rung of the economic ladder.

For reasons we never fully understand, Xiuying needs Mingchun to move a tree planted near their former quarters to a more hospitable location. That will be easier said than done. The local environs have been badly scarred and desiccated by industrial overdevelopment and unsustainably agriculture. Cinematographer Chang Mang often dwarves the father and son amid the lifeless vistas. Hs compositions often resemble traditional Chinese watercolors, but the backdrops are eerily lifeless and barren rather than lush and verdant.

Mingchun and Xiuying’s spirit will also have to contend with her family’s callous indifference and the frightening state of provincial infrastructure. Clearly, there is no support system for rugged peasant stock such as themselves. While Zhang maintains an elegiac tone, the social and political implications of their situation are unmistakable.

Life is a subtle and distinctive film, but it is not what you would opt to watch after an all-night bender. Zhang’s aesthetic is downright ascetic. His pacing is deliberate and his tone is rather severe, even compared to the films of executive producer-mentor Jia Zhangke. Yet, it would be foolish to dismiss Life as just another naturalistic Chinese indie. Zhang Mingjun’s performance as Mingchun in particular is deeply compelling precisely because it is so realistically square-jawed and straightforwardly unfussy. This is a man who takes a beating from life every day, yet keeps plugging on.

It is also striking to see how Zhang depicts spiritual developments in such gritty, down-to-earth terms. There is nothing like Demi Moore’s pottery wheel scene in Ghost here. Yet, when Xiuying guides Mingchun towards encounters with his reincarnated parents, it hits us on a far deeper level, probably because it really seems real. Recommended for mature and well-rested cineastes, Life After Life screens this Saturday (3/19) at MoMA and Sunday (3/20) at the Walter Reade, as part of ND/NF ’16.

NYFF ’15: Mountains May Depart

Evidently, in Chinese discos around 1999, “Go West” was like “The Final Countdown” in Czech dance clubs. When they played it, everybody hit the dancefloor. However, when you heard the Pet Shop Boys’ cover, you knew it was 12:00 sharp, the start of a new day. It heralds the dawn of a new era, but not necessarily a better one in Jia Zhangke’s Mountains May Depart (clip here), which screens as a Main Slate selection of the 53^rd New York Film Festival.

Shen Tao and her friends are going to party like it is 1999, because it is. New Year is approaching, when she will once again sing Fenyang’s big celebratory song. Obviously, the school teacher is the village sweetheart, but the well-heeled wheeler-dealer Zhang Jinsheng and her dirt poor childhood chum Liangzi are particularly smitten. A traditional love triangle forms, but Shen is (perhaps willfully) unaware how dirty Zhang is willing to fight.

By most objective measures, she makes the wrong choice and deals with the consequences in the second act set during 2014. Divorced from Zhang, Shen lives a comfortable life as Fenyang’s leading patroness, but it is a lonely existence without her seven year old son Dollar, as his father insisted on naming him, which pretty much tells you what you need to know about Zhang. However, she gets a poignant reminder of what might have been when the long absent Liangzi returns to Fenyang with his family and a nasty case of black lung.

The 2014 arc concludes with Shen attempting to make some sort of peace with Dollar before he immigrates to Australia with Zhang and his trophy wife. Flashing forward to 2025, the eighteen year-old can hardly remember his mother. Zhang’s dodgy dealings have caught up with them, causing no end of embarrassment for the son. For obvious Freudian reasons, Dollar explores an ambiguously romantic relationship with his professor Mia, a Hong Kong immigrant (by way of Toronto) who happens to be about Shen’s age.

Both the 1999 and 2014 sections include documentary footage Jia shot before knowing they would have a place in Mountains, but not the 2025 segment, at least not as far as we know. Frankly, the opening scene of Jia’s muse and now wife Zhao Tao leading a “Go West” get-down is so infectious, it demanded a film be crafted around. Yet, following its sheer retro joy, the rest of the film down-shifts, maintaining an exquisitely bittersweet vibe.

To match his vintage footage, all of the 1999 scenes are in boxy Academy ratio (as per the state of digital cameras at the time) and feature vivid saturated colors (especially the crimson reds of Shen’s wardrobe). In accordance with technological advances and increased pollution, Jia cranks up the 2014 scenes to standard ratio and dilutes the colors, while the 2025 Australian sequences are shot in sterile looking widescreen. You can also notice the population density of the streets and the screen precipitously decline.

It is all rather fitting and clever as a commentary on the impact of technology on human relationships, but what really sticks with you is Jia’s characteristic use of pop songs, which has never been as poignant. In addition to The Pet Shop Boys, HK Cantopop superstar Sally Yeh’s love songs rouse all kinds of sentimental and nostalgic feelings, in the way only effective pop tunes can.

Zhao Tao is absolutely perfect for Shen Tao. She truly looks ageless and timeless, yet she can eerily convey so much through so such subtle expression. Probably nobody working in film today can hold an audience rapt with a silent close-up as long as she can. Your heart aches for her, but you have to respect Shen for accepting responsibility for her mistakes and carrying on with dignity.

Zhao brings more than enough presence for any film, but Mountains also has the revered Sylvia Chang, hot on the heels of Office after a five year absence from film. Few people have her combination of maturity and sensuality that is so aptly suited for Mia. Think of her as a potential HK Helen Mirren, in a few years’ time. There are no end of pitfalls to depicting May-Septemberish relationships, but she develops convincingly imperfect chemistry with Dong Zijian’s Dollar that makes it work in dramatic terms.

The more you think about Mountains, the more it gets into your head and your soul. It is the sort of film that might break you out in tears later in the night rather than while you are in the theater, which is rather considerate of it, really. It is also further proof that Zhao Tao is the finest screen actress of our generation, bar none. Very highly recommended, Mountains May Depart screens again tonight (9/29) at the Beale Theater, as part of this year’s NYFF.

NYFF ’15: Jia Zhangke, a Guy from Fenyang

Like many filmmakers selected for this year’s New York Film Festival, Jia Zhangke gets more distribution internationally than in his native country. However, in Jia’s case, it is not because he is an elitist or lacks a popular following. In fact, many of his films have been widely seen through bootleg copies. It is simply a matter of government censorship. Despite his uncertain status with the official state film establishment, Jia is received like a favorite son when he revisits his home town and other scenes from his resolutely independent films in Walter Salles’ documentary, Jia Zhangke, a Guy from Fenyang (clip here), which screens during the 53rd New York Film Festival.

The concept behind Guy from Fenyang is hardly a new one. Damien Ounouri essentially did the same thing in his hour-long documentary Xiao Jia Going Home from 2008. However, a lot can change in seven years, especially in today’s China. Nor is Jia one to be idol for long. Indeed, as Salles’ doc opens, Jia and actor Wang Hongwei walk through the streets of Fenyang that were lined with karaoke bars when they made their earlyfilms like Platform, but are ominously shuttered now.

For someone who cannot get his films approved for Mainland theatrical distribution, Jia sure has a lot of people approach him on the streets. Yet, he is always gracious about it. He also seems like a dutiful son when he visits his mother and eldest sister. In somewhat oblique fashion, Salles reveals the importance of family to Jia, especially with respects to his father. As a university faculty member, who had the profound misfortune of keeping a diary since his teenage years, the Cultural Revolution was especially difficult on Jia’s dad. It was also hard on his grandmother, who was the widow of a land-owning doctor. Clearly, his family’s experiences have influenced his work, most notably Platform, but there is a nonconformist humanist perspective reflected throughout his work. Of course, that is exactly why he has such trouble with the censors.

In addition to Jia, Salles also talks to several of his key collaborators, notably including his wife, muse, and frequent leading lady Zhao Tao, who explains how her life inspired The World. In accordance with Jia’s democratic spirit, Salles also elicits insights from his frequent cinematographer Yu Lik-wai and sound designer Zhang Yang. Fittingly, he liberally illustrates the film with clips of Jia’s work, but none are as evocative as the visually striking (and perhaps comparatively underrated) The World.

Picking up on Jia’s concerns regarding overdevelopment and callous demolition, Salles often compares and contrasts the locales of Jia’s film as they were then with their present radically altered conditions. It is hard to miss the devastation wrought on working class neighborhoods. Although Jia never gets explicitly political, we get a clear idea of the social inequities that distress him.

At one point Jia suggests he makes films about average people living common lives. That is sort of true, but it is nearly impossible for anyone to be average or common during a period of hyper-reality. Jia captures that zeitgeist with vivid directness (see A Touch of Sin for a particularly blistering example). Salles provides the cultural and political context necessary to understand Jia’s significance in contemporary China, while conveying a sense of his resilient personality. Recommended beyond Jia’s admirers for anyone interested in independent Chinese film and culture, Jia Zhangke, a Guy from Fenyang screens this Wednesday (9/30) at the Beale and Thursday (10/1) at the Gilman, as part of this year’s NYFF.

ND/NF ’15: K

This is Kafka like we have never seen him before: lusty and Mongolian. Our alienated protagonist is indeed a land surveyor stuck in a bureaucratic nightmare, but he is a rather surly slacker of a chap (and a bit of a horndog). Nonetheless, Inner Mongolia (the Chinese Autonomous Republic) stands in quite well for the vaguely Eastern European setting of Kafka’s The Castle in Darhad Erdenibulag & Emyr ap Richard’s K (trailer here) which screens during the 2015 edition of New Directors/New Films.

K, as he is still simply known, lacks the proper documentation to stay in the small provincial town governed by the nearby (yet conspicuously unseen) castle, despite having been summoned by the governor. Obviously, this causes a bit of an official quandary, especially when it is determined the original work request was sent out in error. Nevertheless, he is now an employee of the Castle, officially reporting to Minister Klamm, who has already palmed off the surveyor on the ailing town mayor.

Still believing he has actual work to do, K doggedly pursues a meeting with Klamm, unaware his actions constitute a serious breach of local protocol. He even takes up with Frieda, a tavern hostess who is rumored to be Klamm’s mistress, but his motives for that might be more carnal and less mercenary than many assume. Indeed, despite the precariousness of his position, K will have his share of hedonistic indulgences.

Although ap Richard’s screenplay simplifies the unfinished Kafka source novel, he is still relatively faithful to its overall storyline. K duly butts heads with Artur and Jeremias, the two locals assigned to serve as his assistants. He also becomes ambiguously involved with the family of Castle messenger Barnabas, particularly his older sister Olga.

Frankly, the oddest thing about ap Richard’s adaptation is how much fun it allows K. Up until the closing sequences, he and Erdenibulag maintain a tone that is better described as eccentric than surreal or, shall we say, Kafkaesque. Since they largely dispense with the paperwork motif, it is even more challenging to read allegorical significance into their updated re-conception. However, they certainly capture a grubby sense of provincial corruption.

As K, Bayin serves partly as the film’s straight man and partly as its madman, but he is a weirdly effective in both capacities. Jula similarly keeps the audience off balance as the possible femme fatale Frieda, while both Yirgui and Jüdengowa have surprisingly touching scenes as Olga and Pepi, Frieda’s barmaid successor, respectively.

It is entirely possible that there is only enough room in the world for one lascivious Mongolian Chinese Kafka adaptation, but K (co-produced by Jia Zhangke) fills that spot rather nicely. Erdenibulag and ap Richard create a strange and irrational world, but it is not as nearly as existentially soul-deadening as most takes on Kafka tend to be. It ends in a rather ambiguous place, but when you leave the theater the sun will still shine and the birds will still chirp. Recommended as an idiosyncratic but mostly successful cross-pollenated oddity, K screens this Saturday (3/21) at the Walter Reade and Sunday (3/22) at MoMA, as part of this year’s ND/NF.

NYFF ’13: A Touch of Sin

It is hard to imagine Jia Zhangke releasing a wuxia martial arts epic. Despite the hat-tips to King Hu (who directed A Touch of Zen), it would be more accurate to describe his latest film as a meditation on violence, offering a challenging glimpse into the heart of a lawless contemporary China.  American partisans on either side of the gun control debate could find themselves squirming at its morally ambiguous portrayal of a lone shooter as well.  Of course, Jia has never displayed a compulsive need to make things easy.  Nonetheless, A Touch of Sin (trailer here) may yet prove to be one of his most accessible films when it screens as a main slate selection of the 51^st New York Film Festival.

Right from the opening sequence, viewers will know they are in a different sort of Jia Zhangke film—one with a body count.  The mystery motorcyclist will reappear later.  Instead we will follow Dahai, a disillusioned labor leader, who returns home to stir up trouble for the corrupt village party boss and the new fat cat factory owner greasing his wheels.  Instead, it is Dahai who is beaten and humiliated.  Eventually, the mockery he endures pushes Dahai to the edge.

Without question, Sin’s first arc is its most unnerving.  Much like Rafi Pitts’ criminally under-appreciated The Hunter, Sin openly invites viewers to condone or at least mitigate a shocking act of violence.  Yet, the consistently contrarian Jia further complicates our emotional response by implying some of Dahai’s rage might be tragically misplaced.  It is keenly disturbing filmmaking, perfectly served Wu Jiang’s tightly wound performance.

Jia then shifts his attention to Zhou San, the sociopathic wanderer who started the film with a bang.  He has returned Chongqing, but his family is not too sure how they feel about seeing him again.  Zhou’s story holds considerable potential, given the sense of danger that follows the drifter wherever he goes, but it is not nearly as well developed as those that immediately precede and follow it.

The presence of Zhao Tao, Jia’s longtime muse and now wife, promises and duly delivers a return to form.  Zhao’s Zheng Xiaoyu is the receptionist at a half-sleazy sauna in Hubei, carrying on a long distance affair with Zhang Youliang, a factory manager in Guangzhou.  Unfortunately, the family of the betrayed wife discovers their furtive relationship, sending goons to rough up Zheng.  It will not be the only incident of injustice she witnesses first hand.  When an abusive sauna client tries to force himself on her, she finally responds in much the same manner as Dahai.

For the concluding segment, Jia shifts to Guangdong, where a rootless migrant worker takes a series of jobs, including assembly line work in Zhang’s factory.  However, it is Xiaohui’s experiences in the local luxury hotel-brothel that will be his emotional undoing.  Luo Lanshan and Li Meng are quite engaging, developing some touching chemistry together as Xiaohui and the young working girl he courts.  However, their storyline feels rather rushed (something you would never expect in Jia’s films), hustled to its untimely conclusion before all the necessary psychological bases have been touched.

Granted, A Touch of Sin is uneven, but it is major cinematic statement, spanning class and geography.  Without question, it is Jiang Wu and Zhao Tao who administer the arsenic with their fearless, visceral performances.  In fact, with her work in Sin, one can make the case Zhao is the definitive and defining actress of our day and age.  Don’t even counter with Streep.  Unlike her Rich Little impersonations that consistently pull you out of the movie, Zhao always draws viewers into her films and characters.  She is beautiful, but chameleon like, playing parts that are emblematic of globalism (as in The World) and Chinese social alienation (a la 24 City).  Yet, she is also achingly moving in a straight forward chamber drama like Jia’s short Cry Me a River.

It is hard to miss the implications of Sin.  Jia unequivocally takes the Chinese state bureaucracy and their corporate cronies to task for their pervasive corruption.  He also casts a disapproving eye on the burgeoning sex industry.  For all its trenchant criticism, Sin is arguably somewhat encouraging—simply because Jia was able to complete it as he intended.  Given his perpetually half pregnant state as a former independent filmmaker partially and uneasily incorporated into the state system, one always wonders if he will still be allowed to make his films according to his aesthetic and ethical principles.  A Touch of Sin might be something of a stylistic departure, but it is very definitely a Jia Zhangke film, which is happy news indeed. 

Even with its odd imperfections here and there, A Touch of Sin packs a whopper of a punch.  Highly recommended for China watchers and fans of social issue cinema, Sin screens this Saturday (9/28) at Alice Tully Hall and the following Wednesday (10/2) at the Beale, as part of this year’s NYFF, with a regular theatrical opening to follow next Friday (10/4) at the IFC Center.

NYFF ’12: Memories Look At Me

It turns out you can go home again, but you’re likely to get antsy after awhile.  A grown daughter and her aging but still vital parents gently reminisce in Song Fang’s Memories Look at Me, produced by trailblazing independent Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke, which screens tomorrow as a main slate selection of the 50th New York Film Festival.

Song Fang plays herself, as do her parents, Song Di-jin and Ye Yu-zhu, as well as her brother, Yuan.  Since they are really related, the on-screen relationships are all quite believable.  Yet, there is hardly a hint of family dysfunction here.  Visiting from Beijing, Song stays in her parents’ Nanjing flat, which looks quite livable.  Her brother drops by as does her bright young niece.  Frankly, her parents appear to be the model of middle class respectability and their granddaughter should have a promising future ahead of her.  Song though, is less sure of her place in the world.

Memories is like a Digital Generation attempt at an Ozu movie.  That is all very nice, but it leaves the audience with a raft of questions.  First and foremost, how did her borderline bourgeoisie parents survive the Cultural Revolution, which they were surely old enough to witness first hand?  Yes, they share memories of hard times, including hunger and hospitals, but are these oblique references to Maoist persecution or merely the experiences of those who have lived through an era of sharp economic contraction?   As a close second, the thirty-ish Song’s status as one of three siblings in One Child China begs for further explanation as well.

Nonetheless, Song presents an intriguingly oblique view of the new China, through discussions of the relative merit of different forms of insurance (isn’t the Party insurance enough for everyone?) and the hectic on-the-go lifestyle of Beijingers.  Memories also subtly reminds audiences of the importance of family, in an almost Confucian sense, without ever remotely approaching didacticism.

Of the many hats writer-director-editor-co-producer Song wears, her lead performance as her pseudo-self is easily the most impressive.  She has moments of simple, straight forward regret that are truly honest and powerful.  However, her sense of pacing is a bit sluggish, making some of her mentor Jia’s more deliberate films seem almost break-neck by comparison.  The DIY dGenerate digital cinematography is what it is.  Those who have seen a number of Chinese art films will know what to expect.  Well acted but a tough go for most viewers, Memories Look at Me is best saved for die-hard China-watchers and Sinophiles when it screens tomorrow afternoon (10/7) at Alice Tully Hall, as part of the 2012 New York Film Festival.