Like his moody, leisurely SUZHOU RIVER (2000), Chinese director Lou Ye's wartime thriller prizes mood over straightforward storytelling and creates a damp, oppressive atmosphere that almost seems to cling to the skin. Manchuria, 1928: Amid growing hostility towards Japanese influence in Northeastern China, foreign student Hidehiko Itami (Toru Nakamura) boards a Tokyo-bound train after a bittersweet parting with his Chinese girlfriend, fellow student Cynthia (Zhang Ziyi). She returns home just in time to see her journalist brother, whose paper has decried Japanese incursions into China, murdered by a Japanese right-wing extremist. Three years later, Cynthia has moved ...
Released:
2003
Rated:
R
Length:
127 mins