Mandarin

  • Kang Cheng & Han Hsiang Li – Niu gui she shen AKA Tales of Larceny (1973)

    1971-1980ComedyHan Hsiang LiHong KongKang Cheng

    In “The Scholar and The Soldier”, Major Fang is obsessed with Yu Zhen by chance, knowing that she is the daughter of scholar Xu, he decided to enter their house in disguise with his page, and however, Yu Zhen’s cousin comes back for the pre-arranged marriage at the same time. Li Han-hsiang both scripted and helmed “Tales of Larceny” about the scams cons worked and the games people played during the corrupt Chinese Warlord era, featuring a cast filled with the best of Shaw’s exceptional character actors.Read More »

  • Yimou Zhang – Wo de fu qin mu qin AKA The Road Home (1999)

    1991-2000ChinaDramaFifth Generation Chinese CinemaRomanceYimou Zhang

    Plot: Prompted by the death of his father and the grief of his mother, a man recalls the story of how they met in flashback.Read More »

  • Ziniu Wu – Wan zhong AKA Evening Bell (1989)

    1981-1990ChinaFifth Generation Chinese CinemaWarZiniu Wu

    Five Eighth-Route army soldiers induce a isolated Japanese squad to capitulate.

    Set on the end of WWII, Evening Bell follows a battle-hardened band of five Chinese soldiers struggling across a remote landscape wracked by post-armistice horrors. Stumbling from one grim aftermath to the next, they bury piles of the dead, help terrified peasants disarm landmines and save a Japanese officer from dying of exposure. When the officer leads them to a detachment of thirty-three starving Japanese soldiers, the film becomes a tension-filled standoff. In his films Wu Ziniu attempts to lead audiences below the surface of war to focus on human relationships instead of ideology. Needless to day, his approach to this genre has brought him criticism within China. (His third feature Dove Tree, about the Chinese-Vietnamese Border war, is still banned for its sympathetic treatment of the enemy.) Read More »

  • Han Hsiang Li – Chou wen AKA Scandal (1974)

    1971-1980ComedyHan Hsiang LiHong Kong

    Director Li Han-hsiang teams up again with the irreverent comedic talents of Michael Hui Kwun-man in this tongue-in-cheek drama. Corruption is rife in Wan Ping County in Hopei Province. Two good-for-nothing loafers Chen Ming (Michael Hui Kwun-man) and Chia Liang (Wang Sheng) arrive and turn the officials on their head. After a bout of blackmailing, they end up in positions of power themselves. It’s all done with the best intentions, or so they believe.Read More »

  • Han Hsiang Li – Hou men AKA Rear Entrance (1960)

    Han Hsiang Li1951-1960DramaHong Kong

    The Tsui’s live a happily married middle-class life on a quiet residential street in Hong Kong. He is a writer, she works at a kindergarten. There is only one thing missing from their life – children. Across the street lives a young girl who spends all day playing on the street, alone…Read More »

  • Yimou Zhang – Qiu Ju da guan si AKA The Story Of Qiu Ju (1992)

    1991-2000ChinaComedyDramaYimou Zhang

    The Story of Qiu Ju (Chinese: 秋菊打官司) is a 1992 Chinese comedy-drama film. The film was directed by Zhang Yimou and, as in many of his films, stars Gong Li in the title role. The screenplay is an adaption of Chen Yuanbin’s novella The Wan Family’s Lawsuit.

    The film tells the story of a peasant woman, Qiu Ju, who lives in a rural area of China. When her husband is kicked in the groin by the village head, Qiu Ju, despite her pregnancy, travels to a nearby town, and later a big city to deal with its bureaucrats and find justice.Read More »

  • Yimou Zhang – San qiang pai an jing qi AKA A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop (2009)

    Yimou Zhang2001-2010AsianChinaComedyFifth Generation Chinese Cinema

    Synopsis
    Wang runs a little noodle shop in a small desert town near Jiayu Pass not far from the Great Wall. He lives in his shop with his wife and their staff. But life with Wang is far from pleasant: he’s a real skinflint who only thinks about himself, and he sometimes doesn’t pay his staff for months on end. His wife also suffers at the hands of this domestic tyrant, although a discrete affair with Li, the shy cook, helps her to bear her lot in life. Every time she needs some more rouge, Li drives his boss lady into town where they have sex. But their regular little tryst doesn’t go unnoticed. Shortly beforehand, Li’s lover purchases a gun from a Persian carpet salesman and gives it to the cook for safekeeping. Wang, she says, must die – it’s the only way they can be happy. In the meantime, a waiter named Zhao and a policeman named Zhang inform Wang about his wife’s love affair and the gun that Li keeps hidden.Read More »

  • Liang Ying – Wo hai you hua yao shou AKA When Night Falls (2012)

    Liang Ying2011-2020ChinaDrama

    Quote:
    The mother of a murderer awaits and prepares to meet her son. The true story of a man who killed six Shanghai policemen after suffering police beatings as a punishment for riding an unlicensed bicycle. This film was produced as a part of the Jeonju Digital Project.Read More »

  • Yimou Zhang – Ying AKA Shadow (2018)

    2011-2020ActionChinaDramaYimou Zhang

    Set during China’s Three Kingdom’s era (AD 220-280). The story of a great king and his people, who will be expelled from their homeland and will aspire to claim it. The king, violent and ambitious, of mysterious methods and motives; his general, a visionary who yearns to win the final battle but needs to prepare his plans in secret; the women of the palace, who struggle to find redemption in a world where they have no place; and a commoner called “Lord of all the world”, will be the characters around who turn the inexorable forces of this story.Read More »

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