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Has anyone seen summer palace?


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Posted

suzhou river still remain as one of my favourite chinese film of all time but I'm very excited about Summer Palace- another movie from same director.

Has anyone seen it? I'd love to hear opinions!

Posted

I saw Summer Palace during its brief run at the cinema and thought it was pretty dull. Maybe I was missing something but the rest of the audience looked thoroughly unimpressed too (though I think most of them were there for the sex scenes). The political background stuff seemed too contrived and the relationship stuff just a bit pointless.

Posted

Summer Palace is a beautiful place. It's shame that such rubbish film was named after it!

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

To be honest I actually quite enjoyed watching it. And the more you think about it the more sense it makes. One thing that hardly anyone could say against about this film though is the music!

Posted

I saw this film at the Taipei International Film Festival last year. There's lots of sex. However, I don't think it was that exciting. I think the director was trying to show how empty and meaningless the young people's lives were and lots of empty and meaningless sex was a part of that.

Posted

I just watched it recently, and I can't get it out of my head. It's one of those haunting, emotionally upsetting movies that proves beautiful despite the discomfort of watching it. The NYTimes has a great review here. It is a little long and definitely a "slow" movie, but I think it says a lot despite what others called "contrived" political background. I think it's just about the intensity of an era and generation, and the loss or purposeless they struggle with after that moment--punctuated in history by 1989, but punctuated in the story by personal events.

  • 3 weeks later...
Posted
The political background stuff seemed too contrived and the relationship stuff just a bit pointless.

You are thinking too Hollywoodish. This movie is from another genre and you can't follow it using Hollywood formulas for character and story development. It is not a masterpiece in it's own genre but it's quite good. Actually this is the first Chinese movie that I have ever liked. Unlike other Chinese movies there are no full of empty heros and this is the first time that I see real feelings and characters in a Chinese movie. It is not a movie about politics, relationships and so on. It is a touch of a everything in that generation. There is a little bit of politics, love and etc. A Hollywood movie connects them for you but in this particular genre you should connect them yourself based on what you have experienced in your life. I'm afraid that most of the westerners who come from free and prosperous countries don't have a personal experience of this movie.

p.s. The music is composed by the Iranaian composer Peyman Yazdanian, who by the way is my friend's friend :mrgreen:

I knew that the music was familiar! :wink:

  • 1 year later...
Posted

Saw 《颐和园》over the weekend. Liked it a lot, but the story's told in a stream-of-consciousness style, which may not work for everyone. It felt like a Chinese version of "Unbearable Lightness of Being."

Not sure where you can download it. You can try the links below. Or buy it on amazon.com:

http://www.amazon.com/Summer-Palace-Bai-Xueyun/dp/B0012680A8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1252391338&sr=8-1

http://www.douban.com/group/topic/2502876/

电驴:ed2k://|file|%E9%A2%90%E5%92%8C%E5%9B %ADyhy.avi|1086908416|2FC5F1FE7A90C61CB3EA4FB9335896F6|h=HO2IOVGNWI34QRGNX2TZBILC6JH6WSHF|/

迅雷、快车:ftp://222.66.106.232:22121/d/nzb/b/2/颐和园yhy.avi

BT:http://221.238.252.237/3C/6D/3CF3C3FE3F6E8726A1277DA979A112386F6B2F6D.torrent

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

I am a Chinese and by accident i came into this forum. So surprised to see that somebody says this movie is very dull... I think you just couldn't fully understand the story and the political background setting.

For me and all my friends, this is a really good movie which touches every inches of our hearts.

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