Help in finding three chinese movies

[Richard_]

Hello to everyone. I have been studying chinese for three years now and I'm about to graduate. I love this forum,it helped me a lot and I'll need it again because I'm planning to continue the study in China. I have to prepare an essay about the evolution that China had in the recent 20-30 years.  Since my studies are involved in films and this kind of entertainment, I have to describe how China evolved trough some films, in particular I need some films the depicts China in the 80s and one the descibes the modern China. The problem is I know very little about this topic and I was wondering if some of you could suggest me some films and some director, thank you very much!

[imron]

3 hours ago, Richard_ said:

I have to prepare an essay about the evolution that China had in the recent 20-30 years

....

3 hours ago, Richard_ said:

in particular I need some films the depicts China in the 80s and one the descibes the modern China

The 80s were nearly 40 years ago now.

 

Anyway going back only 20-30 years, I'd recommend 《爱情麻辣烫》which is kind of a bit like a Chinese "Love Actually" (but came out several years before) and shows a cross section of different parts of society.  Also check out 《有话好好说》because 姜文 is great.  Both these are set in the late 90's.  I'd also suggest 《十七岁的单车》which is early 2000's but shows the divide between rural/urban and rich/poor.  Going back earlier to the 80's, look for stuff made by the "Fifth-Generation" directors who were making films at that time, though beware many of the films they made were not set in the 80s.

 

Coming in to modern times I haven't really watched many recent films but one I have watched was《撒娇女人最好命》which seems modern enough, I'm sure others can chime in with suggestions of modern films.

[Jim]

One of Ning Ying's Beijing trilogy might be good, especially the earlier two: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ning_Ying

[Luxi]

I think "Wild Mountains" may be a good one for the 1980's reform times. It is not strongly political (in contrast with most similar films of the time), feels very true to rural life and is very funny. A sadly neglected excellent Chinese film. 

 

1986 Wild Mountains 《野山》颜学恕 (Yan Yueshu) 执导
https://baike.baidu.com/item/野山
https://movie.douban.com/subject/1986919/

 

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089335/
https://www.nytimes.com/1987/03/19/movies/new-directors-new-films-china-s-wild-mountains.html

 

I didn't know it was based on a novel by Jia Pingwa, no wonder I liked it. More information here:

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/野山

[WANG，H]

I think "Mountains May Depart " may be a good one. It’s not about 80's, but it both have story in 1999 and 2014.

山河故人 (2015) Mountains May Depart   https://baike.baidu.com/item/山河故人/13885362?fr=aladdin

And maybe 90's is easier to write. There are a lot of stories happend in 90's in movie, but 80's is fewer than 90's.  

[889]

I've always been unreasonably fond of 北京，你早, a rather simple love story set around some Beijing bus workers in the late '80s.

 

It's not great art, but captures so well the Beijing of the time, a time before expansion of the Metro, when moving about the city meant a slow-moving trip on a well-packed bus. And hearing over and again: "买票！谁还没买票？后边儿，后边儿有人没票吗？买票！去哪儿？"

[Richard_]

Oh wow, I didn't expect so many answers. I'll check and watch all the films you mentioned, there are some that really intrigued me. Thank you to everyone, if it comes to mind something else, please let me now,I'll appreciat that^^ Again,thank you!

[XiaoXi]

On 11/15/2018 at 7:18 AM, imron said:

On 11/15/2018 at 3:48 AM, Richard_ said:

I have to prepare an essay about the evolution that China had in the recent 20-30 years

....

Haha, I think he means 'development'.