Kaiwang chuntian de ditie (2002)

User Rating:

6.9/10   

Director:

Yibai Zhang

Writer:

Fendou Liu (writer)

Release Date:

28 May 2002 (China)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Plot Keywords:

Subway | Chinese | China | Spring | Train

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Le Geng	...	Jian Bin
Yang Zhang	...	Lao Hu (Tiger)
Lan Ke	...	Public Relations
Yuanyuan Gao	...	Tian Ai
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Wei Fan
Jinglei Xu	...	Xiaohui

Also Known As:

Spring Subway (International: English title) (USA)

Runtime:

China:93 min

Country:

China

Language:

Mandarin

Color:

Color

Company:

Electric Orange Entertainment

Good insight into a young family's life in China

This movie is definitely not for everyone. The pace is kept deliberately slow, there are very few fast scenes, and the music contributes well to the mood. The actors are decent - nothing extraordinary, but they do a good job with the given script. Xu Jinglei provides nice eye candy. However, the real value of the movie in my view is that it depicts fairly well a young couple who have been together for seven years and the gradual arrival to the point where they feel the passion is lost. My wife felt the premise is not terribly realistic. While we disagreed on that, we both agreed that the silence, mind-games, and guessing each other is depicted very faithfully. Personally, I've met quite a few couples in China who are very similar to the protagonists in this movie. My only criticism is really a quibble. However, occasionally the movie depicts imaginary sequences, especially in the beginning. While these are used to good effect, they made me question most of the scenes later on, whether they were real or just someone's imagination. All in all, still, I'd give it a 7/10. It's an honest film about a young couple in contemporary China.