EMPIRE PICTURES
Seamstress Xun Zhou.
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Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
Opens Fri., Sept. 30, at Harvard Exit
Whoever thought there'd be any nostalgia for the Cultural Revolution? The social costs to Chairman Mao's wrenching initiative, usually dated to 1966–76, are incalculable. Hundreds of millions were affected as urbanites and intellectuals were deemed reactionary and sent to the fields for re-education with the peasants. Anywhere from a half-million to several million Chinese may have died from direct or indirect causes; then, after all that suffering, official policy lurched toward state-controlled crony capitalism, and that fervent period is remembered with shame and anger.
Not so for Dai Sijie, however, a Paris-based Chinese filmmaker who competently but blandly adapts his own 2000 novel, based on his forced re-education during the early '70s. In the gorgeous terraced hills of Sichuan, laced with ancient stone footpaths, 17-year-olds Luo (Kun Chen) and Ma (Ye Liu) accept their share of humiliation and hard work—hauling sloppy pails of pig shit to fertilize the fields, mining copper with hand tools, enduring the scorn of the village chief. But this really isn't the focus of Dai's story, which is remarkably lacking in bitterness. Being the only two in the village who are literate and educated, Luo and Ma are regularly dispatched to town to watch North Korean movies—which they're then ordered to narrate for the eager villagers back home. Clever teens both, they substitute samizdat plots from their illegal cache of foreign novels (Balzac, Flaubert, Dumas, etc.), which move the villagers to tears.
Their best pupil, however, is the local tailor's lovely granddaughter (Xun Zhou). She gets private tutoring in their forbidden grotto of books: drinking up their knowledge, losing her peasant accent, learning to write, and eventually taking Luo as her lover. Ma narrates the film from his expatriate perspective 30 years later; he also sneakily convinces the village chief that the Mozart sonatas he plays on violin are actually paeans to Mao. He loves the little seamstress, too, but the movie isn't exactly a Chinese Jules and Jim.
Instead, Dai takes a gentle, sentimental, and thoroughly local view of the period's upheaval. When Luo and Ma meet again as middle-aged men (a rather abrupt transition), they don't complain about the copper mining and shit hauling—they just want to know what happened to the seamstress and the other villagers. Their concern is touching, especially as the village is about to be drowned by history. (NR) BRIAN MILLER
The Greatest Game Ever Played
Opens Fri., Sept. 30, at Metro and others
Actually, it's more like the most boring game ever played. I've always held the opinion that golf is a boring game, played by inherently boring people. Well, this adaptation of Mark Frost's nonfiction account only reinforces my prejudice. Intended to be a heartwarming flick (words that usually chill the heart), the story of Francis Ouimet (Shia LaBeouf), a working-class boy who strives for golf stardom, will only be enjoyed by avid golfers or boring people. Or both, if my theory is correct.
Based on the true story of the 1913 U.S. Open, in which Ouimet defeated veteran British pro Harry Vardon (Stephen Dillane), the film shows golf from many different angles in an attempt to be creative, but mostly it just puts you to sleep. It opens with a little boy awakening to the sound of his family shack about to be bulldozed. This ends up being Vardon, although the connection is unclear. We then jump ahead to a completely different character (Ouimet) and a new scenario.
A poor young American lad, Ouimet longs to become a professional golfer. He practices putting daily on his bedroom floor, eventually becoming a caddy with an amazing swing. Meanwhile, his father, a hardworking laborer, thinks golf is ridiculous and belittles his son's dream. His mother is more encouraging, but both their characters are forgotten by the film's end.
In a far cry from his last directorial endeavor, Frailty, Bill Paxton takes a big step away from God-sent demon killers. He also makes a major error in judgment in heading up this lifeless operation. If we wanted to see a golf movie that isn't boring, we'd watch Happy Gilmore or Caddyshack and be done with it. (PG) MICHELLE REINDAL
Green Street Hooligans
Opens Fri., Sept. 30, at Varsity
Here's a little song I'd like to sing; repeat after me: "Pretty bubbles in the air! They fly so high, nearly reach the sky. Fawg yar flaff, gor init shite? Arrrr, borrocks! Up yer other's bunt. Lah blooh agh, g'ooh? Oi!" Finding it hard to follow? Drink another 20 pints, then head-butt someone, and everything will become clear. When a West Ham United follower (i.e., a soccer fan) and leader of the Green Street Elite (i.e., a gang) tells an American hanger-on (Elijah Wood), "We're a far cry from all that Crips and Blood bullshit," that's obvious—Crips and Bloods have a decent sense of style and music. These London louts aren't going to produce any club hits with their off-key chanting, which is more of a war cry, really. Although when we first meet the chief hooligan (Charlie Hunnam) and his crew in an Underground station, taunting a rival club's "firm" across the tracks, there's a little bit of 8 Mile and hip-hop in the ritual insults. There's also the germ of a good movie here that Hooligans leaves pummeled in the street, teeth scattered on the pavement.
