World Famous Comics: Zheng Qian Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl
Zheng Qian Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl
Starring: Lu Lu, Lopsang, Zheng Qian, Jie Gao, Qianqian Li Directed By: Joan Chen Average Rating: Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Audience Rating: R (Restricted) Binding: DVD Format: Anamorphic, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC Label: Image Entertainment Number of Items: 1 Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen Region Code: 1 Release Date: October 26, 1999 Running Time: 100 minutes Theatrical Release Date: 1998
Description: Directed by Joan Chen from an award-winning novella banned in China because of political and sexual content, "Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl" is a powerful love story. Between 1967 and 1976, nearly 8 million Chinese youths were "sent down" for specialized training to the remotest corners of the country. Before being sent down, the young and beautiful Xiu Xiu dreams of becoming a horse trainer in the wide open plains of Tibet, far away from her busy city home. Her journey begins in a training camp in the isolated plains with a solitary and mysterious man. Slowly, Xiu Xiu discovers that she is unlikely to ever see her home again without a wealthy sponsor. Her world becomes a horrifying cage, where "patrons" promise her escape in exchange for her sexual compromise. This is one girl's story and a compassionate deed that inspired one special man and everyone who hears her tale.
Painful, but so is life I love this movie as it does not sugarcoat anything. China during the Cultural Revolution was brutal, most brutal, and Mao himself raped young virgins on a regular basis (read the biography of his doctor, it is most shocking). So, this is only a tiny part of how it must have been for some. The best movies, I believe, do not have a happy ending, and shouldn't, as such is life. Life is painful, brutal, and harsh. It is mostly not pretty. And a movie should leave you thinking and feeling something drastic, otherwise, you might just as well be dead inside.
Too sad This is too sad movie. I rented this to see the glimpse of tibet. The movie is about Chinese cultural revolution when millions of young people were sent to remote corner of the country. The story in a nut shell for those who want to know is :). There is this girl who wants to go back to her home but she is helpless. Her parents are poor and don't have connections to save her from being thrust into this movement. She tries in vain to appease everyone who could help her go back home and ultimately she asks the person (a father figure) to kill herself. The visuals are of stunning landscape. The girl is so pretty and the end is too sad.
A harsh indictment of Communism This film is a complex mix of interwoven metaphors. Even though the main character, a poor teenage girl, trades sex for freedom, this takes place within the context of a society where individual desire and freedom simply don't exist. The girl, in the communist sense, has corrupted herself, not by trading her body for favor, but by wanting to. She places her own desires above those of the People and is endlessly punished for it.
The film is a meditation on communist values, and how they have misled and betrayed its people. Everyone that the girl meets, except for her emasculated mentor, takes from her until, at the end, she simply has nothing left to give.
The film works in the context of a larger metaphor, I believe, one that deals with Tibet and its relationship to China. One can plainly see that China's presence there is harmful, that its values spread corruption even to the furthest reaches. The relationship between the herder and the girl can be seen as a metaphor for the relationship between China and Tibet. The herder's death is not merely a reaction to the loss of a loved one. It is a metaphor for the death of the soul of Tibet.
The Chinese government understood this film all too well as a harsh rhetorical criticism against its policies against women, Tibet, and people in general. That is why it was banned there.
Although this film is heart-wrenching and, at times, agonizing to watch, it depicts an all too real world where political philosophy sees individuality as criminal. If you ever want to feel good about living in a democratic society, check out this movie.
Painfully sad to watch The two stars go to the director and the actors. It's odd because you know you've just seen a well-acted, well told story but at the same time, it left you with a chasm, a kind of sadness that is inconsolable. And I am afraid there is no entertainment value in this. It is specially sad when you see the lead actress' face. She doesn't look a day over twelve, and I know she's older biologically because of the explicit nudity but still how sad that she indures all these horrors and yet she remained innocent to the end. The poor little girl just wanted to go home to the love and comfort of her family. It doesn't get any better with the Tibetan horseman who tried to be her protector. He is treated as badly by the chinese men and was as impotent about his role as big brother, father, admirer to this poor little girl. How sad, this movie was.
The DVD itself is not very good because it didn't have any extras at all. It would have been really helpful if there was a commentary by the director and perhaps a background on how the movie was made. It leaves one even saddier and emptier.
Poignant This is a story of the abused and abusers of the system in Communist China. Idealistic kids were sent down to the countryside by Mao to learn to appreciate peasants who neither needed nor wanted them there. Telling any more would give away the tear-jerker moments. Suffice to say, you will get angry, you will cry, and you will better understand some of the tumult that was China after the Cultural Revolution.
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