In the Heat of the Sun

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Leaburn O 07/10/2024 The early 90s were the golden years of Chinese cinema, when the censors allowed just a little bit of creative freedom. Directors typically took to this freedom with ease and produced some brilliantly directed and produced modern classics. However, for all its production value and skilled directing, this was a pretty flat coming of age tale from the cultural revolution time period. I went out of my way to find it and could only find a slightly poor picture quality version on YouTube. It wasn’t a great film sadly. See more acsdoug D @acsdoug 07/02/2023 I was hoping for a depiction of the cruelties and injustices of the Cultural Revolution. Instead, I got an average coming of age story that just happens to take place in 1970s Beijing. It could have taken place anywhere. See more Scott R @ScottR 09/23/2018 Some captivating things that show some of the intricacies of Chinese culture in this coming of age drama. See more 06/17/2011 Sometimes, may be a kind of sound and a stream of smell, can bring you back to the truth. This film is a portrait of memory and childhood,thru the viewpoint of a boy growing up in the Cultural Revolution. It tells a story mixed with both facts and imgainations. See more 04/25/2010 如果我早生十年，如果我是个男孩，如果十年后我再看这部电影……或许我就会跟别人一样潸然泪下或者唏嘘流逝的童年吧？ 现在看我感触还不是很深。唯一有所共鸣的，是那老北京的景儿和老北京的音儿。但仅仅凭这一点，此片也已经让我感动颇深了。可见七十后和八十后看这个电影时会有的感同身受和酸楚心情…… See more 11/28/2009 Really outstanding film that takes on the cliches of the coming-of-age, nostalgic memoir - deconstructing literary pretension and pedantic filmic technique with self-reflexive humor. The protagonist, Monkey/Ma Xiaojun plays on that character from Journey to the West, but also mocks Russian literature and film in some film-within-a-film reenactments. He's more than just a semi-autobiographical stand-in for Jiang Wen and Wang Shuo, as there is a strong element of critical nostalgia. The scenes of idealized adolescence, suffused with golden Summer light give way to some very violent, sexual impulses and parodic militarism. A much more effective critique of the Cultural Revolution than a one-dimensional story might more typically provide. The unreliable narrator even dismisses the entire account at key points, slowing and reversing the film to reveal his own self-celebratory tendencies. And unlike the typical coming-of-age blather, the culminating sexual encounter is a disturbingly semi-comic attempted rape and counter-rape. The end credits are important, not only for an appropriate Volker Schlondorff dedication, but for a contemporary drive-by shot that drives home the point of the whole. See more Read all reviews

In the Heat of the Sun

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