I just saw "Peacock" tonight as part of the New York Asian Film Festival. The review I read prior to watching this film touted it as one of the few stories set in post-Revolutionary China that isn't depressing. While this is true, "Peacock" is not sentimental either. Instead, it depicts the realities of small-town family life in a matter-of-fact manner that makes you feel for the characters even more.The family dynamics were so real and relatable. Although I am Chinese-American, and my upbringing took place in comfortable suburban America, I could definitely recognize elements like the passive aggressive "tough love" of the mother toward the daughter (although my own mom is not quite so extreme), and the painful awkwardness of huddling in silence with my brother while family members audibly fought in the other room. The love-hate rivalry and relationships that each member of the family felt for one another, co-mingled with the accepted duties of filial piety and self-sacrifice (nowhere is this realized more than in the two younger siblings' treatment and attitude toward their older brother), was nuanced and realistic.The performances were all amazing, particularly the actresses who played the mother and the daughter. The elder actress' portrayal of a hardworking woman who loved her entire family but expressed it differently toward different family members made me want to call up my mom right after the movie. And the actress who played the daughter made a role that could have come off a bit bratty into a three-dimensional character whom you could root for. She was perfectly vulnerable and tough at the same time. Truly a unique character.The only flaw I found in "Peacock" was that the third act felt rushed, and plot progression was suddenly very abrupt. The third act was ostensibly about the youngest child (the narrator), but I learned more about him when he was "silent as a shadow" in the first two acts.... SPOILERS BELOW... .. .. .. It was hard to relate to him after he suddenly blew back into town, complete with swagger and a worldly new family. It felt a bit out of character, but also -- I didn't realize that being pulled out of school (all because of one dirty drawing?) meant that he ran away from home, and also, how did he go from serving at a rest home (in character) to being a cocky smoker? How did he lose a finger? How did he become so shiftless and lazy? And when did he reconcile with his wife? (In the penultimate scene with the two of them, she says she wouldn't have married him if she had known he didn't want to work for a living, but then in the final peacock scene, they look like a happy family again.) .. .. .. Despite what I perceive as a rushed ending with holes in character and story development, the film as a whole is beautiful, both sensually and content-wise. It is a realistic and compassionate depiction of family life that I believe most viewers will find to be fairly universal.

Set in 1976 in some unidentified midsize city, "Peacock" tells the story of three young adult members of the Gao family trying to make their way in post-Cultural Revolution China. This is very much a fleeting moment in time when Chinese society is still marked by the austerity of the Maoist era and when foundational beliefs in communism have all but vanished--soon to be replaced by consumerism.Structured as a kind of trilogy that puts each child successively into the foreground, it begins with the tale of Weihong (Zhang Jingchu), the daughter and youngest child. Returning home one day on her bicycle, she experiences an almost mystical encounter with a group of male and female paratroopers parachuting into a nearby field. When the parachute strings of the squad leader, a handsome man with a Beijing accent (as the subtitle indicates), gets tangled in her handle-bars, she resolves at that moment to become a paratrooper herself. That decision has more to do with the romance of the uniform, an attraction to the squad leader and the esthetics of the blue silk parachute than it does with the legend of the Red Army. Furthermore, the Beijing accent has a certain cachet for Weihong, which for denizens of her city must have the same class connotations that an Oxbridge accent has for somebody living in the East End of London.After the Red Army rejects her application, she carries a torch both for the handsome squad leader and the numinous parachute. At home she sews together her own parachute, attaches it to the back of her bike like a kite and rides through the streets until unceremoniously crashing into another bike. While she lies semiconscious on the street, an admirer, whom she has rejected in the past, takes the parachute hostage. He will only release it after she has had sex with him in a nearby forest. In this film, love--like all other ideals--comes in short supply.full: http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2006/06/16/peacock/

When accomplished cinematographers take to direction, they often make superb films (William Fraker's "Monte Walsh", Nicholas Roeg's "Don't Look Now" and Govind Nihalani's "Aakrosh") that are often accepted as great movies much later. In the case of cinematographer-turned-director Changwei Gu, to be awarded a Silver Bear for his debut as director must have been nothing short of a dream start into a new career.Interestingly director Gu, opted to entrust the camera to Shu Yang and not do the job the world knew him to be accomplished at. Director Gu, however, opts to act as a lonely, blind accordion player who commits suicide.I am not Chinese but this film had me enraptured from start to finish. The film had superb music by Peng Dou (courtesy Chinese National Symphony Orchestra), enchanting photography, incredible performances and a multi-layered story of a close-knit five member family with family values best appreciated in Asian communities. Though the film is set in the late Seventies in the years following the Cultural Revolution, the film is almost devoid of direct political comments.The film is a common man's epic. The film is a 144 minute film (originally 4 hours) that was easily the most rewarding film at the just concluded Dubai Film Festival. It is a tale of a 5 member family told in three segments by the three children: a daughter who causes trouble for the family but emerges from an ugly duckling into a mature and cynical swan; an elder son who is mentally challenged, physically bloated, but pure in heart; and a younger son, loving, sensitive and occasionally worldly wise. The three perspectives of the family are punctuated by a cardinal shot of the family eating a simple meal. Like Kurosawa's "Rashomon," the three versions offering different perspectives of the family provide cinematic entertainment that is demanding of the viewer.The first segment of the story from the view of the girl is richer than the other two, primarily due to the rich musical subplot of her interactions with the blind musician (played by the director). The segment offers fodder for the impressionable dreamer in all of us: the power and the glory associated with a parachutist soldier, the importance of getting married to a loving husband, and the importance of playing music very well as an escape route from the daily social drudgery of washing bottles.The second segment told from the perspective of the mentally challenged brother looks at society and predictable collective reactions to simple incidents that are not based on reason or analysis.The third segment told from the practical younger brother's view takes another perspective--the best way to survive in an evolving society that is neither one of a dreamer or one of submission to mass reaction.The film ends with three families of the sister and two brothers passing a peacock in a zoo. They state the peacock never dances in the winter. As they move on, the peacock does dance. The beauty of life is best perceived as you move away from the incidents and look at it from a distance, dispassionately. Melodrama takes a back seat. In the forefront, the director presents a philosophical, positive view of life--not in the least limited to the geographical boundaries of China.I wish more people get to see this gorgeous family epic from China. It is one of the finest films of the decade.

A film that bears no intention to entertain but a second viewing or more.I was 17 and I rent it home and I began to experience it alone.Dreams achingly dreamed and dreams never fulfilled.I was 17 and only cherished a rather vague outline of China in the late 1970s;China,my motherland.An age during which mass insanity was gradually quenched with mores still overwhelmingly domineering throughout the country.Blue trousers and white blouses and neatly tied-up long hair.You might encounter various feminine visages,but surely you wouldn't ever meet more than one style of dressing.It just went that way,like what the world sees now in North Korea.But hey,let's not be silly as to apply terms like human rights,etc. to the movie.It repels me to have to put up with those who're for ever seeking to impose upon any piece of art unnecessary or even absurd messages which it itself isn't even aware of.It's pregnant only with messages bound for it to be pregnant with,and let's not go too far and interpret no more.