Saturday, September 11, 2021

272. An elephant sitting still (2018)

 

Country: China

Directed by Hu Bo


The first and last full length film of Hu Bo, who took his life shortly after he completed it at the age of 29, is the most bleak, gloomy and depressing film you can imagine, not offering even a single smile, a single ray of joy in the four hours that it lasts. However, it's not as much hopeless and pessimistic as you think: even if it's not a way out of misery the four leading characters of the movie never stop to fight, never stop their agonizing struggle to live, no matter how damaged and poisoned are themselves by the ultra hostile social environment. With a strong documentary feeling, a superb cinematography with a camera that comes so close to the characters that we feel that they breath a few steps away from us and a   brilliant acting from everyone "An elephant sitting still" is a masterpiece of the modern Chinese cinema, more real than the reality itself, makes you wondering how the absence of any emotion can be so emotional, how the absence of any hope can be so hopeful

 

You can watch the full movie here:

https://youtu.be/xWCkZS5r7Tg

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