33/43
Two lonely souls embark on a new journey together
Story
Released from prison, Lang returns to his hometown in northwest China. As part of a dog patrol tasked with eradicating stray dogs before the 2008 Olympics, he bonds with a black stray.
A beautiful, slow-burning, out-of-the-box story about the bleak setting of rural China with strong performances, direction, writing, and structure
Eddie Peng [the lead] developed such a strong bond with Xin, the dog featured in the film, that he adopted her after filming ended. Filmmaker Guan Hu achieves this by exploring the human-dog relationship from a Chinese perspective and full of stunning camera work, sound design and interesting narrative options.
It brings out the realism, commitment and scrutiny of the characters in a natural way
the dialogue, the sobering approach, the art-house pace and style really bring the story to a new light. The performances from Eddie Peng and the rest of the cast are great and many of the characters are great, while some characters could have been explored a little better.
After winning the Un Certain Regard award, I understand why
I appreciate a film that explores dogs, humanism and society without a biased approach and creates something unique.
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