Still Life

Henrique Barbosa Justini

não à toa a tradução direta do nome do filme chama-se "natureza morta". se o que estava em jogo em Plataforma e Prazeres Desconhecidos era os jovens que assistiam à transformação da china, aqui o país surge como a impossibilidade materializada das mudanças. o cinema de jia trata principalmente disso: não deixar que as memórias individuais sejam naufragadas (neste filme, literalmente) pelo progressismo histórico.

astygianelysium

Still life: 1) the painterly dimension of filmmaking; the camera settling on the immobility of scenes, the alternate boredom and vitality of a class of Chinese person whose life is structured around labour (and, hence, global capital) 2) life which still counts as life; life which survives and develops even as various forms of governmental demolition threaten to sever the populous from its forms-of-life

kartina obskura

jia zhangke´s films don´t take me immediately, from the beginning, they grow in me slowly and crawl under the skin silently so i don´t even notice. it´s like when i read some of kafka´s short stories and the language and the subject seem perfectly ordinary and suddenly i find myself in wonder, how and where the course changed and i try to go back and read again in order to find that specific curve that changed

Lynch/Fellini

The moment when A Better Tomorrow is scene in the background is when I knew I was watching a very bold and intelligent film!

Andrei Herea

One of the few films I have seen in which with every movement of the camera, the director conveys and adds up to the general portrayal of 'modern' China with it's duality of destruction/reconstruction, whilst focusing on the harsh environment of the everyday man and woman in search of their past. Film as time capsule - It has it's representative example here.

Kamran

I'm amazed how well received this is. The impressive cinematography lacks care. Zhang-ke's overly neutral framing (a problem I had with Platform) gives the characters' emotions little expression. The shallow depth of field makes for a rather irksome aesthetic due to whatever high fps, telephoto lens is being used. A sense of reality without humility. Frustrating, because Zhangke is technically very skilled. 3/5

Adriano Rocha

Obra-prima que mostra a situação atualizada da China. Uma história muito simples. Um cinema muito rico. Recomendo.

Crap Monster

Film's narrative aside, one really has to mention the beauty of China that is captured on-screen in this particular work.