One Second

Name: One Second
Director: Zhang Yimou
Genre: Comedy, Drama, History
Released: 2020
Duration: 1 h 44 min

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Comedy
Drama

2020
Zhang Yimou
104 mins
12

Summary

A movie fan in a remote farmland strikes a relationship with a homeless female vagabond.

IMDB

Review

A star rating of 4 out of 5.

Stephen Applebaum

Zhang Yimou's intimate, deceptively simple drama takes place during China's Cultural Revolution. Beginning and ending amid the desolate, shifting sands of the Gobi desert, it follows a man (Zhang Yi) who has escaped from a labour camp in order to watch a newsreel that he has been told features his estranged daughter. His efforts are complicated when the film is stolen by an orphan girl (Liu Haocun) who has her own reasons for wanting it. Zhang and Liu make an engaging, occasionally funny pair, as their initial competition develops into a deeper understanding of each other. The film is a beguiling, heartfelt love letter to cinema, the mechanics of physical film, and the inherent romance of the medium. It also delivers a bittersweet depiction of the power of propaganda, and how it can be used to keep people in their place. The moving, thoughtful result is worth everyone's time.

imdb-square

7.1/10