Tian yu

This is a very powerful movie about a very important and real subject. It made its point very forcefully with the use of strong and explicit scenes that I'm afraid have been with me ever since I watched this movie and promise to appear in my mind day and night for quite some time. I hate to say that I wish I hadn't seen a well-made movie, but that is the case here. If you are very emotionally affected by movies like I am, I recommend that you pick up a good book about the history of sexual politics in China instead.

I love this movie... It's such a sad film. It's sad enough to speak of love for such sad things. It starts off so pretty and happy. Such bright colors, pretty sky... then everything just changes. The colors never change, it is always pretty outside.. but the nights are what makes it sad. It made me feel angry of all the things that went wrong in this film... i wanted to be there, to help somehow... everything in this film is done so artisicly. The end of the movie is a perfect way to end sorrow. There is no better way to end something, than to simply end it. I recommend it to all who want to be touched. This is something that will never be done again. Nothing else like it. 10/10 for this one.

Tian Yu directed by veteran Chinese actress Joan Chen is a bold film which is completely different both in style as well as content from those of other Chinese films made by fifth and sixth generation film makers.Soon after its filming its anti Chinese communist party stance had angered the Chinese cultural authorities to such an extent that it is still banned in China.Much of the film's strength lies in its choice of far off landscapes which add surreal beauty to the film.The film is sad as a young girl is sent away from her home to initiate a communist party sponsored reeducation process but she becomes a victim of sexual slavery.This is a real story which underscores not only the plight of the film's protagonist but also of countless ordinary girls whose happiness was snatched by the official brutality of the omnipotent communist party ideology.Top notch scenes of the film include sequences in which the young protagonist is forced to live in a far off settlement with a Tibetan eunuch.This unexpected event gives rise to emotional bonding between two people cut off from human civilization.

Director Joan Chen has fashioned a lovely, slow-moving film, "Xiu Xiu - the Sent Down Girl" about the abuses of the Chinese Cultural Revolution seen through the eyes of one girl, Xiu Xiu. Yet the film is more than a tale about the misguided totalitarian state and its pervasive influence on everyone's lives. "Xiu Xiu" is also about a special relationship between the girl and her mentor and protector, Jao Lin. It would be an oversimplification to call it a love story because the film only hints at any romance between the two (Xiu Xiu spends much of the film in contempt of Jao). Indeed their contrasting lives could not be more pronounced. Jao Lin is a horse herder, a man of the soil, one who cleans himself when it rains, and a victim of a castration leaving him without his manhood. The much younger girl, Xiu Xiu, is from the modern city, doing her duty until she can return to her loving family and to a boy who yearns for her; she with the soft, innocent smile, and the daintiness to appreciate a kaleidoscope or a freshly dug waterhole. They must live together in one tent for six months because ‘headquarters' has mandated that Xiu Xiu learn horse herding. While adapting to each other's needs, Xiu Xiu seems to have the upper hand on Lao (she bosses him around like a hired hand) but there is a strange, intuitive feeling between them that is really not appreciated until the very last scene. As the story develops, six months have passed and Xiu Xiu still cannot return home because her family is too poor to bribe officials to take her back. At the heart of this film is the evil that those in power do to those who are too weak to fight them. Men from ‘headquarters' regularly have sex with Xiu Xiu, sometimes with the frustrated Lao in the same tent, since Xiu Xiu mistakenly assumes these men will help her get back home. All Lao can do is watch because even as he tries to protect Xiu Xiu in other ways, he is powerless to stop what is going on. What develops, slowly but surely, is another side of Lao, besides the father figure - he becomes a man who can touch but cannot possess what he wants. The latter is made clear when Lao steals Xiu Xiu's shoe and then lies to her that a man has come to steal her shoe so that he can return later to tell her of his love. "Xiu Xiu - the Sent Down Girl" succeeds in giving us a poignancy about innocence lost and about the deep meaning of sacrifice and love.

What affected me and haunts me most about Xiu Xiu is the character of Lao Jin and his tender, sexless love and caring for Xiu Xiu. He does his best to make her life easier in a place that she hates, and his pain and frustration mount as he sees how she is destroying herself. His deep, sincere, and inarticulate caring for her touched me profoundly. I wished that a romantic love could develop between them (and I am not generally into movie romances -- very few of them really work for me) but that was out of the question from the beginning, since Lao Jin was castrated. That very fact gave their relationship a sense of tragedy from the beginning.

I would love to see more of this Tibetan actor, Lobsang. Imdb info shows this movie as his only film credit.

The locale was spectacular and gorgeously photographed. Only intellectually could I understand Xiu Xiu's dislike of such a gorgeous place (as well as her lack of appreciation for Lao Jin's caring for her). But both characters were very believable and involving, and this sad movie will stay with me for a long time.