The Cloud in Her Room

Hey it's an artsy fartsy Chinese movie, I lived in Hangzhou once, here we are again, a movie that lets you know nothing whatever about the cool place, and guess what, basically nothing whatever about the characters either, a girl goes here, goes there, lots of shots of her plain face and expressionless eyes, tons and tons and tons of shots of her smoking, of everyone smoking, she has sex once, with a kind of boyfriend who tells her he loved someone once before but can't love anyone now once was enough, and it goes on and on from scene to scene this girl's plain face, definitely not worth shooting a whole movie over!, do yourself a favor, skip it.

Filmed in Hangzhou, "The Clouds in My Room" seeks to capture states-of-being and the feelings that go with them, and does this remarkably well through a subtle montage of cinematographically stunning images. Mood is more important than plot, although the plot offers a story which is universal: the loneliness of young adults, longing for companionship, understanding and love. And at the same time situated with precision: here that universal experience is captured in a specificity that is female, Chinese, and set in Hangzhou. Well-acted throughout, the first sex scene is surprisingly explicit, and yet perfectly conceived as underscoring the profound loneliness of Zhou Mozi, her existential despair at lack of meaningful connection. Like the ancient art of calligraphy, this film applies its ink (its sequences and frames) gently yet precisely to produce a work of art.

With the blessing of Rotterdam tiger award and the gimmick of three full disclosure of male and female stars, it has naturally become the hot spot of this #first youth film exhibition # but it is also the best interpretation of moaning without illness. Many young directors will focus on the place where they grew up and the past, bright or sad, but I can't see any changes and arcs of characters in this film, and the text can be said to be basically zero. Finally, the award of the best art exploration award or the direction of editing may be just a comfort to some extent.

It is slow and not that different from other art-house movies out there, which you can find in indie cinemas.

But it is good at what it does. I didn't fall in love with it while watching it, but it did stick with me. Weeks after watching this piece, I still find myself recalling some of its moments, some of its calmness.

Maybe it is just some kind of personal connection with some of the characters, who have since remained in my memories as distant old friends, especially Muzi. Or maybe it is really well acted and directed.

Either way, it is a movie I will be rewatching in the future.

It's not an easy film to watch but it's really not that complicated if you focus and you are drawn in. I think that's the issue with some of the naysayers throwing artsy-fartsy at this movie. It may be a little artsy, but honestly not really. Maybe the B&W can give off that vibe and if you can find a good quality version it's probably more beautiful. I don't think it was necessary, but that's generally my opinion about B&W movies being done today. It's rarely worth it and this one was not that amazing looking to justify it. But other than that the difficulty might be in piecing together the various disjointed scenes and people and relationships. I dealt with that especially in the beginning, trying to figure out who these people around her are and what is her relationship to them. But that was maybe in the first half hour. And any movie worth its salt challenges your brain a little I'd say.

So it's a movie about this 22 year old young woman, called Muzi and her mom and dad and step-sister and step-mom and her situationship with this guy and her interest in this other older guy she meets and there are a couple of older scenes that I had trouble figuring out but I think I got my hint towards the end when she referred to a past relationship so I think those were in the past.

So it's a movie made by a female director about a young woman navigating the world, trying to carve a place for herself and see where she fits and where to fit these people. I had a hard time seeing Muzi's perspective, the director keeps us at bay and Muzi herself is very cryptic and reserved a lot of the time, till I could see the cracks. She's really trying to keep it together and not fall apart. Be a good and understanding daughter. Even a good girlfriend. All the while as they do not. All these emotionally unavailable men. Her mom is a bit of a mess too. I wanted that boyfriend gone, he was so aggravating. I might be projecting a little. I had to stifle my feelings so much when I was younger. Not anymore.

There are some risqué things in this movie and I don't know if the Chinese establishment took kindly to that. Maybe the artsy label helped in that regard. There appears to be quite a lot of pot smoking, which I know is heavily criminalized in China and a mention of heavy recreational drug use. And a funny one, an extensive shot of female pubic hair, which was not erotic in any way, but it was just there, out of nowhere. Never seen anything like it. There's even an interesting close-up of it.