In communities in mainland China not bordering rivers or lakes, the water well is the focal point of the neighborhood. A well is the place to catch up with gossip, local news and other important events in the community. JIN (1987) or THE WELL, focuses on the life and hardships of a recent female college graduate turned bottom-level factory worker in mainland China. Xu Lisha has grown up from a young age without any mother or father. Being raised by her slightly Westernized gambling addicted grandmother, Lisha is innocent, but emotionally scarred.
Mr. Zhu has a nice job as the administrative boss of the research department in the Communist "company" running Lisha's factory. The nice job was given to Mr. Zhu only because Zhu's late father held a high place in the company before he died. Zhu sees beautiful Lisha, and quickly promotes her to the research division to work with him. Lisha is attracted to Mr. Zhu's stable life and home and they rush to marriage.
Lisha is a very bad housewife. Mr. Zhu is lazy and spoiled and eventually loses his job. Friction and bitterness at their home only increases when Lisha receives two big promotions in her department and becomes a nationally famous scientist.
Another twist, Lisha starts to fall for her kind assistant although she keeps her feelings a secret and never tells anyone. Actually, nothing ever happens, but if it did, there is no indication that Lisha could ever create a happy home-life with him. Lisha can make harmony with either her assistant or husband, or anyone inside the workplace, but Lisha seems much too dysfunctional in any family or domestic relationship situation to ever be happy at home. However, this aspect of her character is not fully explored.
The makers of THE WELL claim that the film shows the power of tradition and people's resistance to change. However, this movie fails to do much of anything because the direction is profoundly weak. There is no attempt to show time transitions. Lisha can reach for a bucket to fill, then cut to the well as she is filling the bucket and 15 days, 15 months, or 15 years may have passed! Every transition in this two hour movie is a straight cut. A marriage is planned and completed without any sense that more than 5 minutes have passed. Two decades go bye but viewers have no hint until a character's line offers us a clue. Then, the film suddenly ends!
After two hours of watching a bitter man fight with his bitter wife, and always having to blindly guess if any time has passed at every single film edit, the viewer is left... well, bitter. It is as if others have took a possibly interesting journey, but all we have is an impossible to understand post card.
