Return to Dust

Ruijun Li's touching Chinese drama about two lonely souls raised the ire of the government which has subsequently banned it. A political tract it is not.

Ma (Renlin Wu) is dismissed even by his own family as 'fourth brother'. Cao (Hai-Qing) is similarly the dark sheep of her family, challenged by health issues and quiet almost to the point of being a mute. Their families arrange a marriage - not necessarily for the benefit of the man and woman - as much as taking them off their hands. They are peasants. Subsistence farmers eeking out not so much a living, as survival.

Good fortune seems to strike the newlyweds when the rich land baron who owns their tracts calls upon Ma for a vital personal favor. Ma is so humble and honorable that he never demands any true reward for helping out the landlord, indeed he extracts nothing at all. He is the type of man who doesn't even ride his farm labor donkey - afraid his weight will burden the beast.

Ruijun Li (who also wrote) provides a gentle guiding hand. The small miracle that evolves with Ma and Cao truly becoming a married couple is accomplished with the smallest of touches. There is minimal music and few major incidents. Li adopts a neo-realist tone. It's et in the present day - which probably is what triggered the government's reaction to the appallingly poor and exploited condition of the farm workers. Other than the use of cell phones and modern vehicles, it could take place at any time.

RETURN TO DUST is simple, but not simplistic. Renlin Wu and Hai-Qing's unadorned but accomplished performances carry the movie over some occasionally slow patches. It's a lovely work that should be seen -- especially, in it's homeland.

Immensely ethereal scenes paired with a gut wrenching story. The story unravels like a cloth covering the true nature of a persons intentions slowly, but with an impact so strong, making you doubt, and question with great dissapointment the nature of the human behaviour. And in all of the chaos of greed two beacons shine throughout the movie...the two protagonists, the outcasts of the rotten society they've been brought up in...highlight the outmost beauty in human relationship. Youre always followed and reminded of the courage and the absoute humanitarian spirit of the couple and it makes you complete...Complete, for you need it if you want to make it to the ending.

By far the most humanitarian movie ive seen in a while.

The government of China killed this movie in September 2022. It removed Return to Dust from all streaming platforms, deleted comments on the Weibo social media platform, and outlawed a hashtag for the movie. Possible reasons:

* The protagonist is pretty much compelled to give his blood of a rare type in order to save a local exploiting businessman. The protagonist does not resist, but his wife tells him don't do it.

* The protagonist couple are hounded out of one home after another so that housing developers can make money on land cleared by demolishing the home.

* In a supposedly socialist country, nearly all relatives and villagers treat the protagonist - a man content to be a farmer - and his wife - a woman with medical problems leaving her unable to have a child - with contempt. This is socialist morality and culture? However, we foreign viewers do not know whether this depiction is accurate for rural China as a whole.

In short, Return to Dust shows how much capitalist scramble for riches there is in China today, despite the mouthings of the "Communist" Party of China. The protagonist couple are collateral damage as far as the government is concerned.

Return to Dust is a humanist movie. Its strength is that it puts the fate of the oppressed couple in the viewer's heart. In part this happens when the movie immerses you in the rhythm of their farm labor. The tools are primitive, the toil is backbreaking, and the cycle of seasons is immortal.

The weakness is that the only social change depicted is an onslaught of capitalist exploitation. In reality, the peasants backed the Communist Party when it fought for liberation from landlord exploitation and foreign, especially Japanese, oppression. The peasants heartily backed Communist initiatives to improve their agriculture by cooperative, egalitarian, modernizing methods from the early 1950s to the mid-1970s. If you keep this real history in mind while you watch Return to Dust, it deepens the tragedy.

She lovingly cradles a little cardboard lightbox from him with holes that make her room appear like it is full of stars, and he gently places wheat husks on her wrist in the shape of flower petals. This late blooming romance between a poor farmer and an abused woman fills them each with such overwhelming happiness that anything seems possible. A rainstorm that washes away their work of many days, a demolished home, oppressive cold, and poverty, are nothing compared to their love. They find pleasure and wonder in everything; a nest full of swallows, hatching chickens, a wandering donkey, and bottles built into the roof of their home that make the wind sound like it is playing a melody. Still, the challenges of living in modern China constantly test their resolve, patience, and determination.

In addition to being a captivating and tender love story about a mature couple, Return to Dust provides an intriguing picture of the current affairs of China and the ways the developments are affecting the lives of rural populations, food supplies, and China's soul. People are encouraged to move to 70 story apartment towers when their homes are demolished, farms are flooded for massive hydroelectric projects, and artisans are replaced by machines and factories. I witnessed these issues at play in a visit to China in 2018.

It is heartening to witness this loving couple appreciate the small joys of life and peacefully accept adversity, and devastating when society seems to want to grind them into the dust in pursuit of questionable goals. "Where do our chickens, donkeys, and pigs live?" they ask when they are pushed to move to a condo. The couple is so kind to people and animals, and their greatest treasure is each other, so you wish them and those like them all the success in the world.

Screening at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Everything the other reviewers have said. I would like to add that out of the many thousands of other films I have seen this is my second most admired (My favorite film is Matewan). Such a sad but profound story of the human condition. I cried heavily at the end. I can't understand why the Chinese government would ban such a masterful film because it's not going to prompt any meaningful actions by us peasants. The film only creates a human connection between the citizens from different parts of the world by showing us as essentially people, going about our lives as best we can. I would love this film to be promoted heavily in the west.