Love behind the lies

In 1944, an American journalist snapped a photo of a young girl in an oversized army uniform riding a roofless freight train. The train was speeding along, and the baby-faced girl looked lost. The photograph remained largely unknown to the public, but for Yang Shuping, it became the inspiration for his debut movie, The Cold Flame.

Yang approaches the events of the time of the Japanese aggression against China from the perspective of a trouble-making girl, from which he hopes his audiences can see the even more heartbreaking story behind the girl's lies and love. Orphaned and displaced by the war, the 14-year-old Chinese girl clings to her little brother and her dignity. The plot thickens when she begins expressing her love for an army officer through a myriad of blatantly overt lies. Indeed, the 37-year-old self-taught writer-director seems much more interested in romantic conflicts than in military ones. The girl (Gong Siyu) falls in love with an older, badly injured army officer (Zhang Hanyu). She helps him dress his wounds, all the while spinning a web of lies in hope of winning his love. But the object of her affections cannot find it in his fatherly heart to return her love. The incredible age difference between the two main characters is one of the central themes of the film. Most of the plot plays out as a flashback to the time immediately following the war's official end in November, 1945. Eventually, the girl is forced to move on. At the same time, the city is swarmed with retreating Japanese soldiers, bringing the drama to its tragic climax. The Cold Flame opened in cinemas citywide from April 11.

And the Spring Comes, director Gu Changwei's new movie that won his wife, Jiang Wenli (the heroine in the film) the Best Actress award at last year's Rome International Film Festival, opened on April 11. The film is set in a backwater province of China during the 1980s. It tells the story of Wang Cailing. She's a plain woman consigned to the fringes of society because of her looks and her overwhelming passion for Western opera.

The Chinese epic film Three Kingdoms: Resurrection of the Dragon hit public screens on April 3. The film portrays the life of a widely known Chinese hero, Zhao Yun, who lived during the Three Kingdoms period (220-265 AD) And this story is based on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, known as one of China's four major classical literary works. Some characters have been changed to highlight the dramatic effect.

The Children of Huang Shi, a heroic blockbuster set in 1930s war-torn China, tells the story of a young British journalist who saves a group of orphaned Chinese children with the help of an Australian nurse in the late 1930s. The $40 million project is a joint production of studios in China, Australia and Germany. Helmed by Roger Spottiswoode, director of the 007 series, Tomorrow Never Dies, this film took more than two years to complete.

In Love We Trust, by six-generation director Wang Xiaoshuai, is about a divorced couple trying to save their daughter, who is suffering from blood cancer, by having another child and transplanting his bone marrow. However, they have both re-married. The two families suffer from the ethical conflict. Adapted from a real story, the film won Best Screenplay at the Berlin Film Festival.

Taken, a French action movie is about a retired spy (Liam Neeson) whose daughter (Maggie Grace) is kidnapped by a group of gangsters in Paris. The former spy is forced to rely on his old skills to save her. Screenplay by Luc Besson and directed by Pierre Morel.

Apocalypse Code, this Russian action movie has a secret agent organization made up of a group of beautiful Russion ladies, appointed to break the code to defuse four nuclear bombs set by terrorists in four big cities of the world.

Chen Nan

(China Daily 04/19/2008 page6)