Le Lac aux oies sauvages

"Since the film is entirely spoken in Wuhan dialect (kudos to the main cast and their dialect coaches), for the majority of Chinese audience, which means subtitles is a requisite to understand the plot, Diao perceptibly carves out a tenuous mutual attraction between Zenong and Aiai, and the two fine actors exhibit tenacious resilience in restraint and nuances. For Hu Ge, it is also a physical transmogrification that persuasively shucks off his heartthrob mass appeal and signifies a wide road ahead in the mode of a serious thespian; as for Taiwanese actress Gwei Lunmei, who also triumphantly conceals her modern-look and urban delicacy, eloquently morphs into a conflicted character living in the margin with no hope in sight, during a nocturnal boat trip on the placid lake, the vestigial human-to-human compassion and connection brings a chink of warmth into this largely grim tale."

read my full review on my blog: cinema omnivore, thanks

Rain falls hard over a remote area where a mobster-on-the-run awaits instructions from a mysterious woman; the camera captures the dazzling, stylish and inventive visions of director Diao Yinan as he opens this action-packed thriller demonstrating how poetically he conceives a scene. Bleeding, hurt and wanted, Zenong has wrongly shot a cop, while on a competition with other gangster families, in order to claim control over the drug/theft most profitable streets. Aiai is a hustler and "bath lover"- a Chinese modern version of prostitution- who is working on both sides, struggling to survive as a mediatior on the bloodshed war between the gangsters' families and the police seeking to avenge their colleague. As they wait for their next move, they both narrate in flashbacks the circumnstances prior, when the street war sparkled a revolution on the local criminal business. An electrifying, fast-paced, ultra violent and seductive neo-noir thriller, Yinan obviously understands of visual techniques, conceiving each frame as a piece of art in movement, with lyrical, glamorous observations on the details, on the silent moments embracing the unexpected, the subtle eroticism, the rain, the neon lights on the roads, but most impressively how he extracts poetry from the bloody confrontations and its uncontrollable shootings. Addressing male rivalry and dominance, pride and greed, it's a riveting, visually-arresting and superbly crafted mobster-on-bikes tale.

When I saw Wong Kar-Wai's "In the Mood for Love"(2000) with Maggie Cheung - I knew we were watching a completely new cinema that would one day self-realise into epic cinema ~ epic Chinese cinema. And I have now seen that realisation in The Wild Goose Lake. This film is like a cross between Godard's Breathless and de Sica's Bicycle Thieves - and is so satisfying you could watch it upside down. It is possibly the grittiest film I have ever seen, with the urgency and cinematic style of French cinema of the 1960s - where the possibilities are endless and every new film in this genre will be waited for in anticipation.

Diao Yinan 's third feature-length feature film presents a unique and unprecedented temperament in the previous Chinese-language movies. Although this style is not original in film history, as a purely Chinese-language movie, it may be historically Still the first time.

Breaking away from the context of traditional Chinese art films, this film presents a complex look and feel, on the one hand, it is addictive and shocking to the film's audio-visual, on the other hand, because of looking at those screen faces that we are familiar with , The weirdness of performing with a rare performance rhythm.

"Southern Station Party" set the story background in Wuhan. In this city known as one of the "Four Hot Stoves", the car thief Zhou Zenong played by Hu Ge accidentally shot a policeman in the fire of an opponent gang. The police issued a price tag of 300,000 yuan for Zhou Zenong. Zhou Zenong, who became a fugitive, fled in the wild goose lake in Wuhan's "outside of law", but accidentally met Liu Aiai (Guilin Magnesium), an acquaintance who didn't know her in the process. ...



85% of the "Southern Station Party" is a night show, like the night show 25 minutes before the start of the movie. But the night scenes in the film are not a single rendering of a dark atmosphere, and the night under the lens of Diao Yinan is layered. This is due to the ingenious use of neon lights, shadows and sounds.

The film is full of super bright neon elements, whether it is a neon sign, an electric car neon sign, a square dance shoe neon sign, or a toy neon sign ... their dazzling light and shabby gloomy environment seem to be incompatible, so their red It is "disastrous red" and yellow is "dim yellow"; under the contrast of the dark night, they release a sense of fantasy and illusion of stealing in the end of the world.

If you enjoy neo noir, specifically films from directors such as Michael Mann (Thief, Heat) or Jean Pierre Melville (Le Cercle Rouge especially) then this will be right up your rain slicked neon lit boulevard. Similarly it'll likely appeal to fans of 'Asian extreme' cinema and indeed anyone interested in or simply curious about contemporary China and her cultural products. Grounded in believable realism whilst being highly stylised by virtue of action taking place in locales which exist, not film sets. This isn't a China of shiny high skyscrapers and jaw dropping surveillance technologies, instead it's one of dingy backstreets, cheap restaurants, second hand stores, a cheap and plasticky sheen lit mainly with lurid artificial light. I say 'China' in quotation marks because as another reviewer pointed out it's set in a particular province using local dialect. Reminding us China isn't some monolith, that there's great diversity in this huge nation. There's an obvious debt to films by Hong Kong director John Woo - it rains a lot, most of the action takes place at night soaked in a putrid colour cast of neon and sodium street lights. Woo of course being indebted himself to an earlier generation of directors... 125cc motorbikes and scooters are, for most people living on the Latin American, Asian, African continents, their main experience of private motorised transport. Wild Goose Lake is innovative and impressive in this form of transport (rather than conventional gangster cinematic conventions of big black SUV's with tinted windows) being central to the narrative. It is something of a slow burner and I found myself restless during the first twenty minutes. Which is the point, to make you the viewer feel what the characters are feeling, inertia. Waiting. Not quite sure what's going on. If you're more accustomed to Hollywood action gangster movies this will reward but you need to be patient. Give it time and it will deliver. I promise. Don't let subtitles put you off. I watched it in France with French subtitles and didn't have trouble following. While relations between characters became confusing that didn't detract from my enjoyment this movie is driven by action and mise en scene rather than dialogue. The mise en scene or what you see works to reflect and comment on the interior psychological (and exterior) worlds of the characters. One amazing scene towards the climax set in a dimly lit apartment block alludes to trash, with the implication of the characters as literally rubbish. By contrast, another scene uses washing machines in a massively impressive stroke of sheer stylistic inventiveness. Creative violence is all the more astounding being beautifully choreographed, consisting of actual stunts instead of fast cut editing and CGI. Once again, stylistically satisfying innovativeness to the art of killing will delight martial arts fans and jaded movie goers (such as this reviewer) alike. However, what else would you expect from the culture which gave the world kung fu and pioneered the martial arts film genre? French director Jean Pierre Melville nailed the thin line dividing cops from gangsters in films like Le Cercle Rouge (a cop is literally joined to his quarry with a handcuff, said cop lives alone with his pet cats who're surely analogous to the criminals he pursues). A similar line is drawn here, making explicit the symbiotic relationship the police have with the criminals they pursue. A similar fatalism also operates and I loved the way that, even though we know where the Ge Hu character is headed, the journey there is nonetheless thoroughly enjoyable. Liu Aiai is superb as the poker faced hooker. Instead of the femme fatale, she's all the more mysterious, her motivations never quite clear. She's being used, in that sense she's the quintessential noir character caught up in events beyond her control. However she's aware she's being used and it suits her purposes to pretend otherwise. I need to watch this film again. My purpose here isn't to describe the plot but to highlight why I think you should watch this film. Finally, the total lack of irony or post modern referencing of other films is a delight. Sure there's the familiar ingredients of neo noir but they're combined into something very fresh and exciting. Watch for the astonishing 'Rasputin' disco scene and I think you'll agree.

I wouldn't have thought there was anything more left to squeeze out of neo noir then along comes this. Astounding, audacious and amazing.