• Cinema, a film by Zhang Yimou opens the 69th edition of the San Sebastián Film Festival

  • Berlinale: Zhang Yimou film, the shadow of Chinese censorship, withdrawn

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October 17, 2021Pure poetry and true homage to cinema, as declared by Zhang Yimou himself, this "One Second" that comes three years after "Ying". Already at the San Sebastián Film Festival and in Toronto, this 'new' Cinema Paradiso in Chinese sauce is now presented at the Rome Film Festival that takes you and never lets you go in the 104 minutes of duration, with its desert and with its always pure characters in their naivety.



Originally, the film was to be presented at the Berlinale in 2019, but was withdrawn at the last minute "for technical reasons", leading to suspicion of the intervention of the censors.



Set in Northern China during Mao Tse-tung's Cultural Revolution, the film stars Zhang Jiusheng (Zhang Yi), a lifer on the run from the good gaze, but with a very specific mission: to be a spectator of a newsreel full of the usual regime propaganda.



Reason? It is the only possibility she has to see for a second the daughter selected among the model workers and therefore the protagonist of a service. But before the screening, the precious film is stolen by a young girl, Liu Guin ?? (Liu Haocun). One thing that the life prisoner casually witnesses, so much so that he begins a long pursuit of the thief. Once the pizza has been recovered, we enter perhaps the most extraordinary part of "One second", with the entrance on the scene of Mr. Film (Fan Wei), the projectionist of the village, a true local authority because he is the

deus ex machina

of an enormous sparse room which, however, fills up beyond belief during the rare and highly anticipated projections in which everyone takes a seat. And this in every order of height; there are also those who get on the seat of their bicycle to see everything from above.



And that cinema is a real popular festival can be seen very well when the whole village, militarized by Mr. Film, as if it were a single man, puts itself at his service to fix the film ruined by travel and sand. Each act of restoration is punctuated by the authoritative, and at the same time authoritarian, voice of the projectionist amid the cries of wonder of a population enthusiastic to review for the umpteenth time the celebration of the revolutionary and industrial achievements of Maoist thought.



For the final film by Zhang Yimou full of tears, those of the protagonist (and not only) who compulsively looks at his daughter on the large and precarious canvas that acts as a screen. It's only a second, but for him it's a very long time.



The

palmarès

of the Chinese author is rich as few. In 1988 he won the Golden Bear in Berlin with "Red Sorghum". Zhang later became one of the most celebrated directors in the world. With films like "Ju Dou" (directed with Fengliang Yang) he had his first Oscar nomination with 1991, then "Lanterne Rosse" (Silver Lion in Venice in 1991 and Oscar nomination in 1992), "La Storia by Qiu Ju "(Golden Lion in Venice in '92 and Coppa Volpi for Gong Li as best actress)," Vivere! " (Grand Jury Prize and Best Actor Award at Ge You, Cannes 1994), "Non uno di meno" (second Golden Lion in Venice in 1999) and "La strada verso casa" (Silver Bear, Gran jury prize in Berlin 2000). Nice paradox:Zhang's films were celebrated around the world, often banned at home. That was until the filmmaker changed direction, with Chinese swashbuckling films such as "Hero" (for the third time nominated for an Oscar in 2003) and "The Forest of Flying Daggers", until he was chosen as the director of the opening ceremony. and closing of the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008.