Lu Liping Movies

When the state-owned Factory 420 becomes a luxury apartment complex known as "24 City," the stories of three generations and eight characters meld together to offer an intimate glimpse into the history of China. The line between documentary and fiction blurs as the towering factories on which socialism was built are dismantled and employees are laid off, paving the way for a free-market economy. Located in Sichuan's capital city of Chengdu, the 420 plant used to produce airplane engines. For more than 50 years, it was the center of life for hundreds of workers. Now, as builders prepare to transform the factory into luxury condos, interviews with real workers and ex-workers are intercut with vignettes about a lonely Shanghai woman (Joan Chen) exiled in Chengdu, a mother (Lu Liping) who lost her son on the long trip from Shenyang, and a young professional (Zhao Tao) pondering the uncertain fate faced by her elderly working-class parents. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Chinese-born, American-based director Ann Hu debuts with this epic historical drama about the introduction of motion pictures to China during the beginning of the 20th century. The film is based on a true story of Liu Jung (Xia Yu), a Peking photographer who struggles to start a film industry in China in spite of the strong anti-Western sentiment of the time. At the film's outset, Liu Jung is scolded by his autocratic boss Master Ren (Liu Peiqi) for his obsession with Western gizmos after he brings home a junked Victrola. During a photo session with China's most famous opera star, Lord Tan (Li Yusheng), Liu Jung runs into Raymond Wallace (Jared Harris), a mysterious Brit who is hell-bent on introducing movies (called "shadow magic") to the Emperor. As soon as Liu Jung sees his first frame, he is hooked on the medium and committed to Wallace's scheme. This film was screened at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

The Chinese title translates as "Growing to Manhood." Lu Xuecheng, a 1990 graduate of the Beijing Film Academy, filmed several shorts before embarking on his feature directorial debut drama. The symbol of Chinese culture, the Great Wall, is viewed with awe by two boys. One is the film's adult narrator Zhou Qing (Zhu Hongmao), who reflects on his life: The story opens in Beijing of 1976 when shantytown youth Zhou reads a comic book, The Making of Steel, adapted from the popular 1932-34 novel by Russian author Nikolai Alekseyevich Ostrovski (1904-1936). Praised as a peak of early Soviet literature, this autobiographical story traced the life of crippled Pavel Korchagin, who overcame handicaps to become a successful teacher and writer. In his rundown neighborhood, Zhou and his pal Xiao team with guitarist Jiwen to form a music group featuring Jiwen's girlfriend Fu as the lead singer. Zhou develops a crush on Fu, but no sexual relationship materializes. When Zhou finds work in a bathhouse for railway workers, train driver Zhu, who owns a copy of the original Ostrovski novel, becomes his spiritual mentor. Jumping from the early '80s to later in the decade, Zhou returns to Beijing from Germany, discovers that he no longer feels a bond with his musician friends, and seeks out his mentor who gave his life direction and purpose. Accompanying the film's tapestry of life in contemporary China is a soft score of guitar music composed by lead actor Zhu Hongmao. Shown at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

Tian Zhuangzhuang, a charter member of China's politically beleaguered, so-called Fifth Generation of Directors (along with Ju Dou's Zhang Yimou), made this film about the gradual disintegration of an entire family targeted by Mao's political reformation movements of the '50s and '60s. Told in a series of three stories, the audience sees the little boy Tietou and his mother try and try again to rebuild their lives from the ashes left them by the madness of the era. Director Tian works from a palette of primary colors on widescreen images that are often fixed in an icy-white Kubrickian glare of omnipresent paranoia. Yet much of The Blue Kite is resplendent with palpable signs of ordinary life: noisy kids, happy weddings, loud mealtimes. Tian amplifies the human element of these heady days, so that viewers may genuinely feel the humanity ripped from this story as events overtake and shatter all hope. ~ Tom Keogh, All Movie Guide