THE BLUE KITE (1993)

This story of an ordinary Beijing (extended) family weathering the Mao dominated political tides of the 1950s & ‘60s is beautifully acted and simply, but effectively directed (lots of lovely two-shots, although megger Tian Zhuangzhuang overuses slow tracking shots on every interior), but it plays like a serial as one personal or political catastrophe follows another in succession. The central wife/mother character loses three husbands, a beloved uncle slowly goes blind, food is short, political edicts reverse with the wind . . . It’s a veritable Peking Perils of Pauline. All the Maoist insanity is factual, but the presentation feels overstuffed. Perhaps Tian should have concentrated on the true-believer sister-in-law character who bores her family with lectures in an attempt to keep everyone on point all the time, while she slowly loses her own humanity only to be denounced in turn just to fill this month’s quota.