The Story of Qiu Ju
by Yimou Zhang
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DVD details
Actor: Li Gong, Liuchun Yang, Peiqi Liu, Quesheng Lei, Zhijun GeDirector: Yimou Zhang
Brand: Sony
DVD: Region Code 99
Audio: Cantonese (Original Language); English (Subtitled); Chinese (Dubbed)
Format: Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD-Video, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 100 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-03-28
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Sony Pictures
DVD Reviews of The Story of Qiu Ju
DVD Review: A Masterpiece
Summary: 5 Stars
The story is well told in many of the other reviews--Qiu Ju's husband has taunted the village chief who retaliated and kicked her husband in the groin and ribs. She is a peasant who undertakes a quest through the Chinese system of officials and courts, from village to city, seeking to compel the village chief to apologize. He turns out not to be a bad man, and most of the people--including the officials--are good people throughout the movie. There are many realistic pictures of people and village and city life in northwest China, and the story is compelling and interesting. What would be justice for this case? How does "losing face" affect these people? Is she right to do what she is doing? Unlike other reviewers, I was actually impressed with the quality of the justice system as portrayed, and her rights and ability to pursue one appeal after another, coupled with the practical nature of the remedies ordered by the officials and judges. There are some real twists at the end, as the viewer bounces from one surprise to another. The ending will make you think about Qiu Ju and this movie for a long time--it was already a great movie before the ending. Gong Li is a great actress, and Yimou Zhong is a great director. I now plan to see all their movies. This one also has humour--you will really be amused by the scene following where the peasants are told to dress like city people so as to avoid being the targets of criminals. This movie was the only movie added to our list of books to read before a Princeton University trip to China this summer. I am so glad. DVD Review: Gong Li- Brilliant from the start
Summary: 5 Stars
Gong Li is just a kid or young adult when she starred in this wonderful story with a great moral content. What's that you say? "Be careful what you wish for".
Gong is such a beauty yet she plays it so close to the heart as a peasant farm girl here. Her actions are deeply thought out and utterly natural in execution. I was marveling at this woman's talent. She's now at the very pinnacle of her profession in China and it is so easy to see why even in this early effort.
Terrific good looks and a talent that is pure genius. Yes, I love this woman.
Don't you?
DVD Review: Required viewing for law students
Summary: 4 Stars
This may be one of the best films ever made about the law, perfectly illustrating those first-year law school lessons that not every wrong amounts to a legal cause of action (i.e., merits a lawsuit) and that justice does not belong to the wronged individual, but to society as a whole. The law will always fail to satisy a personal sense of having been wronged. In this film, a woman feels slighted by an assault on her husband (a vicious kick in the nuts), and she spends the rest of the film pursuing "justice" in the form of an apology from the perpetrator, the local village administrator. The woman just happens to be Chinese, but the subsquent truths about the legal process are nigh universal. The village head is simply unwilling to acknowledge his fault, so various attempts to settle the dispute or find compromise are not enough to satisfy the woman, and she sets the wheels of legal procedure in motion, following them through to their ultimately unsatifsying conclusion as she travels to district and provincial capital cities. The resulting film, as an exercise in frustration, is as essential an addition to the "literature" of the law as Dickens' Bleak House or Trollope's Orley Farm, and should be on the curriculum of every law school. (And a final note: I have never before or since been as impressed by actress Gong Li, who commands the screen by allowing her usual glamourous presence to be utterly subsumed into the character of a pregnant peasant woman. That she still stands out in one crowd scene just by sheer force of her pesonality is a testament to a charisma that, I admit, eluded me in many of her other films after Road Home.)DVD Review: This is a wonderful, realistic film about modern rural China
Summary: 5 Stars
I have seen this film many times and have used it to teach American high school students about rural China today. When I first saw it, I thought the story was funny, quirky and well acted, especially by Gong Li. Now that I have been to China several times (not in tour groups) and have had a chance to see some of rural China shown my by my new Chinese friends, I can appreciate how well Zhang Yimou has portrayed both the rural countryside and the bureaucracy that runs China today. It seems that everywhere you go in China today, there are large numbers of people in uniforms acting official. In many cases I had no idea what their duties were. In this film the government offices always seem full of people petitioning the government for something, just as is Qiu Ju. Gong's portrayal of her is so laid back and unglamorous that she seems very real. I credit her acting skills with carrying the part off so well,so far as it is from her normal roles. This film makes you laugh a lot, but also just stare in wonder as the Chinese countryside and cities roll out before Qiu Ju- and you. The wonderful repetition of the bicycle ride out of her village on every new trip is a great image, the equivalent of saying "here we go again!" This movie is worth renting, but after you do so, you may want to buy it, as I did.DVD Review: A Glimpse of Rural China
Summary: 4 Stars
I liked "The Story of Qui Ju" bacause it was a nice story about a woman in rural China who wants simple justice. Her efforts to rectify an embarassing wrong done to her husband expands to a point beyond anyone's expectation. The beauty of the movie is in the process and determination of Qui Ju to receive satisfaction. The characters are very well presented (especially the title character). The view we get of life in China is outstanding. As much as I enjoyed this movie, however, I have seen too many greater movies to give this a "5 Star" rating. It IS a nice rainy-day film, though.
Description of The Story of Qiu Ju
A humorous fable of justice that traverses shot in the north of China. Gong Li plays Qiu Ju a tenacious farmer determined to right a wrong done to her husband. Defying all stereotypes of the passive Chinese woman she remains unbowed by the frustrations of bureaucracy in her quixotic search for dignity.System Requirements:Run Time: 100 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre:?FOREIGN/LATIN Rating:?PG UPC:?043396141124 Manufacturer No:?14112The kick is never shown, but the entire film is based around it. It's winter in the remote Shaanxi province. Pregnant Qiu Ju (Gong Li, 2046) is married to laidback farmer Qinglai (Liu Pei Qi). When village chief Wang (Lei Lao Sheng) kicks him during an argument, she sets out to ensure that her husband receives medical attention--and justice. Clad in a bulky jacket, face partially obscured by a thick scarf, the strong-willed woman, joined by sister-in-law Meizi (Yang Liu Chun), travels far and wide to find someone who can coerce Wang to apologize (she asked, he refused). All agree the chief was in the wrong, but each authority with whom she meets hands her off to another. Along the way, the couple is offered financial compensation (for medical care and lost wages), but an apology is as elusive as a dragonfly in December. Taking cues from both Frank Capra (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington) and Vittorio De Sica (Bicycle Thieves), Zhang Yimou (House of Flying Daggers) presents modern-day China as a country where bureaucrats run the show and the citizens--especially the women--must suffer the consequences. Fortunately, some are more persistent than others, and The Story of Qiu Ju is far from tragic. Just as their fifth pairing represents one of Yimou's rare contemporary efforts, the dressed-down title character is also an anomaly for Li, his real-life love at the time. The risk paid off and the result is one of their most cherished collaborations. --Kathleen C. Fennessy
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