Summer Palace

Aka: Yihe yuan / A Chinese Youth
Director: Lou Ye
Release date: May 18, 2006
Language: Mandarin
Subtitle: English (Soft-subbed)
Genre: Drama, Mature 18+

Starring:
Xueyun Bai ... Wang Bo
Lin Cui ... Xiao Jun
Long Duan ... Tang Caoshi
Xiaodong Guo ... Zhou Wei

Synopsis:
Country girl Yu Hong leaves her village, her family and her lover to study in Beijing. At university, she discovers an intense world of sexual freedom and forbidden pleasure. Enraptured, compulsive, she falls madly in love with fellow student Zhou Wei. Driven by obsessive passions they can neither understand nor control, their relationship becomes one of dangerous games - betrayals, recriminations, provocations - as all around them, their fellow students begin to demonstrate, demanding democracy and freedom. Protests collapse, and Yu and Zhou lose each other amidst the social chaos and panicked crowds. Zhou Wei is sent to a summer military camp, and on his release moves to Berlin, fleeing both his country and memories of Yu. She finds a job, a lover, but can not forget Zhou. In Germany, social unrest is mounting: calls for freedom, demonstrations for democracy. A familiar story for Zhou. Weary, still haunted by Yu, he returns to China as the Berlin Wall crashes down. He finds her at last, in a small town. From evening to dawn, their future stretches before them, two changed souls in a changed world.
(Credit: Crunchyroll)

Review:
"Because it is only when we make love that you understand that I'm gentle."

This is an art-house/indie blue-plate special. Not as erotic as it is made out to be. It's more of a heady, brutal love story about a passionate and poetic young woman with a huge social climate hanging around. Great film.

Trailer:



Related Links:
Trailer: YouTube
More Info: IMDb
Download Links: 01 - 02 - 03 - 04 - 05 - 06 - 07 - 08 - 09 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - sub

Curiosities:
After screening Summer Palace in the 2006 Cannes Film Festival without government approval, the film was de facto banned in Mainland China, and its filmmakers officially censured.

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