PEACOCK wins The Jury Grand Prix at the Berlin Film Festival

http://www.monkeypeaches.com/
http://ent.sina.com.cn/2004-12-20/1629604942.html



Peacock (Kong Que), a humorous family drama about individual freedom during the late 1970's China, directed by cinematographer Gu Changwei, was awarded with the Jury Grand Prix at the Berlin Film Festival and Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-Ling's sexual musical The Wayward Cloud (Tian Bian Yi Duo Yun), won a Silver Bear for an outstanding artistic contribution.

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Personal liberty in China spotlighted in Berlinale contender
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u ... 0218152506



BERLIN (AFP) - "Peacock," a family drama about individual freedom in Maoist China, screened in competition at the Berlin film festival Friday in a picture the director said revealed the major strides Chinese society has made on personal liberty

As the competition wound down at the 11-day event, filmmaker Gu Changwei said he had aimed to present a snapshot of 1970s China where the expectations of family could be as repressive as the state apparatus.

"Individual degrees of freedom have changed immensely as China has become more affluent. There is now a much greater degree of liberty outside the family," Gu said.

"But in the family, those bonds and responsibilities are still extremely important."

The film traces the story of a young woman in a constant struggle to define her own future, dreaming of becoming a paratrooper with Mao's military to flee the confines of her rigid surroundings.

She finally marries as a means of escape but later divorces, to the shock of the town, as her idealism is slowly crushed by the poverty and communal obligations of her environment.

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Wow! Peacock actually sounds great, and doesn't use the same five big names out of China that the international community all knows!

Two things, 1. I've not heard of a cinematographer making the jump to direction? Is there a precedence for this? I think that one of the cinematographers for KIDS went on to do Gummo, but that doesn't comfort me. I wonder about his connection with the screenplay? Judging from the poster, this movie is going to have "sweeping" cinematography, which is odd in the scheme of comedies, but then again, this sounds more like a dramdey to coin someone else's phrase here. A rather insightful one too, I have the feeling, anyone who who struggles with family expectations is going to relate to this one beautifully.

It also has a very aggressive political commentary, not just as far as Mao, but on a broad sense that can apply from everything from the Red Scare to Franco, etc. They all used these tactics that resorted to cultures of self-censorship. Self-censorship is a big deal, and I wonder how much of this movie is meant to comment on trends today? The young woman's "communal" ogligations is a critique of status quo?

Sounds great, when should we expect Miramax to get around to distributing it? 2007?