Last night we went to see "Aftershock," billed as the most popular film in Chinese box office history and nominated for an Oscar in the Best Foreign Language Film category. It did not disappoint. I gave it five stars (highest rating possible) on the audience feedback form and strongly recommend it to anyone who appreciates a drama that transcends boundaries of language, geography and culture.
The film tells the story of the 1976 earthquake in Tangshan that killed 240,000 people and its devastating aftermath. The scale of that much death and misery is often hard to grasp when it happens thousands of miles away from us. But when a storyteller engages us in the lives of a single family, it can bring understanding and compassion.
That was the winning approach taken by director Feng Xiaogang and his terrific cast. The movie features a little of everything: special effects that grab you by the throat; skillful acting that makes you invest in the characters; scenes of everyday China; a haunting story reminiscent of "Sophie's Choice"; dashes of humor, passion and longing that reinforce the universal truths in our lives as parents, children and siblings, no matter where we were born or what language we speak.
The plot revolves around the quake that kills a father and seriously injures his wife and two young children. In the chaos of the rubble, brother and sister are buried beneath the debris, and rescuers tell the mother Yuanni (played by Xu Fan) she must choose between the two because both cannot be safely extricated. We feel Yuanni's agony as she makes an impossible choice, and her guilt as she lives in solitude, forever loyal to her husband's memory and haunted by her decision.
If you don't have the means to attend PIFF, which continues through Feb. 26, be sure to look for this film on Netflix at some point. It's a movie that leaves you marveling at the strength of the human spirit.
Image: www.imbd.com
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