Every month, Time Out Shanghai shows one of the best Chinese films of all time at Glam, M on The Bund, with free popcorn and drinks specials.
Devils on the Doorstep
Dir Jiang Wen, 2000; Comedy/War
Jiang Wen is known as an actor who can fill the most mundane dialogue with the ribald brashness of peeing into a ditch. The Cannes Grand Prix-winning Devils on the Doorstep showed that he knows a thing or two about exasperating audience expectations from behind the camera too. Set in 1945 in a backwater Chinese village held captive by the Japanese army, the film begins with its bumbling protagonist, Ma Dashan (played by the director), interrupted mid-tryst by a seemingly familiar voice. Upon opening the door, Dashan is met with an unknown intruder who persuades him at gunpoint to stash two captives in his basement cellar until New Year.
The captives Dashan is saddled with turn out to be a churlish Japanese sergeant who tries to goad the villagers into executing him and his Chinese translator who, rather more keen on the idea of living, deliberately and hilariously mistranslates his fanatically nationalistic companion’s seething rants into words of flowery flattery. When Dashan’s mysterious visitor does not arrive to reclaim the detainees, it is up to the troupe of misfit villagers to figure out what to do next.
Glam, M on the Bund. Feb 12. 4.15pm. Free. To reserve your spot, message 'film' to our official WeChat account.
