To call “Aftershock” a melodrama doesn’t really do it justice. Shortly after Feng Xiaogang’s film begins, a woman whose husband has just died in the devastating 1976 Tangshan earthquake looks up and screams: “God! You bastard!” And things go downhill from there.
These scenes, including a highly effective rendering of the earthquake, which killed an estimated 240,000 people, are dispatched quickly. But the pain is just beginning. Still to come are an adoption, an unexpected pregnancy, terminal illness, two amputations, three emotional reunions, four abandonments and more than 30 years of exquisite suffering, guilt and resentment, until a redemptive finale brought about by — it’s almost too good to be true — the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. The film may be a blunt instrument, but it’s rarely maudlin — with some exception.
“Aftershock”, which is China’s entry for the 2010 foreign-language Oscar, is receiving a wide American release for a Chinese film.
Directed by Feng Xiaogang; written by Su Xiaowei, based on the novel by Zhang Ling; director of photography, Yue Lu; edited by Xiao Yang; production design by Huo Tingxiao; music by Li-guang Wang; produced by Wang Zhangjun, Gio Yanhong and Han Samping; released by China Lion Film Distribution. Running time: 2 hours 10 minutes.
