IMDB Bottom 100: No.s 88 & 87 - Beginning of the Great Revival & A Story About Love

Number 88: Beginning of the Great Revival (2011)

Now, there’s no getting away from the fact this is a propaganda movie. Commissioned by the Chinese government, Beginning of the Revival was made to commemorate 90 years since the foundation of the Communist Party in China.

But even if you don’t agree with the politics that doesn’t mean a film can’t be good in its own right. Birth of a Nation and Triumph of the Will are still considered cinematic masterpieces despite being less than desirable politically speaking.

Just about every big name in Chinese cinema is brought in for this, including Chow Yun Fat and Andy Lau. John Woo, the man Michael Bay wishes he could be, makes a rare appearance in front of the camera.

This is basically a two hour Chinese history lesson covering a 10 year period. There is WAY too much history to cover in detail but I’ll try sum up as best I can.

So in 1911, China is being torn apart by civil wars between Imperial and Republican forces (Ooh, it suddenly sounds a bit Star Wars). The Emperor is overthrown but people are becoming hungry and restless. The students in the universities lead, inspired by their Marxist influenced teachers, begin what are depicted as mostly peaceful revolts. In 1917, the October Revolution happens in Russia and Marxism begins to become more widespread in China. The working classes are galvanised as a political force. The ruling regime attempts to suppress their movement but without success. The film ends with all the key figures together on a boat and the formation of the Communist Party on 1st July 1921. They sing the Chinese national anthem and a message comes up to say the Communist Party is now leading China into a glorious and prosperous future.

Yes, the propaganda is unescapable – communists good, everyone else bad – but as a film in its own right, it’s actually quite good.

It’s not great – too many characters (everyone who played even a minor roler is crammed in), historical inaccuracies, drawn out in places – but it is well shot, the actors are good and it has that epic feel to it.

I am trying to be as fair to the film as possible and view it in its own terms but I do recognise the difficulty of separating the film from the politics. And I think for most the politics will be the deciding factor as to whether they like this or not.

Number 87: A Story about Love (1995)

Now we head over to Norway for A Story about Love. Or Dis - en historie om kjærlighet to give it’s proper Norwegian title. And it’s the worst film I have come across so far, nothing but pretentious drivel.

‘Student Arthouse’ is the phrase that comes to mind. The film is a collection of stories about love from around the world: Cairo, Oslo, Paris and New York. The characters in the film never speak to each other, they are all too mean and moody for that. Apparently, being in love means you can’t smile anymore either.

I hope you like long location tracking shots. If not you are in a lot of trouble since that is about 80% of the movie. I now no longer feel I have to visit Cairo, I have now seen every inch of it.

The ‘story’ is told via internal narration. It’s all a lot of ‘she is beauty, love is pain’ type stuff. It’s a lot like an extended Calvin Klein advertisement but even less ethnically diverse. And it is. All. Just. So. Boring.

It frightens me there are 86 films considered worse than this. It’s only 70 minutes long but it just seems to go on forever. Thank you Norway but no thanks. Go back to doing whatever it is Norwegians are stereotypically supposed to do. Being Norwegian.

I did invent a game to make it more bearable though. Basically what I did was replace the characters narrations with Rorschach from Watchmen. Weirdly, it kind of works especially for the bits in New York.

‘All the filth and politicians will look up and say, ‘Save us from this movie!’ and I’ll whisper…’No!’


(these are from the IMDB Bottom 100 list as it was on 31st August 2015)