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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Still Life
New Yorker Films


6.8

based on 10 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 5 votes
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FILM:

Internet Movie Database

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Tao Zhao, and Sanming Han

Sam Ming makes a trip to the City of Fenjge to find his ex-wife and daughter. He has not seen them for several years. (Ad Vitam)

GENRE(S):	Drama \| Romance
WRITTEN BY:	Zhang Ke Jia Na Guan Jiamin Sun
DIRECTED BY:	Zhang Ke Jia
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: November 25, 2008 Theatrical: January 18, 2008
RUNNING TIME:	108 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	China / Hong Kong
LANGUAGE(S):	Mandarin

Alternative Title: Sanxia haoren

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

TV Guide Ken Fox

Few of China's Sixth Generation filmmakers have turned to their country's explosive economic growth and its attendant upheavals with so sharp an eye and so heavy a heart as Jia Zhang-ke.

100

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

More than a million people have been displaced in central China in the cause of generating electrical power to meet the needs of the future; Jia's flowing river of a picture washes over a few of them as they adjust to life's currents in the present.

100

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The first great film of the year. It’s beautiful but so much more—full of subtle feeling, framed by a monstrous, eroding landscape.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Kamal AL-Solaylee

Perhaps Jia is trying to prove the point that the future has already arrived. Or perhaps he is suggesting that the truth is stranger than science fiction. This is today's China: Anything is possible.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

This 2006 drama may seem to be worlds apart from the surreal theme-park setting of Jia's previous film, "The World," but there are similarities of theme, style, scale, and tone: social and romantic alienation in a monumental setting, a daring poetic mix of realism and lyrical fantasy, and an uncanny sense of where our planet is drifting.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

As usual, Jia's people tend toward the opaque--one of the movie's most enthusiastic conversations is conducted with ringtones. But his compositions have their own eloquence. Everything's despoiled and yet--as rendered in cinematographer Yu Lik-wai's rich, impossibly crisp HD images--everything is beautiful.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

A modern master of postmodern discontent, Jia Zhang-ke is among the most strikingly gifted filmmakers working today whom you have probably never heard of.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

There is no turning back; the biggest project in China since the Great Wall and the Grand Canal has claimed its human cost and now must prove its own worth. -

The New Yorker David Denby

Despite all this desolation and depression, however, Still Life is an extremely beautiful movie.

Variety Derek Elley

Has almost zero plot but molto mood. It will appeal to the most faithful of the director's camp-followers and no one else.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.8 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Robert H. gave it a7:
The film has it's moments but when compared to the director's previous efforts the filmmaking here strikes me as far too lazy, relying too much on the backdrop and nonactors at the cost of lackadaisical narrative. if you don't edit your view of life enough to focus our attention where's the art?

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Still Life New Yorker Films

Still Life
New Yorker Films