Title: "Spring Subway" (開往春天的地鐵)
"Spring Subway" (開往春天的地鐵) is the deput of Chinese director Zhang Yibai (張一白). It is about an unemployed man (acted by Geng Le) finds it difficult to tell his wife (acted by Xu Jinglei) the truth and can only keeps telling his wife "white lies" and kill his time through fooling around on Beijing subway. His denying to tell his wife the truth makes his wife feel strange and even disappointed. Failing to understand her husband, she starts to doubt if the 7-year love between her and her husband has been worn out. At this moment she meets a man who wants to pursue her and thus faces the dilemma of saving her love or restart a new affaire d'amour.
Zhang Yibai nicely dealt with topics such as pressure in urban life, and the difficulty of maintaining love, trust, and frank communication in couple relationship. He aptly used some formalistic way and symbolic expression commonly used in theatre to foreground the contrast between figures' imagination and the real situations in which they are situated. I like his way to create tension and climax in the whole filem, and especially appreciate his way to arrange side stories about the relationship between the main actor and a injured patient,the relationship between a mute young man and a girl he secretly loves, and the relationship between a cook and a sales lady who promotes products on Beijing subway.
While the dialogue in this film could have been more succinct, and the formalistic expression the director chose could be reconsidered to make the flow of the film better, they don't harm the integrity of this film. Furthermore, the film doesn't end with a trite morality, which is impressive among Chinese film directors' works. I recommand this film to anyone who are interested in urban life and couple relationship.
Rate: 3.5 / 5 stars
Other reviews of this film:
http://www.chinesecinemas.org/springsubway.html
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/13294
