In 1985, in the midst of China’s economic reform period, three college students in Beijing—an overzealous country boy who refuses to accept his destiny of being a farmer, a cynical intellectual with a superiority complex, and a romantic idealist who wants to be a movie star—bond through a shared fascination with Western literature, music, and movies and an ambition to live the American dream. This sets the three on a roundabout course toward the foundation of a wildly successful English-language tutorial institute—but fame, enormous fortune, and lawsuits test the bonds of ambition. Shot by superstar cinematographer Christopher Doyle and dubbed “the Chinese Social Network,” this seductive, epic tale of business bravado reveals both the spirit and the detail of China’s dramatic economic coming-of-age.
Appears in: 37th Portland International Film Festival
Genres: Drama, Biography
Other Films by Peter Ho-Sun Chan
Dearest
Based on a true story, Dearest is about the sensitivity, complexity, and indelible pain of child abduction. The lives of Shenzhen residents Wen-jun and his ex-wife Xiao-juan are thrown into turmoil when their young son goes missing. They join a support group active in exposing child abduction rings and, enduring several years of false-sightings and scams, finally …