Mountains May Depart (2015)
I know it is a strange thing to notice first, but I was quickly taken by the color balance of how this looked. I just really liked how the first segment set in 1999 looked. The actual movie is very minimal in plot but drawn across three timelines with segments in 1999, 2014 and 2025. The story is on the surface a simple love drama, but set within a background of massive progress and changes in China across the decades. Underneath is at least some critical reflection on those changes, not outright political criticism, but it is there. The first two segments works best, by quite a large margin. Something just goes wrong in the third chapter. Not because I am watching it in 2024 and the idea of 2025 here isn’t exactly accurate, as you can just see it as 2035 to get a similar effect. It is just very detached from the first two thirds in tone and style and theme. I also think I lost a great deal of response to the narrative when they switched to English. The acting became hokey and untrustworthy. It does detract somewhat from the first two halves, but overall worth the watch.
Rating: 3