UCCA Art Cinema will launch a new series Filmmaker in Focus, presenting established contemporary Chinese filmmaker's work with full retrospective and holding discussion with filmmaker in person.

This month, Lou Ye will be presented firstly in this series. He was born in Shanghai and studied film at the Beijing Film Academy. He received international recognition with his film Suzhou River (2000), which recounts the story, in poetic images, of the people in the poorest quarter of Shanghai not far from the river Suzhou. The film received several awards at international film festivals, including Tiger Award at the 29th International Film Festival of Rotterdam. His following feature films Purple Butterfly (2003), Summer Palace (2006), Spring Fever (2009) were all selected in competition at Cannes Film Festival. His unique style in all aspect of filmmaking (storytelling cinematography, music and editing) stands him out from his peers, especially, his unlimited expression on people emotion in contemporary society. His recent film Love and Bruises (2011) will have its nationwide premiere in this series.

From Suzhou River to Love and Bruises, Filmmaker in Focus will unfold Lou Ye’s all stories to you.

*Please visit e.mosh.cn/yelou for online ticketing.
** Mar 25 【Art Cinema】Filmmaker Forum: Lou Ye’s Approach to Filmmaking

Film Schedule
3.13 TUE 19:00 Spring Fever
3.14 WED 19:00 Suzhou River
3.16 FRI 19:00 Spring Fever
3.17 SAT 16:30 Purple Butterfly
3.18 SUN 14:00 Suzhou River
3.20 TUE 19:00 Love and Bruises
3.21 WED 19:00 Summer Palace
3.23 FRI 19:00 Summer Palace
3.25 SUN 19:00 Love and Bruises

Spring Fever
2010. China/Hong Kong/France. 116min. Mandarin/Cantonese, No subtitles
CANNES 2009 IN COMPETITION, BEST SCREENPLAY
TORONTO 2009, VANGUARD PROGRAM

Nanjing , present day, spring time . Wang Ping's wife suspects him of adultery. She hires Luo Haitao to spy on him and discovers that her husband's lover is a man, Jiang Cheng. It's with this man that Luo Haitao
and his girl friend, Li Jing, form a torrid love triangle. For all three, it' s the beginning of asphyxiating, sultry nights of physical abandon that exalt the senses. A sulfurous journey into the confinement of jealousy and obsessive love.

Suzhou River
2000. China/Germany. 83min. In Mandarin with EN subtitles
Rotterdam 2000, Tiger Award
Paris 2000, Critics’ Award, Best Leading Actress
Tokyo Filmex 2000, Grand Prix

A motorcycle courier in his mid-twenties is asked to drive the 16-year-old daughter of a smuggler. They fall in love, but one day when she finds out that he is kidnapping her for a ransom, she kills herself by jumping into the Suzhou river, and he is jailed for murder. After his release he meets a bar dancer who looks identical to the girl.

Summer Palace
2006. China/Hong Kong/France/Germany. 140min. Mandarin/German,No subtitles
Cannes 2006 OFFICIAL COMPETITION

Against a volatile backdrop of simmering unrest, two young lovers play out their complex, erotic, love/hate relationship. Beautiful Yu Hong leaves her village, her family and her lover to study in Beijing, where she discovers an intense world of sexual freedom and falls madly in love with fellow student Zhou Wei. Their relationship becomes one of dangerous games.

Purple Butterfly
2003. China/France. 127min. Mandarin/Japan/Vietnamnese，with CN subtiles
CANNES 2003 OFFICIAL SELECTION - OFFICIAL COMPETITION

1927. Manchuria. Itami, a young Japanese man, falls deeply in love with Cynthia, a beautiful Chinese girl. Their brief happiness ends when he is called home for his military service and they are forced to part. Returning sorrowfully from the train station where she has sent her lover farewell, Cynthia witnesses her brother's bloody murder at the hands of Japanese right-wing extremists.

Three years later, Shanghai has been unofficially occupied by Japan. The city is tense, rife with violence and barely contained anarchy. Cynthia - now known as Ding Hui - is working for Purple Butterfly, a resistance group planning to assassinate Yamamoto, head of the Japanese secret service. Itami is also in Shanghai, a secret agent who reports directly to Yamamoto.

Love and Bruises
2011. France. 100min. Mandarin/French，with CN subtitles
Venice 2011 VENICE DAYS

Hua, a young teacher from Beijing, is a new comer in Paris.
Exiled in an unknown city, she wanders between her tiny apartment and the university, drifting between former lovers and recent French acquaintances.
She meets Matthieu, a young worker who falls madly in love with her. Possessed by an insatiable desire for her body, he treats Hua like a dog.
An intense affair begins, marked by Matthieu’s passionate embraces and harsh verbal abuse. When Hua determines to leave her lover, she discovers the strength of her addiction, and the vital role he has come to play in her life as a woman.
The film is based on a novel by Jie Liu-Falin, a Chinese woman novelist living in Paris.

Organizer: Dream Author

Co-organizer: Ullens Center for Contemporary Art