Feng Xiaogang's stirring 'Youth' follows a Chinese military arts troupe through history
by Justin Chang, Los Angeles Times
Dec 19, 2017
3 minutes
An early sequence in Feng Xiaogang's elegiac epic "Youth" shows a dance number being rehearsed by a People's Liberation Army arts troupe in southwestern China.
As 1970s propaganda floods the soundtrack ("We are armed with Mao Tse-tung thought!"), the performers run through their precisely synchronized movements with practiced skill, and not even the litany of harsh criticism they receive from their leader can dispel their contentment and fierce concentration.
Feng's camera, gliding around the room with a freedom that increasingly seems to evade his characters, zooms in
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