Director Wang Xiaoshuai | China, 2014 | Mandarin with English subtitles | 116 minutes
Deng is a stubborn retired widow who spends her days caring about her two grown up sons and her elderly mother, despite her family efforts to stop her. But her daily routine starts derailing when she keeps receiving anonymous calls. What's happening to her? Who could have anything against her? Even her husband's ghost doesn't seem to know...
“An award-worthy performance by stage vet Lu Zhong fuses together the incongruent elements of “Red Amnesia,” Wang Xiaoshuai’s involving if fragmented take on an older woman lost in the disorientation of China’s breakneck changes and seeking expiation for an earlier act of self-preservation. Wang views “Amnesia” as the last of his Cultural Revolution trilogy, begun with “Shanghai Dreams” and “11 Flowers,” yet the film’s first half is also related to “Chongqing Blues” in its expression of intergenerational disparity.” Jay Weissberg, Variety.
