"Black Coal, Thin Ice" Wins Golden Bear at Berlin International Film Festival
Good news for China, from the Berlin International Film Festival. The film Black Coal, Thin Ice, from director Diao Yinan, received the Golden Bear for best picture. Diao, a graduate from China's Central Academy of Drama and director of films like Uniform and Night Train, spent close to a decade developing Black Coal, Thin Ice and getting it into production.
Part thriller, part love story, the film follows police captain Zhang Zili (Liao Fan) as he investigates a series of scattered body parts found in coal plants. He eventually loses his job in pursuit of the killer after a failed police operation claimed the life of two of his colleagues. The story continues years later after he becomes a security guard; when the killer reemerges, Zhang decides to re-open his investigation. A Silver Bear award also went to Liao Fan for his portrayal of the time-hardened detective consumed by his misgivings and the complexity of the case. This is the first Chinese film to take the award since Wang Quan'an's Tuya'a Wedding in 2007.
Indiewire reported, “Promising, and potentially provocative on the both the level of its genre aspirations and its arthouse credibility, "Black Coal, Thin Ice" is more likely to appeal to rarefied cinephile audiences than the larger numbers it clearly hoped to attract —the press screening was one of the best attended, with advance word being strong on the possibility of the film becoming that whitest of whales: a crossover Chinese-language international hit.”
A Silver Bear was also awarded to Chinese cameraman Tui Na for his artistic contribution on Lou Ye's Blind Massage. This narrative film follows the lives of sight-impaired masseurs and masseuses, from Nanjing and their outsider existence in mainstream society.
Variety Magazine writes that this adaptation of Bi Feiyu's novel portrays its characters in a unique and realistic way that avoids the patronizing tone of most mainland literature on the disabled. Lou Ye's Blind Massage maintains this integrity by keeping a realistic perspective, focusing upon the sexual desires and deprivations of the lives of the masseurs.
