Summer Palace

BANNED BY THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT

Critic's Pick - The New York Times

“Sex and politics are on full boil….beautifully blends the political with the personal.” - Manohla Dargis, The New York Times

“Hao Lei…has an urgent eroticism that mesmerizes the audience!” – Time Magazine

“Great triumph....of Lou’s work!” – The New Yorker

From the director of Purple Butterfly and Suzhou River comes the film that the Chinese government did not want the world to see! Lou Ye's sprawling epic Summer Palace follows Yu Hong (Lei Hao), a rebellious young woman from a small Chinese town transplanted to a politically - charged Beijing University in the late 1980s. The country's social turmoil is witnessed through its disaffected youth, whose newfound sexuality and activism culminate in violent suppression. Spanning nearly 20 years of modern Chinese history, Summer Palace projects the country's struggle for definition through the eyes and heart of a young woman ill-equipped to handle it. While drifting between the arms of two men, her love fervent for both, Yu Hong's existential crisis mirrors that of her nation.

SPECIAL FEATURES:
Making of Featurette
"Summer Palace and Chinese Censorship"
Trailers