LIVING THE LAND (SHENG XI ZHI DI) World Cinema

In his second feature film, director Huo Meng (Silver Bear for Best Director, 2025 Berlin Film Festival) confirms his talent with an epic tale of a farm family navigating life-changing events in ‘90s rural China — recalling the work of both early Zhang Yimou and Meng’s mentor, Jia Zhangke. Sent to live with his uncle after his parents move to take factory jobs, 10-year-old Chuang learns the ways of Henan province farm and village life, not just the toil of work and navigating village bureaucracy, but the complex relationships, both caring and cruel, among the men and women in his extended family. In collaboration with cinematographer Guo Daming, Meng’s vision of a farming community whose lives have been entwined for generations with the flow of seasons, working the land and facing the elements in good times and bad, takes form in a series of striking, painterly compositions. Whether it’s a long shot capturing the entire village population at work in the fields during harvest, the hypnotic rhythms of the wind at play across shafts of wheat, or dynamic tracking shots depicting the family’s funeral processions and weddings, Meng crafts beautiful, and thrillingly cinematic, big screen tableaus tinged with melancholy — signifying this way of life is coming to an end. –Todd Hitchcock