Film "SUNFLOWER" plays at 4-Star Theatre
From The Director of “Shower”

Winning of Best Director and Photography Silver Shell Award a 2005 San Sebastian Film Festival | Official Selection, 2005 Toronto Film Festival | 2006 Hong Kong International Film Festival | 2007 Pacific Rim Film Festival

Film: Sunflower

Opening Date: Friday, May 16th, 2008

Location:
4 Star Movie Theatres
2200 Clement St.@23rd Ave
San Francisco, Ca. 94121
(415) 666-3706
http://WWW.LNTSF.COM

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TITLE: SUNFLOWER (Original title: Kiang ri kui)

From The Director of “Shower”

Winning of Best Director and Photography Silver Shell Award a 2005 San Sebastian Film Festival | Official Selection, 2005 Toronto Film Festival | 2006 Hong Kong International Film Festival | 2007 Pacific Rim Film Festival

"Sunflower," mature and luminous, weaves a subtle psychological insight into a rich, narrative texture. The movie is destined to be entrenched in the viewers' memory as a brilliantly focused family snapshot. It glows with an interior light that seems to settle like a sunbeam, shining with particles of memories containing visions of a China forever lost in the frenzy of modernization and urbanization. – By Zhu Linyong, China Daily

Synopsis

Sunflower spans the course of three decades - focusing on the years 1976, 1987 and 1999 – in the lives of Zhang Gengnian and his son, Xiangyang.

In the years leading up to 1976, when The Cultural Revolution and the reign of the notorious ‘Gang of Four’ were coming to an end, Zhang Gengnian was an absentee father. Condemned to spending six years in a rural ‘Cadre School’ - a labor camp where he was to be politically “reeducated” - Gengnian missed Xiangyang’s formative years. At nine-years-old, Xiangyang is having the time of his life. Nearly free of adult supervision, he spends his days mischievously roaming the streets. Gengnian, however, has his own idea about the direction that his son’s life should take and, now that he’s been released, he’s determined to make up for lost time. Most particularly, he wants Xiangyang to learn to draw, but it isn’t long before Xiangyang starts to chafe under his father’s constant rules and orders, quickly giving rise to tensions between father and son that won’t soon go away.

By 1987, Xiangyang has become an accomplished draughtsman, but his conflicts with his father seem set in stone. While he dreams of escaping his father’s clutches by running away with his girlfriend to Guangzhou, Xiangyang remains stuck at home, forced to study for the university entrance exams. Xiangyang has no idea how far his father will go to control his life in the name of “what’s best” for him, although he’ll one day discover the hurtful truth that his parents have taken away the one thing that was truly his…

Twelve years later, Beijing has become a new city, with redevelopment projects stretching to the horizon and demolition of the last remaining alleyways and courtyard housing in progress. Xiangyang has married a girl named Han Jing and his burgeoning career as a painter is about to take off with a big solo exhibition of his work. However an unplanned pregnancy that both Han Jing and Xiangyang are determined to abort leaves Gengnian reeling. Erupting over his son’s “selfish” decision to deny him a grandchild, Gengnian fails to appear at the opening of

Xiangyang’s exhibition. Days later Xiangyang does find his father secretly visiting the exhibition and praising his work, but Gengnian soon disappears, leaving behind only a revelatory audio tape for his son.

Sunflower is a powerful and touching look at the compelling inner dynamics of one post-Cultural Revolution family in Beijing and their struggle over thirty years to adjust to each other as the fabric, politics, and social mores of Chinese society change ever so rapidly.

Director: Zhang Yang

Cast: Sun Haiying, Joan Chen, Liu Zifeng, Zhang Fan, Gao Ge, Wang Haidi

Running Time: 129 Minutes | Language: Mandarin with English subtitle

Year Released: 2005 | NR | Screeners are available on request

Film Website:

http://www.newyorkerfilms.com/nyf/theatrical/nr_t.htm