Devils on the Doorstep (2000)

Original title

鬼子来了

Directed by

Jiang Wen

Genre

comedy film

Country

People's Republic of China

Runtime

2h 19m

Rated

NR

Rating

8.2 of 10 from 192 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

During World War II, a Chinese peasant in a remote village is forced by a mysterious man to guard a Japanese soldier and a translator. The whole village becomes trapped in a dangerous and absurd situation as they try to survive while tensions escalate.

darkly comictensebleakslow-burnunsettlingabsurdgrittysatiricalprovocative

What happens

Devils on the Doorstep (simplified Chinese: 鬼子来了; traditional Chinese: 鬼子來了; Japanese: 鬼が来た!; literally "the devils are here"; the devil is a term of abuse for foreign invaders, here referring to brutal and violent Japanese invaders in China during World War II) is a 2000 Chinese black comedy war film directed, co-written and produced by Jiang Wen, starring Jiang himself, Kagawa Teruyuki, Yuan Ding and Jiang Hongbo. Shot in black and white to mimic old-time war movies, the film premiered at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival on 12 May where it won the Grand Prix. The film was initially not allowed to be shown in theaters in its native China for a certain period but has eventually been made commercially available there since. The story takes place in a small remote village named Guajiatai (or Rack Armor Terrace) near Shanhaiguan, Hebei at the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War. One night, a mysterious man brings two captives in sacks (Japanese soldier Teruyuki and translator Dong Hanchen) to the doorstep of a peasant's (Ma Dasan) home and threatens Ma to keep them until he returns to pick them up on New Year's Eve. Fearing both the mystery man and the Japanese, the whole village falls into a dilemma over what to do with the two prisoners. The film is inspired by the novel Survival by You Fengwei, and was greatly modified during the process of adaptation. This film shelved the theme of "the brave resistance against Japanese aggression" in the original literature, and focused on the themes of "the ignorance of the peasants" and "the absurdity of the war." Contrary to its title, Devils on the Doorstep is not at its core an anti-Japanese war film. In Jiang's own words, the film shows how Chinese literature and film has perpetuated an attitude of blaming the aggressor and casting the Chinese population as passive victims of aggression. Jiang hoped that the film illuminates this common human psychological trait of blaming others for disaster that goes beyond Chinese. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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