Unknown Pleasures (2002)
- Original title
- 任逍遥
- Directed by
- Jia Zhangke
- Genre
- drama film
- Country
- People's Republic of China
- Runtime
- 1h 52m
- Rated
- G
- Rating
- 6.5 of 10 from 55 voters
- Elsewhere
- IMDb
The catalogue in 3D
The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.
How it feels
In the city of Datong in 2001, three young people drift through life without clear direction. They are influenced by popular culture from China and the West, which distances them from their immediate reality.
restlessalienatedmelancholicbleakslow-paceddisaffectedmedia-saturateddetached
What happens
Unknown Pleasures (Chinese: 任逍遥; pinyin: Rèn xiāo yáo; lit. 'Free from all constraints') is a 2002 Chinese film directed by Jia Zhangke, starring Wu Qiong, Zhao Weiwei and Zhao Tao as three disaffected youths living in Datong in 2001, part of the new "Birth Control" generation. Fed on a steady diet of popular culture, both Western and Chinese, the characters of Unknown Pleasures represent a new breed in the People's Republic of China, one detached from reality through the screen of media and the internet. The film was a co-production of four countries: Japan's Office Kitano and T-Mark, China's Hu Tong Communications, France's Lumen Films, and South Korea's E-Pictures. It competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival but would eventually lose to director Roman Polanski's Holocaust film, The Pianist. Unknown Pleasures is Jia's third feature film after 1997's Xiao Wu and 2000s Platform, and it is sometimes considered the final film of an informal trilogy on a modern China in transition. The film also marked Jia's last production outside of the Chinese studio system. With 2004's The World, Jia would work with the approval of the state film bureaucrats (SARFT). (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)
More like this
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Shanghai Panic (2001)
Far from Home (2002)
Life Show (2002)
I Love You (2002)
Pretty Big Feet (2002)
Zhou Yu's Train (2002)
No Lonely Angels (2002)- More like this film, on a shelf you can walk up to.It's the lit case on the top shelf.