In the Heat of the Sun

(Yang'guang Canlan de Rizi)

[Japanese]
[Shadow Magic--three pictures of Xia Yu]
pamphlet cover

This movie portrays the life of a sixteen-year-old boy (Ma XiaoJun or Ma Hou -- Monkey Ma) in Beijing(Peking) in the middle of the 70's. He and the nineteen(?)-year-old girl (MiLan) whom he fell in love with are both very natural, lively, and charming. It is a great fun to see this movie especially if you are over thirty. The last 4 minutes is really beautiful and heart-seizing (if there is such a word).

Producers : Liu XiaoQing, Wen Jun
Director  : Jiang Wen
Ma Xiaojun: Xia Yu
Milan     : Ning Jing

(1994 China/Hong Kong, based on the novel "Wild Beasts" by Wang Shuo)

Ranked as the 2nd best in Kinema-Junpo Best Foreign Films, 1997
Ranked as THE BEST CINEMA OF 1995 in TIME magazine.

A lot of good music is used throughout this movie; some are western, some are Chinese. One may say that this is "Chinese Graffiti". The Tibbetan song used in the background of the credit titles is very fascinating.

Although no sound track CD of this movie seems to be availble, there is a CD titled "Vision/Love in a Century" featuring Xia Yu, Ning Jing, Jiang Wen, Liu XiaoQing, and other Chinese actors and actresses. The first track is "In the Heat of the Sun" sung by Xia Yu; but this song is not directly related to the movie itself.

There is also a book on this movie which was published in China in 1997 and contains various records of the making of the film, essays, the scenario, a reprint of "Wild Beasts", pictures drawn by Jiang Wen, etc. [cover photo]

Title: Tansheng (The Birth of a Movie)
Authors: Jiang Wen, et al.
Publisher: Huayi Publishing (Beijing)
ISBN: 7-80039-815-3/I 498
Pages: 520pages (excluding color & monochrome photogravure pages)

Japanese page (You can find more information on this movie; e.g., links to various sites, and a (not-complete) list of magazine articles).

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