The Children of Huang Shi Review
by Steve Rhodes (steve DOT rhodes AT internetreviews DOT com)May 28th, 2008
THE CHILDREN OF HUANG SHI
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 2008 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): **
Pretty as a picture, THE CHILDREN OF HUANG SHI comes glowing to your local cinema. With perfect period piece sets, handsome and inviting cinematography and pristine examples of 1930s transportation vehicles, the movie would appear to have it all, especially since it's based -- I have no idea how loosely -- on a heart-warming, true story of selfless courage.
But, with its clunky dialog and wooden acting, the film never rises above being a gorgeous tableau.
It may be based on a true story, but with all of its just-in-the-nick-of-time escapes and its many improbable moments, it plays like a highly glamorized version of a true story.
Directed by Roger Spottiswoode, whose last movie of any consequence was THE 6TH DAY, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, THE CHILDREN OF HUANG SHI is the story of a brave British reporter named George Hogg (Jonathan Rhys Meyers, "The Tudors").
When we meet George in 1937, he is living in the comfort of Shanghai, said in the opening credits to be a very European-like city in pre-World War II China. The Japanese are busy fighting an undeclared war in and around the city of Nanjing. George, like all of the other reporters, is eager to make his way to the front but is prevented from doing it by the Chinese government. In a subplot, the Chinese are shown to be bitterly divided between the Nationalists and the Communists.
Impersonating a member of the Red Cross, George manages to make his way into the heart of the battle, where he is able to take photographs of the Japanese carrying out genocide against the Chinese. In one episode, we watch the Japanese soldiers line up the Chinese peasants and mow them down with a machine gun.
But the movie is not really about any of this.
The central story concerns an orphanage, where George finds himself. He decides to take the boys on a harrowing, six-hundred mile journey through the snow covered mountains, in order to get them to a place so remote that the enemy soldiers will not bother them. The school is basically an all male establishment, except for a fetching nurse, Lee Pearson (Radha Mitchell, Melinda in MELINDA AND MELINDA), whose place in the narrative appears to be to supply a small love interest.
In a typical example of the triteness of the film's dialog, Lee asks George about why he came. "Why China?" she asks him with a pensive seriousness. "Because they are in trouble," he replies quickly, without the need for any reflection. No, he's not a mere reporter hot after a story, as he appeared when we first saw him. Not at all. Coming from a family of committed and doctrinaire pacifists, George explains to Lee that he is not at all like his parents, and he is ready to take up weapons and fight his newly found enemies.
Of the many unrealistic scenes, which are needlessly staged solely for the purpose of pulling at our heart-strings, one example occurs before George leads his minions on their arduous journey. He is seen teaching the orphans English at night. With resources extremely tight, he burns up precious fuel to generate electricity in order to light the classroom so the lessons can be held. Of course, the kids could just as easily have been taught during the daylight hours.
The movie, with all its shortcomings, is at least lovely to look at and tells a wonderful story, albeit badly.
THE CHILDREN OF HUANG SHI runs 1:54. The film is in English and in Mandarin and Japanese with English subtitles. It is rated R for "some disturbing and violent content" and would be acceptable for teenagers.
The film in limited release in the United States on Friday, May 30, 2008. In the Silicon Valley, it will be showing at the Camera Cinemas.
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