Aftershock

Although this Chinese film opens with the famous 1976 earthquake that struck Tangshan, China—killing an estimated 240,000 people—and ends with the Sichuan quake of 2008, this is no disaster movie. Rather, Aftershock serves up a sweeping historical melodrama, a crowd pleaser with real-life resonance and no political subtext (kind of like a Chinese version of Titanic). The opening spectacle is used to illustrate the scale of the event that shatters one family, setting up a “Sophie's choice” dilemma for the hysterical, panicked mother (Fan Xu)—a decision that haunts the survivors over the decades. The foreboding shadow of Sichuan also hangs over the film, while the intervening years provide an interesting, if uncritical, survey of China during and after Mao. Aftershock may be full of sentimentality, but director Feng Xiaogang effectively explores the subject of loss while also paying tribute to the dead and damaged. While Aftershock didn't get much international acclaim or attention, it was hugely successful in China. Recommended. (S. Axmaker)