Devils on the Doorstep

It's easy to see why Steven Soderbergh would call Jiang Wen's Devils on the Doorstep "a masterwork" in his DVD introduction to this potent Chinese antiwar film: the filmmakers served together on the 2002 Cannes Film Festival jury, and as an acclaimed director himself, Soderbergh could appreciate the complexity of Jiang's vision, which begins as a somewhat farcical comedy set during the final days of Japanese-occupied China in the winter of 1945. In a small village near the Great Wall, a Chinese peasant named Ma Dasan (played by the director) is forced to shelter two prisoners of war, a Japanese soldier with a death wish and a Chinese interpreter/collaborator who wants to stay alive. With a Japanese regiment and marching band stomping through the village on a daily basis, Ma Dasan's efforts to hide the prisoners grow increasingly absurd and desperate, especially when it becomes clear that the prisoners' captor won't be returning to claim them. A sort of semi-controlled chaos ensues among the villagers who are in on the secret, but the film ultimately takes a startling, dark, and violent turn to demonstrate the madness of war. Though Devils on the Doorstep is not the kind of movie you can easily cozy up to, the film's final scenes pack a wallop, and the black-and-white cinematography is superb. Ultimately banned in China (Jiang Wen's controversial approach to Japanese/Chinese atrocities during WWII drew the attention of Chinese censors), it's great to see the ambitious film--winner of the 2000 Cannes Jury Prize--on DVD. Recommended. (J. Shannon)