Simple beauty of 'Xiu Xiu' ends in long, basic bore

The 1970s brought a perplexing social campaign to mainland China. In an attempt to prove the worth of Communism in an increasingly capitalist world, the Chinese government implemented a program called the Cultural Youth Revolution. Through this social campaign, nearly eight million Educated Youths, as they were called, were "sent down" from the large cities to the Chinese hinterlands to act as a sort of cultural exchange.

In theory, these youths would bring their education to the peasantry, later returning to their home cities with newfound abilities in trade, factory work, craftsmanship and various other specialized skills.

But, as time passed, the program slowly proved a failure, and as the bureaucracy disintegrated, it became nearly impossible for the Educated Youths to obtain official papers guaranteeing their return home. Six month tenures in the beautiful Chinese

Courtesy of Stratosphere Entertainment Actress Lu Lu stars as Xiu Xiu in "Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl," the directorial debut of "Twin Peaks" actress Joan Chen.

countryside turned into agonizing years in the bush. The youths became desperate, searching wildly for any way to return to their homes, their families, their loves. Many of them ended up resorting to bribery, prostitution and even self-mutilation in the hopes of acquiring the elusive documentation that would take them away.

"Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl" is the story of one Educated Youth and her thwarted attempts at return. Wen Xiu (Lu Lu), known among her friends as Xiu Xiu, is an early recruit of the Cultural Youth Revolution.

She leaves a happy home and a loving family in the city of Chengdu, ultimately landing on the plains of central China with the task of learning horse herding from a Tibetan nomad named Lao Jin (Lopsang). Xiu Xiu sees Lao Jin as possessing a naive provincialism, and to Lao Jin, Xiu Xiu can only represent a brazen intrusion into his pastoral existence. Nevertheless, a strange almost filial friendship forms between the unlikely pair.

But, as time passes, it becomes increasingly obvious that the regional headquarters of the Revolution have no intention of returning any of the Educated Youths to their homes. The rest of the film deals with Xiu Xiu's innocence lost, and the final tempering of her friendship with Lao Jin that leads up to the film's poignant conclusion.

Directed by Joan Chen, the film has its strong points. Lu Lu and Lopsang give admirable performances from opposite ends of the spectrum of acting experience. Impressively, Lu Lu had only two cameos to her credit before "Xiu Xiu." Lopsang, a 20-year veteran of Chinese theater and film, has been awarded the title of Advanced-Level Actor, an exemplary honor in the world of China's Performing Arts.

Furthermore, the film's accoutrement is breathtaking. The musical score is unaffectedly touching in its clarity. The views of the Chinese landscape are symbolic in their beauty.

Chen chose her vehicle well, for the story of Xiu Xiu is surely effective in its pathos. In an admirable attempt at beautiful simplicity, Chen filed down her film to the rudiments of cinema. Dialogue is sparse, and basic camera shots are meant to convey the film's sentiment and its message in a fundamental fashion.

But, the film gets bogged down in its own overdone sense of simplicity. Silences become deafening in their length, landscapes become commonplace and the film's midsection drags on interminably. Its final moments are delicately handled and beautifully shot, but it runs the risk of having lost its audience long ago.

The message of "Xiu Xiu" is an incredibly important one. Any director looking to take on the injustices of a flawed bureaucracy, the pain of separation, and depressing prospect of a youth's lost innocence would do well to choose a story like "Xiu Xiu." However, while it might have made a breathtaking film short, Chen's two-hour feature ends up too long, too basic and rather boring.

09-24-99