Dreams May Come (2006 film)

Dreams May Come (梦想照进现实) is a 2006 Chinese drama film directed by Xu Jinglei (徐静蕾) ,starring Xu Jinglei (徐静蕾) and  Han Tongsheng (韩童生)

Profile

• Movie: Dreams May Come / 梦想照进现实 (2006)
• Director: Xu Jinglei (徐静蕾)
  
• Producer : Liu Xian (刘璇) 
• Writer: Wang Shuo (王朔) , Xu Jinglei (徐静蕾)
  
• Cinematography : Lu Gan (甘露) 
• Production Designer  : Zhang Wu (张武) 
• Genre : drama
• Release Date : June 30 , 2006
• Distributor:
• Running Time :
• Language: Mandarin
• Country: China

Synopsis

Stars

• Xu Jinglei (徐静蕾)
  
• Han Tongsheng (韩童生)
  
  

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Xu Jinglei most popular blogger in world


The weblog by Chinese starlet Xu Jinglei is now the world's most popular. With more than 50 million clicks it tops the "Technorati" billboard, a leading weblog search engine.    "I didn't expect it to be so popular. An avalanche of clicks has encouraged me to keep writing," said Xu, adding that her blog is mainly aimed at promoting her films.  Xu, an actress-turned-director, became famous overseas when she won a best director award for "Letter From An Unknown Woman" in the 2004 San Sebastian International Film Festival in Spain.  She considers blog writing to be the most convenient and economic way of publicizing her films.  While busy shooting her latest movie "Dreams May Come", which was released in China at the end of June, she put details of the filming process and her marketing plans into her blog.  She even inserted in her blog links to film clicks posted on the website of her film company.  China Mobile seized the occasion, adding a link at the top of her blog's home page to announce that the theme song of "Dreams May Come" sung by Xu herself could be downloaded for cell phone rings.  Begun last October, Xu's blog at blog.sina.com.cn/m/xujinglei only took 112 days to break domestic records with more than 10 million visits.  Since then, she has updated her blog every other day. But if she feels in a very good mood she sometimes posts two or three articles in a day.  Sensitive articles with her musings about life have made this beautiful young director even more thoughtful and talented, and drawn legions of fans.  Visitors leave thousands of messages about each of her articles, applauding her open, free writing style, commenting on films or taking advantage of her popularity to advertise their own blogs or businesses.  A survey by Baidu.com showed there were 16 million bloggers writing in Chinese last year, with a total of 36.82 million weblogs. Xu Jinglei was one of the first celebrities that the portal website Sina invited to open blogs last year.

(Xinhua)

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Two leads, one scene and endless dialogue-Dreams May Come sounds more like a play than a movie, and it might have been better on the stage instead of the screen. If you want to tell people what the story is about, you'd have to recite the whole dialogue. Written by famed novelist Wang Shuo, the lines are funny, sarcastic and memorable-the soul of this modest movie. Some of Wang's newly-invented words have proved so popular, they've been adopted by audiences as new post-film slang.

Shot in a dimly lit room without using too many filming techniques, some have complained that the two-hour film is tiresome and chatty. It becomes clear that the plot is not director Xu Jinglei's foremost concern, if there's even a plot involved to begin with. The main characters are a director and an actress. One night, while shooting a film, they begin a long conversation, talking about art, values, dreams and life. They talk and talk, by turns critical, resigned and confused.

Through the two characters' examination of their inner selves, screenwriter Wang expresses his personal outlook on these issues. And that's why his loyal fans find delight in watching it-it's like a screen version of one of Wang's novels.

As a film director, Xu Jinglei is still a relative novice. A basic flaw in her movies is that she seems to like telling a story through monologues or dialogues, not through the plot and the characters. In her previous film, Letter from an Unknown Woman, the story is mainly pushed through by the protagonist's narration. Dreams May Come is the same. We can't help but wonder, if Wang Shuo had directed this film himself, would he have done it differently?

(That's Beijing August 7, 2006)

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