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Audio Format: DD 2.0 Stereo Video Format: Widescreen 1.85:1 (Anamorphic) Languages: Mandarin Subtitles: English Region Code: 1 Year Made: 2002 Running Time: 150
 Examining the transition in 1980s China away from Maoism and socialism and towards commercialism, Westernization, and popular culture, PLATFORM comes from director Jia Zhang Ke. The film follows a group of performing artists who change with the cultural and political changes in China, becoming less and less humble and more and more like Western rock stars. A film that creatively depicts an important chapter in Chinese history, PLATFORM has been compared to BOOGIE NIGHTS and BYE BYE BRAZIL.
Title Note for Platform DVD
--Theatrical screening: October 8, 2000 as part of the 38th New York Film Festival.
PLATFORM was named Best Undistributed Film by Take Two: the Second Annual Village Voice Film Critics' Poll, and Film Comment named it the second best unreleased film of the year.
Review for Platform DVD
--"...Conceptually, this is a provocative approach to filmmaking, and it makes PLATFORM an intellectually engaging movie..." - New York Times 03/14/2003
Shot without the consent of the authorities, the follow-up to "Xiao Wu" from independent Chinese writer-director Jia Zhang Ke examines the cultural and social changes that swept through China during the 80s after the death of Chairman Mao.
 The film's young characters are all members of a performance troupe, the Peasant Culture Group, growing up in the dingy provincial town of Fenyang (where Ke himself once lived).
Initially the likes of accordion player Minliang (Wei) and singer Ruijuan (Tao), and their friends Chang Jun (Dong) and Zhong Pin (Yi), help stage Maoist propaganda tracts.
Shorn of state funds, however, and influenced by the newly available commercial sounds emanating from Hong Kong and Taiwan, the privatised group renames itself the All Star Rock and Breakdance Band and embarks on a series of provincial tours to spread the pop gospel. (The film's title actually derives from an 80s hit song.)
Filmed in long, static takes which avoid close-ups, "Platform" occasionally feels overly detached and elliptical, making it hard to completely engage with its characters. Yet it's also pleasingly ambivalent towards the impact of historical forces on ordinary lives.
Minliang and his colleagues yearn to escape the restrictions of the past, and they enthusiastically adopt new fashions in clothes, hairstyles, and music, but their personal happiness remains an elusive commodity - Chang Jun and Zhong Pin find their futures affected by the state, whilst Minliang finds it hard to escape Fenyang's ancient walls.
Special Features:
- Interview with the Director
- Behind the Scenes
- Photo Gallery
- Foreign Trailer
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