"Return to Dust" or "Yin ru chen yan" is a relatively new Chinese movie in the Mandarin language that premiered already back in 2022, was also shown over a year already at the Berlin Film Festival 2022, but it took until now for the film to have its wide release and I am really glad it did now. I had not heard about it before really and Chinese films surely do not come here too often, but this one is a triumph. I genuinely enjoyed the watch the other night, even if "enjoyed" is probably not the best word to summarize the viewing experience here given the contents and plot and the story that happens from beginning to end. First things first though: The director and writer here is Ruijun Li and it should not surprise anybody that he is working in both fields here as this is what he usually did since starting to make movies about 1.5 decades ago. Actually, this film here marks his 15th anniversary in the industry. Nice to see and I am optimistic that he will make many more films. I surely would watch them after liking this one here. The film runs for over 130 minutes, so it is indeed a really long release, but it did not feel that way. I was drawn into the story quickly. I cannot say too much about the cast here, simply because, as I just stated, Chinese films do not come here too often and I am, as a consequence, not particularly familiar with the performers. I want to say though that the two leads in here are Hai Quing (male) and Wu Renlin (female) and I feel they both played their parts very well. You could maybe say that Quing is the slightly bigger lead, mostly because the film continues still for a little while after his wife's death and it is not 100% clear, but seems as if the film ends with his own death then.
I think it was a very touching film. The sweetest moments are between the couple when we see how they take care of one another. There are so many examples. Most come from the wife to her husband. Look how she, when her health has gotten worse already, still rather wants her husband to eat than do it herself. She was really self-sacrificing. Or how she is always so worried when he donates blood. There are many other moments that serve as examples. You will recognize them when you see then. She is the epitome of a caring spouse. He also helps as much as she can in terms of physical labor when the two are building a house. There is this one escalation scene though from the husband's side when he is just really fed up that she does not get anything done really with the haystacks. This was a heartbreaking scene how he barks at her there then and you can see how hurt she is because of his words. The donkey insult must have been especially humiliating for her because she said at an earlier point that she was treated worse than the donkey. I think, if I saw it correctly, we also see herself pee in her pants in this scene again, which was the result of an illness she was having. Other than that, the husband was really caring and loyal to his wife too. He just seems to have moments of anger here and there where he cannot control himself, like when he sees hos his neighbor's wife is able to help her husband and his own wife is of no help really. Or take the scene with the donkey of course when he leaves the animal behind or at least tries to do so. Still, there are also really sweet moments like the way he says goodbye to her that is a reference to other moments of trust and security between the two. And after his brief meltdown, he also realizes immediately that he overreacted and comforts his wife again and quickly the issues are solved and they are getting along well again.
The most memorable aspect from this film is surely the humiliation though that the two have to endure. It already starts when their relatives basically decide that they have to get married. This was a very humiliating scene how they talk about the characters and they can here these disrespectful words the others are saying. But maybe it was really this outcast status that helped them in staying together in harmony for the most part. I mean just look at the moment when these people sitting there say (or, to be precise, one woman says so) that the man takes really good care of his wife and that the two are much closer than most others. But there is also tragedy to these people sitting there because absolutely nobody does anything when the female protagonist struggled with her health and falls into the water. All they do is inform the man when he comes by and he heads to get her out of the water, but she is gone already. You could wonder at the very end with how long he looks at her photo if he just wants to be united with her again. My guess was really that he did die in the house then when it is once again torn down and the people who do so outside do not even check if somebody is still inside. Torn down houses bring money and that is all they care about. Money is a big aspect in this film too. The male main character has a certain blood type that is needed to save another character whose money is really helping most villagers there, so they literally drain the protagonist's blood to get their money, but they do not act as if he was helping them. He still has to pay normal prices for everything etc. Instead, they say that the one whose life is saved this way is the one who should really thank him. They offer the protagonist cigarettes when they come to his house to tell him he has to leave his home, so basically want to hurt his health in a way and think they are doing him good when this cigarette turns him into a peer of their own for a brief moment. He on the other hand offers them to come inside into his house, but they all refuse as the clearly do not want to be associated too much with the couple at the center of the story because it could hurt their reputation.
Further discrimination ensues, a great deal of it also coming from their family members who act as if they were doing them a favor. It already could not have been any more absurd than one character telling them to leave the house because tearing down empty houses brings him money from the government. I mean the two lived there and thus it was not even an empty house at all, let alone that they won't be getting the money either. Not one coin. If there is any aspect here where you could blame the protagonist(s), then that he/they never said no and just let it all happen with him/them. Let the others have their way. But often, they also simply could not have done anything. I want to mention two examples of this helplessness linked to the wife: They put a great amount of food there at the table and she can eat, but the moment the man goes to donate blood and has agreed, another (unlikable) woman says that she can eat, but not too much. They have reached their goal to have him donate, now they must be held small again. The second moment was among the most touching for me, namely when the female protagonist is about to get in contact with a child who is playing and the child's mother upon seeing this makes sure the child gets away and says something like it should not play with dirt. So humiliating. Another example linked to the man again was the scene how he is paid towards the end a specific sum and I don't know the exact amount anymore, but it was slightly under a specific number like 400 or so, but to make things clean, the one who pays the protagonist rounds down instead to a number that is not a round lot at all. Difficult to explain in a foreign language, but you know what I mean when you watch it. Or at least I hope so. I felt many during my screening did not grasp this, but anyway, it was one of the most humiliating (money) moments of the film. As I said earlier, money is always a factor and the two protagonists should not get too much of it from others. Even when they are given jackets, it is always with something in mind that sooner rather than later they would have to do something in exchange for what they were given. So the international title of the film here is very fitting, no matter if we are talking about what happens to the house or what happens to the protagonists in the end.
Before I get to the end of my review, I still would like to mention the scene when the couple is in that apartment and realizes it is not to their liking at all and they simply do not belong there. This was a haunting moments, like they (especially the man) felt so utterly out of place there, especially when he starts talking about his animals. Really nice depiction. This film here is really everything that the overrated "Decision to Leave" was not in 2022 if we are looking Asian films that featured a romantically-involved man and woman at the center of the story. Finally, 2022 is also a bit the year of the donkey if we look at Banshees, EO and now this movie, even if the latter did not get in at the 2023 Oscars. 2024 then maybe? We will see, probably doubtful. But it does not matter. With or without attention from the Academy, this is a marvelous movie. Yes it is very depressing fur sure, but I could not be happier that I went and saw it and aside from all the humiliation happening in here, we should never forget about the beautiful love story at the center of it, something that many (smaller characters from the) will never find. You see it often with movies that they include hopelessness towards the end and fix that then unrealistically with a rushed-in happy ending, but here it is rather the opposite because there is this uplifting moment when the man tells his wife that he will take her to the city and help her have surgery and get her a television and she is happy about these words, especially about seeing the city, but all this was not meant to be. I will end the review here then and give Return to Dust a big thumbs-up and enthusiastically positive recommendation. This is a film you don't want to miss if you are in the mood for character and story depth. Highly recommended.
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