The Shaft aka Dixia De Tiankong DVD (Global Film Initiative)
RELEASE DATE: November 22, 2011
… the stark melancholia achieves a rare authenticity, perhaps most pointedly manifested in the objective correlative of the mineshaft itself, the dismal bowels of which we only see in two brief and uneventful scenes. The family doesn’t abhor mining because it’s hazardous or arduous, but because it represents their only career option: It’s a Plutonian symbol of universal resignation… The intermittent genius of director Zhang Chi resides in how he juxtaposes this social claustrophobia with scenes of refreshing but elegiac liberation. –Slant Magazine Check out the trailer here.
