Up the Yangtze (2007) User Reviews

A good documentary, though not a masterpiece

[ron-chow · 8/10 · 3 July 2008]

I finally watched this film during its third run at a local art-house cinema, having missed it on two previous occasions. I enjoyed the film, but at the same time felt it could have been done better. The knitting could have been tighter.

Ten years ago I took a boat trip up the Yangtze, starting from ChongQing. No, I was not on a 5-star cruiser depicted in this film. My boat was much more modest, and smaller. At night I could hear rats racing across the ceiling. But it was, nevertheless, an enjoyable trip. The water level was much lower at that time, so the cliff faces were higher and more impressive. What I once saw is now mostly submerged, as was chronicled in this film. Taking this trip 'Up the Yangtze' again on the big screen sure brought back fond memories.

Overall I find the focus on the demise of a poor family affected by the rising water level, and the activities surrounding large cruise ships catering to well-off visitors from around the world to be a good and relevant backdrop to this informative documentary. The acting and interviews were well conducted, with unforced ease and human sentiment. At the end, you draw your own conclusion who to sympathize with, whether you want to point fingers at the establishment, or just resign to the fact that progress toward modernization, in any country, comes with a price.

As the end credits rolled on the screen, a band played 'To traverse a big sea you need a good navigator', a song composed and forced into the ears of every Chinese national during the Culteral Revolution - in praise of Mao, the 'Navigator'. It was a great propaganda song but the band, using inappropriate instruments, made a mess of it and it sounded like white noise. I don't know why the director did not chose the far more superior 'choir' version, which would have been more becoming to close out a good documentary. This is just one example of how some fine-tuning and refinements could have brought this film one step closer to being a masterpiece.

Sent up the river by Chinese capitalism

[Chris Knipp · 8/10 · 5 June 2008]

Canadian filmmaker Yung Chang's National Film Board of Canada-sponsored documentary about the displacement of the Yangtze river and the population surrounding it by the Three Gorges Dam in China creates a vivid picture of people and transitions. But it's got a tough act to follow in the films of Jia Zhang-ke, whose recent 'Still Life' goes over similar ground in a style that feels at once more sweeping and more intimate.

Chang mainly alternates between a big "luxury cruise" boat that takes North Americans and Europeans to see the river landscape before flooding changes everything, and a poor family living in an improvised riverside shack that's shabby but is in a place where there is land they can cultivate for food. In the course of the film, the family is moved up to temporary housing where they have to buy food and water and their sixteen-year-old daughter, who wanted to continue beyond middle school, struggles and makes her way up from dishwasher to dining room help on the boat. Meanwhile Chang also follows another new boat worker called "Jerry" (Chen Bu Yu) who washes out after his trial period despite being handsome and a good singer. He is accused by his supervisor of being over-confident, egotistical, and careless of others, which some Chinese think is a common byproduct of one-child families.

'Up the Yangtze' is skillfully edited by Hannele Halm to underline social contrasts . It moves seamlessly back and forth between "Cindy" (as the subsistence farmer's daughter, Shui Yu, is called for her boat job) and her family's shack. We see "Jerry" boasting, drinking and swearing at a Karaoke bar before beginning his boat job. He interacts smoothly with a couple of young European men while bartending on the boat, and performs a Chinese song for an assembled audience of the tourists on board. The workers' supervisor, "Campbell" (Ping He) gives them lots of instructions.

Symbolically, Chang's extensive coverage of life on the cruise boat among the young workers and their supervisors, who teach them how to tell tourists what they want to hear and not bring up controversial subjects, is a vision of China's desire to make nice with the western world on its upward path to being one of the leading nations. At the same time, this cruise boat story seems somehow peripheral to general Chinese life. Jia's 'Still Life,' with its haunting fiction of several different lives disrupted by the Three Gorges project, gives a more vivid sense of the turmoil and unpredictability of contemporary China and more specific detail about the shifting interface between people and the dam's ongoing displacements. The cruise boat story in 'Up the Yangtze' has its richer counterpoint in Jia's previous film, 'The World,' and he presented a portrait of several decades of contemporary Chinese history in his second feature film, the 2000 'Platform.' In 'Unknown Pleasures' (2002), Jia dramatized the marginal lives of semi-educated young people (like Cindy) who are caught in the swirl of transformation of the rural into the urban in China's vast economic cauldron.

But Chang seems to have had excellent access to each of the worlds he chooses to focus on, and particularly to the sense of humiliation and grief some people feel in the course of things. This includes Cindy, before she leaves home; a shopkeeper who was brutally relocated; and Jerry when he begins to realize that his coworkers don't like him because he's not a team player. Chang was able to film Cindy's parents explaining why they can't send her on to further schooling, and their humble visit to the boat after she's been working there a while. Jerry seems to have characteristics that would serve him well in a western setting or a school. But though he comes from a richer family than Cindy, such opportunities are unreachable even at nineteen, and when he's banished from the river boat job, one wonders if he may end up like the young lost souls in Jia's 'Unknown Pleasures,' who face jail or worse.

In 'Still Life' it's clear that people at all levels are being churned around in China, and since English is Chang's first language, it's quite possible "Up the Yangtze" is meant to evoke the words "up the river." It seems that the only value that survives is the intense desire to work and no one can really see the big picture, even though they may supervise the construction of big bridges or buildings. The recent earthquake in China is a new demonstration that planning and construction are often faulty. Since Chang's film is a documentary, you may wonder why nobody is asked whether there wouldn't have been an alternative to the giant dam with its disruption of a vast eco-system and displacement of two million people and counting. But nobody does, and Chang's access doesn't mean he could talk to policy-makers, or even mid-level bureaucrats. Like many documentarians, he has worked very well with the material that came his way. He also refers to his own family stories and trips to the area of the river--this isn't his first. The film has a strong but not obtrusive soundtrack by Olivier Alary; the cinematography of Wang Shi Qing is often striking. Jia's 'Still Life' remains a hard act to follow.

Shown at Sundance, Seattle, San Francisco and other festivals, currently (June 2008) in US release in 6 theaters.

Unmoved

[rgcustomer · 6/10 · 19 June 2008]

Perhaps I am the dam, as I was unmoved by this film. The promotional material I received prior to the showing of the film had prepared me to see a story about a huge dam project, with serious environmental and human consequences. So I was disappointed that the dam itself was not a major feature of the film, and no environmental issues were raised. But I can't really fault the film itself for the people who promote it, so I'll try to leave that aside. I was impressed with the access that the filmmakers had to get frank comments from a variety of people in the film, and for me that was something new that I enjoyed for a film from China. But still I found it to be a slow film of two kids who are sent by their families to work serving foreign tourists on a river tour boat, and the difficulties that first-time jobs, especially away from home, can bring to anyone. It was also about a very poor family having to move from their shack to a more densely-populated place where they will need to learn a different way of living. In both cases, I found that I was admiring people's ability to find ways to move forward, but I felt that the movie wanted me to believe that this was bad. Some scenes appeared to be included randomly, as they did not fit in with the rest of the film, such as the creepy stop-motion dancing kid, or the praying woman. On the flip side, the story of the two kids working on the boat seems to just stop without explanation after something significant happens to one. I wanted to know more about what happened to each of them. That it was in China, or on the Yangtze, seemed insignificant to the story itself. I don't feel that I know much more about life on the Yangtze, or the Three Gorges Dam, than before I saw the film. Seeing that a documentary of this type can be made in China, I feel this subject is therefore still ripe for someone else to make a more informative documentary about the Yangtze and/or the Dam.

Highly recommended

[wandering-star · 9/10 · 30 May 2008]

"Up the Yangtze" is a documentary which is at its heart, about a poor Chinese family and the impact the Three Gorges Dam project is having on their lives. In a broader sense it is about a rapidly changing China and the huge disparity in rich & poor that exists there.

The Three Gorges Dam is a colossal hydroelectric project. The hydro plant on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, "wonder of the world", generates 2,300 MW of electricity. The Three Gorges project will be 26,000 MW, a dam two km wide, and when complete will displace 2 million people and empty about 9 large cities.

One such displaced family is featured in the film. The daughter of the family goes to work on a cruise ship on the Yangtze which caters to rich Westerners. The story is told from the point of view of the daughter, and various people we meet along the trip.

The film made me laugh, and cry a couple of times too. (Which was embarrassing because I watched it on an Air Canada flight to Vancouver) If you want to get a little window on what is going on in China right now, the corruption of officials, the disparity between rich and poor, the treatment of peasants by the government, beyond the newspaper headlines, then this film is for you.

Chinese cinematic masterpiece

[wangyimin999 · 10/10 · 3 March 2008]

This cinema masterpiece is experience of Chinese not westerner story. I hope you will go to take in this experience and learn more about middle kingdom. This movie is fair and shows piece of Chinese life. Do not miss this masterpiece. It made me laugh it made me cry. It made me think about my homeland.

this is from variety Asia online: "If the title "Up the Yangtze!" suggests "up a creek!," it's no coincidence. China's Three Gorges Dam is considered by many experts to be a full-steam-ahead eco-disaster, but helmer Yung Chang's gorgeous meditation is more concerned with the project's collateral human damage: old farmers evicted, young people in servitude to Western tourists, all brought about by an endeavor whose collective weight may ultimately tilt the Earth's axis. A gloriously cinematic doc of epic, poetic sadness, "Yangtze" should be a hit on the specialized circuit and could break out, thanks to its embrace of irony rather than righteous indignation."

i think this review is right. i'm very happy for this film and i think, as a Chinese, it is important to see all of the sides of our story. that way we can grow to learn to be better.

No big statement, just basic realism to very strong effect.

[SteveSkafte · 7/10 · 23 November 2008]

For such a slow paced documentary, you might at first doubt it's ability to draw you in. Initially, I watched the film because I somehow expected it to be one man's journey into the depths of China. But, no, it's not really about that. Instead of diving into China as a geographical location, "Up the Yangtze" concerns itself with the culture and politics of modern China as it affects the average citizen.

Two characters are central to this documentary's narrative. 'Cindy' who lives with her family in a shack beside the rapidly rising river, and 'Jerry' who comes from a higher standard of life in the city. They both find themselves working on a cruise ship which goes up and down the Yangtze river. The passages which deal directly with the ship and ship's passengers are rather revealing. The tourists come off largely as self-absorbed and unimaginative people with far too much money. They seem to all share peculiarly uninterested attitudes. This comes in rather stark contrast to the locals' acute awareness of their situation.

There are several interviews throughout the course of the film that reveal a darker side than might first be visible. This is particularly poignant during an interview carried on with a shopkeeper while a heated argument goes on outside.

Certain limitations are apparent in such a focused documentary, but it's very interesting and more than worth your attention.

RATING: 7.0 out of 10

A fascinating documentary about modern China that's both sad and funny

[albertrchen · 10/10 · 12 February 2008]

The biggest fear with documentaries is that they got bogged down in the boring details that don't do enough to tell a story. This film, however, is always intriguing because although it tackles a large issue, the impact the flooding of the Yangtze river valley that displaced millions of residents, it does it through the very human story of one family. There are some nice panoramic shots, and interlaced among the genuinely touching moments was a wry humour. It's a great film for those who want to see a portrait of the lives of contemporary Chinese in transition, and for those who want to see the aspirations of China, and the challenges that it faces.

Twain And Dylan Would Be Proud

[djdavig · 7 August 2008]

Mr. Chang and crew took me on an unforgettable journey down the foggy ruins of time......and then it hit me. Mark Twain, the River King, would be very proud.

The timing of the Olympics peaked my interest in this magical and misty movie. I whistled, I wept, on the edge of my seat I sat laughing.

I cannot do it justice with a full review but instead will quote here maybe the greatest lyrics ever written about change, memory, sorrow, and finally, hope.

Chang is the Tambourine Man for China in this most critical moment in their modern times. This is merely the end of the beginning. Bravo! Encore!!

"Then take me disappearing' through the smoke rings of my mind down the foggy ruins of time,

far past the frozen leaves, the haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach,

far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow.

Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,

silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,

with all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,

let me forget about today until tomorrow.

Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to Hey ! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me In the jingle jangle morning I'll come following' you." - Dylan

Nicely done narrative about a poor family -- the rest is backdrop

[sioenroux · 7/10 · 14 September 2008]

Don't think that at the end of this film, you will understand the complexities of industrialization and modernization of China. Don't think it will lay out for you the ways in which trade and capitalism exploit (or help, depending on your view) the world's poor.

This film isn't that story. Instead, what we get here is a beautifully drawn and complicated portrait of one poor family, and their ambiguous relationship with the Three Gorges Dam project.

I would argue that the opening quote is very telling -- Confucius offering the three different ways of learning wisdom -- as the film then shows you that the Chinese people are apparently going to have to learn about the wisdom or not of modernization (at the expense of fulfillment and connection to nature) for themselves, rather than reaping the benefits of others' experience.

But that's my take on it, based on my value judgments as a person. The joy in this movie is that you can decide how the Confucius quote applies for yourself. The story isn't simple, and the filmmaker doesn't hit you over the head with some narrowly tailored point. Instead, it shows that the real world is interwoven in ways that don't always make easy moral judgments.

And ultimately, this is a movie about a family. It's a human narrative, and all the other themes are simply woven in as a beautiful backdrop.

perfect movie-making

[anuragr · 9/10 · 28 April 2008]

I would consider this to be a perfect documentary for its technique and narration.

The movie's account of the massive three-gorges project is quite detailed. But without letting viewers loose attention to its subject, the movie takes us through the history of China, the paradoxes of its "modern" path of development and even the myths and goddesses associated with the river. The movie aptly exposes and questions the "tourist" nature of our own interests in the vast orient unveiled to us. The satire in the film (which may not be all non-fictional) is sharp and quite funny. Overall, the story telling is so fluid that it may feel to be a fictional account altogether.

Like any other documentary this is a movie replete with the accounts of lives of the people associated with the project. However this movie accomplishes much more by reevaluating our own ideas of economic development; by showing us the two sides of it – fulfillment of a dream of progress and loss of an environment that constitutes the being.

Lastly, owing not just to the country of landscapic beauty that china is, there are some captivating shots in the movie that stay in memory long after the movie is over.

Even the cats go Mao

[juliankennedy23 · 7/10 · 6 December 2018]

Up the Yangtze: 7 out of 10: Yung Chang's documentary follows two young people who get a job on a tourist boat as the water in their province rises due to the completion of the massive Three Gorges Dam.

Some documentaries sneak up on both a person and a filmmaker. I don't know exactly what type of film Yung Chang set out to make when he went to China during the completion of the Three Gorges Dam but he wisely tossed the script for an intimate portrait into an illiterate dirt poor family scratching a living on the soon to disappear banks of the river.

Relatable is the surprising keyword I have for this film. Many of us remember our first jobs away from home and many will find both the overconfidence of the male singer and the shyness and attitude of the sixteen-year-old female dishwasher extremely familiar in others and in possibly themselves. Many of us, with great shame, may also relate to the clueless tourists aboard in their oversized Western glory. (In all fairness I have seen Chinese tour groups in Orlando trying to queue and that would make quite the documentary as well)

If you are actually looking for a film about the Three Gorges Dam and the social, economic and environmental toll it has taken I have a feeling you may go away disappointed. This is a rather intimate story about a poor family with some additional commentary on another young man and occasional trips with the tourists on the boat.

Up the Yangtze is a wonderful visit with some young people starting out in life with all the overconfidence and fears that entails mixed with a turbulent time. It is also a very perceptive film willing to take a bite out of both over the top Chinese propaganda and plump elderly western tourists. I enjoyed my brief visit to this world.

An extraordinary film, not to be seen prior to taking the cruise

[lh-cooper-1 · 9/10 · 6 July 2008]

I was part of a tour grip visiting China a year ago last May. Part of the itinerary was the Yangtze river cruise. Had I seen this film prior to my trip, I doubt I would have been able to handle the cruise. It's one thing to know intellectually about how many people are being displaced by the project. It's altogether different - and gut wrenching - to witness the impact on one family.

Because I was so intensely affected by the film, it's impossible for me to avoid some spoilers.

Although it starts out slowly, this is a really powerful film that had me in tears by the end. The juxtaposition of the travelers and crew in an overly elegant setting against the farmer and his family and their humble home on the river was a perfect balance. The score is well suited to the different settings, especially near the end, as the family's home and land sink slowly but inexorably under the waters of the Yangtze. You're left imagining what the young girl from the family will be able to do with her life beyond sending her savings from the cruise ship home to enable her parents and family to eat. And this magnificent project, still underway, will produce a grand total of 2 to 3% of the country's energy needs at the expense of millions of displaced Chinese who are in the way of "progress."

Not nearly as good as everyone has said

[david-1843 · 2/10 · 18 August 2008]

Everybody thinks that, armed with a camera, they can make a film. I thought that the subject matter contained in this particular effort was enough for a 10 minute news special; yet the themes were much more profound. Where was the focus of this film? Was it the dam? Was it the loss of the beautiful gorges of the Yangtze? Was it the seedy exploitation of the Westerners wanting to see the real China? Hard to say. Many shots were condescending and insulting to the protagonists involved, and smacked of immaturity and amateurism. I would have to say that these moments made me hate this film. Audience manipulation par excellence. They could have made a wonderful film with all the material they had but seemed to lack the necessary sensibility. Strange, as I gather the filmmaker has Chinese roots. You would have thought that a greater love of the director's homeland would be in evidence! The audience of my art-house cinema left unmoved. It wasn't just me.

A Telling Documentary

[ackthpt · 9/10 · 20 July 2008]

Sorry if you were looking for Wall-E or something else 'feel good', this is a documentary focusing on two young people at the center of change in China. The Three Gorges Dam, at the time of filming was beginning to flood areas where about 2 million people were being displaced, as we are told, for the good of the country, which appears a phrase parroted enough in the belief it will come true.

'Jerry' is a Have, while 'Cindy' is a 'have not.' Both seek employment on a cruise ship for western tourists. Little is told of Jerry's family, which is apparently better off than Cindy's, which the film focuses on. Cindy's family are poor farmers who are doing fairly well, but know everything will change when their home and fields will be flooded. The hardship of change is clear and Cindy works hard to help support her family. Jerry doesn't show the same work ethic, which leaves the viewer to draw their own conclusion of traditional vs. modern values.

Quite a lot of detail on modern China is available to the viewer, including frequent complaints of corruption. I was moved considerably by the contrasts and the snips of history, which show not all have prospered in modern China, though there is again parroted belief that anyone can succeed. It was also a bit surprising to see in China High School education is not a given for everyone.

I found this to be a very informative and well done documentary and highly recommend it to anyone wishing to see the changes and impact of this dubious national project.

More than this

[fablesofthereconstru-1 · 9/10 · 25 June 2008]

Don't ask an affluent person to offer their opinion about matters that concern the disadvantaged. Without having the breadth of their degraded experiences, without meaning to, the proffered observations by the socialite, the privileged, or in the case relating to the relocated victims of Hurricane Katrina; Barbara Bush- famously quoted for having said that the displaced New Orleans families would benefit by a change of scenery- may amuse, outrage, or sadden those who had to make do without a silver spoon throughout their quotidian lives.

In "Up the Yangtze", a tour guide shows a bus load of Americans the living arrangements that the government is providing for the victims of a man-made flood created by the Three Gorges Dam. Judging by the lilt in the woman's voice and corresponding enthusiasm from the tour group, you can tell that a formed consensus among the well-attired men and women about the future prospects for these Chinese river dwellers. Like the former-First Lady, they readily assume that the loss of their homes and culture will turn out to be an unexpected blessing.

"Up the Yangtze" follows two service industry workers: one, a thirteen-year-old girl from one of those "lucky" rural families, and the other, a self-centered older boy from the city, as they learn how to interact with English-speaking tourists on a ship that traverses up and down the famous Yangtze River. The boy will be fine(he's a cocky son-of-a-bitch), we sense, but the fate of the girl is another matter. Denied the opportunity to further her comprehensive studies, the sheltered girl leaves home because her illiterate parents need the extra income to support their new lifestyle, one that isn't centered around sustenance farming, we suspect. The peasant couple also have two smaller children. Although the exposure to new people and places are beneficial to "Cindy", the central image of "Up the Yangtze" foretells her potentially dire future. The ship moves forward, but the ship always retraces its progress; the ship is going nowhere. When a co-worker takes the girl shopping for clothes that's more suitable to city life, and introduces her to make-up, we see a possible future in store for this uneducated young woman should she ever tire of washing dishes and making beds.

Turtle rises again

[doctorsmoothlove · 8/10 · 30 March 2009]

The Three Gorges Dam is one of the most impressive architectural projects of this decade. I've never been to China, so I've been forced to appeal to various Western resources about it. All sorts of environmentalist critiques are available, even from such mundane places as youtube. Those of that viewpoint lament the loss of habit for the Chinese river dolphin and other typical claims. This view doesn't require much thoughtfulness to reach and ignores China's economic struggle for modernization. The libertarian viewpoint harshly condemns forced relocation of millions of peasants. I find the latter an issue irrelevant to those living in community-centric China. The business manager (of my university organization) is a Chinese citizen and once told me that her people "conform," for lack of a better word, to what others expect of them. She cannot wear a tank top in public because everyone will stare questioningly at her. So, from her stories, and my own off and on research, I wanted to learn about Chinese citizens' reaction to Three Gorges Dam. I didn't think it would bother people in the way Westerners claim. I never expected to find such an illuminating answer so quickly. It's like how I felt the first time I watched Batman Begins.

Most residents, by the time Up the Yangtze was filmed, had already relocated. The project was completed October 30, 2008, so no one still lives along riverside like previously. Director Yung Chang, also narrator, tells us how he realized a while ago that old China is dead. What people see in their mind's eye, as they board river cruise boats, is China as depicted in Hong Kong martial arts movies and wuxia pictures. The Yangtze project is complete and China is modernizing. You can still travel luxuriously; getting service from young people like those shown in this movie, but you won't see what you want. China itself isn't sure of its future. One man interviewed says that he isn't sure if China is capitalist or communist now. As long as society progresses forward, its path is unimportant. A black cat or a white cat is fine, as long as it can kill mice.

Most of the story follows a single impoverished family who lives in a hut beside Yangtze. They send their daughter to wait tables on a tour boat. Yu Shui doesn't adjust well to her new robotic life as maid. Other children don't either. Middle class kids are on board to advance themselves, while Yu Shui is on board to survive. Mr. Chang suggests that China's one child policy permits parents to mollify their male children. While what we see indicates this, I found similar effect in young women. While they were harder workers, they were more withdrawn. Everyone on that boat has to be from a small family, so they're sense of family community must be incredibly strong. Perhaps China's one child policy may have larger negative effect on human capital than it has positive environmental impact.

When we aren't on deck, Chang shows us various clips of Chinese urbanization. Government officials show dumb Westerners new housing projects, built to accommodate relocated persons, and acknowledge that everyone residing there is "happy." Of course people are happy; they are still alive. Chang's documentary can be summarized by my preceding statement. It's like The Grapes of Wrath or Doctor Zhivago. The characters in both those books (and films) experience tremendous hardship. When your family is tossed around, all you care about is keeping it intact. Chang does show us that older, single people do feel nostalgic regret at having to leave their ancestral homes. Even then, they aren't rallying against their government.

Up the Yangtze is too limited to be the authoritative "Three Gorges Dam" documentary. By following Yu Shui's family, Chang shows us what we could probably have deduced from reading an amateur film review. I hope his next project will be more inclusive of all people affected by "an issue." A documentary about middle class people living in Shanghai would be unique but not inspiring.

slice of life

[SnoopyStyle · 8/10 · 16 August 2016]

Chinese Canadian filmmaker Yung Chang joins a cruise up the Yangtze River carrying Canadian tourists. The river settlements are set to be flooded by The Three Gorges Dam. The tour shows the orderly move but the film also shows some of the locals struggling. Along with the ghost cities, the Yu family is about to be flooded from the river shore where they squeeze out a living growing food. The daughter Yu Shui wants to continue her education but the family has no money. She gets a job on the cruise and given the English name Cindy. She suffers home sickness. Another new worker Chen Bo Yu is given the name Jerry. He's a higher placed peasant who sees the cruise as a cash cow. The two new workers strike different paths culminating in a surprise ending.

This is a nice slice of life. The best thing that a documentary like this can do is to bring a different world to the audience. It shows our common humanity while keeping the individual personal stories. The two young people are very compelling and their changing world is fascinating. This is a movie at a personal level against a backdrop of an important time of change in China.

A Nutshell Review: Up the Yangtze

[DICK STEEL · 8/10 · 20 February 2010]

I had initially thought that I would be watching a National Geographic film about the Yangtze river and the Three Gorges Dam project, and the introductory scene of the film suggested just that, until it dawned upon me that the subject matter goes beyond the mighty river and the world's largest hydroelectric project, and follows something more intimate, that of how a decision made by the powers that be translated to the relative hardship of people directly impacted by that decision.

Any layman would know that with a dam means the rising of waters behind it from accumulation, and the damming of any large river spells disaster for the village and townsfolk which have settled along its banks. 2012 suggested that only China had the means and resources to build those arks in record time, and undoubtedly such a reference holds true in their attempts to relocate millions of people and settlements along the Yangtze, to the detriment of the poor being uprooted from their livelihood, and into the great unknown.

Curiously, with such a massive landscape change, and the inevitable prospect of having everything today buried 175 meters deep under water, it gives rise to opportune river tours aboard luxury cruise ships, and here's where the documentary embarks upon its examination of two main characters, the village girl Cindy, and the arrogant Jerry, both of whom work aboard such a cruise ship, pandering to the whims and entertaining the tourists, most of whom are foreigners wanting to catch a glimpse of a certain aspect of China through the riding down the signature river.

Through the eyes of Cindy and Jerry, the film provides a look at how change has impacted the lives, dreams and hopes of its people, which a funny anecdote told in the film seem to sum it all up pretty nicely, where the road to Capitalism is followed wit the signal light toward Socialism turned on. This cannot be more keenly felt through Jerry, whose arrogance of youth spells his primary dream in life, and that's to make a lot of money, in stark contrast to another group of folks represented by Cindy, the village people who are yearning for the simpler life, but are always getting the shorter end of the stick due the inability to break out of the poverty cycle, made worst now with massive migration programmes that forces them to adapt.

Granted there are enough scenic shots to wow you, and even astonish, such as the "ghost" towns created when the community had to abandon to avoid the eventual flood waters from enveloping its surroundings. I can imagine Atlantis in a smaller scale, brought about by the slow and unavoidable build up of water volume. This is not just a documentary on the river or the dam, but more importantly about the people and how change had been forced unto them. Recommended!

Preposterous, Seemingly Dishonest And Ludicrous Upon Reflection (but great visuals)

[Michael-70 · 3/10 · 11 September 2008]

I was very puzzled by Up The Yangtze and upon reflection; I must admit that I don't like this film. It feels dishonest and seems to be nothing more than a wishy-washy environmentalist's nightmare showing poor people being displaced by the construction of the Three Gorges Dam in China.

The film simply wallows in an atmosphere of negativity about this massive dam project and the people who will be affected by it. I'm all about saving the planet, but does that mean there should NEVER be any kind of large construction project anywhere?

I have been accused of being callous before and I expect I will be again, but I found it hard to feel sorry for the family about to be displaced in Up The Yangtze.

The father is this mopey peasant who sits by helplessly while his shack, with dirt floors, no running water and a wood-burning stove slowly gets inundated by the rising waters from the dam.

Excuse me; Three Gorges Dam began construction in 1994, it is now 2008. This peasant has had 14 years to consider moving and now, just as the water begins lapping around his shack does he suddenly come to the conclusion he better leave?

Far from ignoring the plight of the people in the flood plain, in this man's case, the Chinese government moves him and his family to a nearby apartment with floors, electricity and modern marvels like flush toilets and indoor plumbing.

And I'm supposed to feel sorry he lost his primitive shack?

Up The Yangtze takes the position that the Three Gorges Dam is an ecological nightmare and will only serve to displace poor people and there is truth in this. But any large construction project displaces people; consider the Hoover Dam here in the USA. A person can argue that the growth of Los Angeles and Las Vegas were not improvements, but I would disagree.

In my own city of Philadelphia, lots of ramshackle slums and poor people were moved to build the Ben Franklin Parkway which led to the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art where Rocky Balboa eventually jogged to the top of. You have to admit, sunrise on the open Philadelphia skyline is a better visual than poor crowded tenement buildings and slums.

I was also confused by the formal aspects of Up The Yangtze. It seems to be the opposite of a "mockumentary". A "mockumentary" uses documentary techniques to tell a fictional story. Up The Yangtze seems to uses dramatic narrative techniques to tell a realistic story and it is very disconcerting.

Up The Yangtze does this by focusing on two young people who get jobs on a riverboat that takes tourists (mostly Westerners) on sightseeing trips up and down the Yangtze. They are Jerry, a likable 19-year-old boy from a nearby city and Cindy, who is the daughter of the dipstick peasant who is awaiting the slow inundation of his shack.

Genial, good looking and whip smart, Jerry is a most attractive and energetic person, but Up The Yangtze ultimately turns this hard working kid into the villain of the film because he DARES to hustle at work and provides extra good service for tips.

Jerry quickly learns that he can make more in tips in one day than his grandfather could earn in a month. And we're supposed to dislike him because he is capitalizing on his youth, good looks and charm? I wish him all the success!

The film seems to want us to root for Cindy, the wish-washy, peasant girl who breaks down crying every five minutes because she misses the dirt floor of the shack she has left to work on this riverboat.

Let me see if I understand Up The Yangtze's attitude toward these two young people correctly. Jerry is good looking, neat, self-confident, hard working, speaks English, loves to meet new people, is extraordinarily friendly and thrives in his job as combination porter, waiter, bartender and entertainer.

But, because one cheapskate, old-biddy from the USA accuses him of "expecting" a tip, he gets fired. For the record, Jerry denies the charge and seeing how he handles other passengers, he may be a bit over-friendly, but that is certainly not uncommon in the service industry.

But looking at the arrogant, Western jerks that populate the cruise ship, I tend to believe he's innocent of the charge. It's not his fault if dumb-ass Westerners feel obligated to give him money to assuage their own guilt.

So poor Jerry finds himself in the unenviable position of being too self-confident for his Chinese bosses, but not subservient enough for his Western guests.

On the other hand, little Cindy gets to keep her job in the kitchen of the riverboat even though she is an annoying little wimp who cries every five minutes because she is so far away from her mopey father who is back home waiting for the water to rise and drown his shack.

Maybe it's me, but promoting the weak subservient Chinese girl as an ideal is all wrong. Showing the mopey Chinese peasant waiting for the water to drown him while wearing the blank look of a dumb "coolie" from an old western is a portrayal of the Chinese people I find insulting and more than slightly racist.

Like it or not, things are changing in China. Their economy is going global and the people will have to make adjustments. But if they are going to clamp down on the dynamic "Jerry's" who want to succeed and encourage the wimpy "Cindy's", then it will be no surprise that the "Jerry's" will leave China and probably come to America where they will embody a hard work ethic that will make them prosper in fields of business that many Americans would consider beneath them.

And I say, Welcome!

Worthy of comparison to "Still Life"

[dongwangfu · 8/10 · 8 July 2009]

I just finished reading an excellent comment comparing this documentary to "Sanxia haoren" by Jia Zhangke, saying that this film has "a hard act to follow." This was a very insightful comment by someone who knows Jia's films very well, but something about it struck me as unfair, and I wanted to offer an alternative point of view.

Both "Up the Yangtze" and "Sanxia haoren" are terrific films, but they are fundamentally different kinds of film. I actually think the relatively unheralded "Up the Yangtze" is just as good as "Sanxia Haoren" on its own terms. The director filmed a number of people's stories over the time that the Three Gorges dam was raising the water level of the river, documenting the ensuing social dislocations. Using this "Spellbound" method, he singled out one and half narratives that turned out to be the most interesting, and the result succeeded both as social science and as an engaging and moving narrative.

Jia's project was to take two couples' stories and dramatize them against the same backdrop. The two movies share similar scenery and locations, but "Sanxia haoren" works off a screenplay, and while the look strives for verité, the drama builds on precedents that are non-documentary in nature.

An example of what I mean is when Cindy (in "Up the Yangtze") reacts to a decision by her parents by being a drama queen, the viewer reads it as a real person borrowing from a script from the realm of fiction. By contrast, the Shen Hong character (in "Sanxia haoren") is a dramatic one and she never leaves the realm of fiction -- the viewer accepts her as a "real person" only in the sense that we know that she is being presented to us as one by Jia, who likely imagined her as a variation on actress Tao Zhao's personality. It is not social science at all but fiction -- which is worthy in its own right, but something different from watching Cindy grow up.

Of course, documentaries are not entirely non-fiction, and documentarians influence their subjects in some of the ways that dramatists do, and in other ways that are entirely their own. But I think that to compare these two films as if they were both trying to do the same thing is not to do justice to "Up the Yangtze" -- a gem that deserves to be appreciated on its own terms.

A sobering glimpse at the "new" China.

[rshepard42796 · 8/10 · 2 July 2012]

Economic miracle or environmental disaster, the Three Gorges Dam in China has been the source of considerable debate. This movie ignores all of that and explores the social implications of the project. From the peasant farmer who wants to understand electricity but doesn't to the brash young capitalist giddy with new money from free-spending western tourists, the film poignantly documents the upheaval that has been going on in China over the last decade. One has to wonder how much change China can handle. The twenty-first century has been called the Chinese century as the twentieth century was the American century. However, as I write this there is a global recession that has even slowed Chinese growth. Yet there is concern that change is coming too quickly for China anyway. As always, time will tell. In the meantime we have this film to remind us of what is at stake.

a bit slow, more suitable for a middle aged audience

[arzewski · 4/10 · 5 September 2008]

Saw it after seeing the bill board of a spectacular image of row boats in a steep and narrow gorge, and thinking it was going to be a beautifully-landscaped documentary, was looking forward for it with great expectations. Turned out to be a dud: it was slow, with many almost-still images. On the other hand, it was interesting to see the personalities of the workers on the ship. But the scenes of the shack along the river, the carrying of furniture and belongings, and the river rising, were just to "classic" documentary style, and just too boring (leave those for public television). I guess, what I am trying to say, when making a documentary, think about addressing an audience of 17-year old. Put some jazzy stuff in it, move it a bit, make it more dynamic. Ironically, this documentary's audience, the mid-aged good-feeling fellas in their mid-50's, is the same population profile that fits the Canadian and American tourists to the boats as shown in the documentary. Maybe they should give copies of this documentary to the tourists...