POSTMEN IN THE MOUNTAINS - Shadow Distribution

POSTMEN
IN THE
MOUNTAINS
Running time (90 Min.), "in Mandarin with English subtitles,"
Distributor Contact:
Publicist:
Ken Eisen
Sharon Kitchens
Shadow Distribution
SKpr, LLC.
P.O. Box 1246 P.O. Box 254
Waterville, ME 04903 Camden, ME 04843
ph (207) 872-5111 ph (207) 596.5686
fax (207) 872-5502 mobile (207) 542.3723
shadow@prexar.com
skpr@skpublicrelations.com
www.shadow distribution.com
http://www.prcmovie.com/postmen/
Best Film-Montreal World Film Festival
Audience Award-Maine International Film Festival
Best Pictures, Best Director, Best Actor-Golden Rooster Awards (China)
Best Foreign Film-Japanese Academy
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CREDITS
CREW
Director: Huo Jianqi
Screenplay: Si Wu
Based on a Short Story by Peng Jianming
Producers: Kang Jianmin, Han Sanping
Cinematography: Zhao Lei
Art: Song Jun
Music: Wang Xiaofeng
Advisors: Liu Liqing, Zheng Maoqing, Lin Mingtai, Ding Laiwen
Supervisors: Ouyang Changlin, Shi Jiuhui, Li Xiaogeng
Planning: Pan Yichen, Shi Dongming, Zhou Peixue
Executive Producer: Li Chunhua
CAST
Teng Lujan.......Father
Liu Ye....Son
Gong Yehong....Grandmother
Chen Hao....Dong Girl
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THE STORY
Father (Teng Rujun) has been a postman all his life. His job is to deliver mail to the remote
mountain areas of Hunan, China by foot. He is in his late 40s. But now, poor health is forcing him
to retire. He cannot trust anyone else but his son (Liu Ye) to take over the job. The morning
comes that Son is ready for his first trip as a postman. It's going to be a 3-day trip., 122
kilometers, as it always is. Father cannot rest easy, ans insists that heill come along, knowing the
importance of his job, and not quite able to give it up..
This is Son's first trip and Father's last. They have never taken a trip together.
The mountain paths are so familiar under Father's feet. However, walking them with his son
makes him feel strange. He has so much to say to him, but what comes out of his mouth is only
about the job. And Son doesn't even know how to address his own father properly. The word
"father" sounds so awkward to pronounce to him.
The trip is not as easy as Son thought it would be. Walking in the endless, nearly deserted zigzag
paths through the mountains, Son realizes how much Father has contributed to his work and the
people who depend on him to get messages to and from the outside world, and how much Mother
has given up to support the family. Father, in his eyes, is no longer as tall abd distant as he
remembers from his childhood. He's thin and common.
When they finally get to a creek for a short cut, Son insists that Father should never touch cold
water again. He wades across the creek with his father on his shoulders. The distance between
Father and Son evaoprates. For Father, it reminds him of how he used to carry Son at a time that
doesn't seem so long ago. At that moment, he knows he's getting old...
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FROM THE PRODUCER, KANG JIANMIN
Over ten years ago, after I'd read Mr. Peng Jianming's short story "That Mountain, That Man,
That Dog ", the idea to put the story onto the silver screen burgeoned. I was deeply touched by
the gentle love message conveyed through the writer's exquisite wording about those simple
people who live in mountains.
It's my luck to run across two of my bosom friends in Beijing, Ms. Si Wu and Mr. Huo Jianqi, the
scriptwriter and director of the film. They also wanted to make an artistic film out of the story,
which doesn't mean that we didn't have the concern about its commercial prospect in the current
immature film market in China. But, our passion and sense of responsibility as artists finally
cleared all the uncertainties and built up our confidence.
We started the shooting in the summer of 1997. It was hot, real hot. Everybody worked hard
regardless the little remuneration they'd got and nobody complained a thing about the poor
conditions in the remote mountain area in South Hunan. The whole shooting took us about over
one month.
Here I just want to say, without the hard work of the whole crew, we won't have this finely made
work of art released. For that, I really appreciate what they have done. Thank you all.
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CAST AND FILMMAKERS:
TENG RUJUN
Father
TENG RUJUN (Father), professor of the Central Drama Academy in Beijing. His career in the
film industry goes back to Zhang Yimou's "Red Sorghum (Hong Gaoliang)" in 1987. He also
starred in Huang Jianzhong's "Ambush (Mai Fu)" 1996. For his exquisite performance in
"Postmen in the Mountains", Teng won the Best Actor Award at the Golden Rooster Awards,
China.
LIU YE
Son
LIU YE (Son) made his film debut with "Postmen in the Mountains" while he was still an
undergraduate student at the Central Drama Academy in Beijing and has subsequently
experienced a distinguished and distinctive career. He last starred as a young literate during the
Cultural Revolution in Lv Le's love story "Years Without Epidemic (Meiren Cao)". He has
collaborated with some of the Chinese film industry's most respected directors and actors,
including Lou Ye and co-star Zhang Ziyi in "Purple Butterfly (Zi Hudie)" a nominee for the
Palme d'Or at the 56th Cannes International Film Festival 2003; Guan Jinpeng's "Lan Yu", a film
about love between men; Li Miaoxue's "Floating Landscape (Lian Zhi Fengjing)", a competition
film at the 60th La Biennale di Venezia (Venice International Film Festival) 2003.
With "Postmen in the Mountains", Liu Ye earned his first nominee of the Best Supporting Actor
Award at the Golden Rooster Awards China. In 2001, he won widespread acclaim for his bravura
performance in "Lan Yu", which earned him the youngest Best Actor Award in the history of the
Golden Horse Awards, Taiwan.
KANG JIANMIN
Producer
Former president of Xiaoxiang Film Studio, Changsha, Hunan Province. Now secretary general
and executive vice president of China Film Association.
Kang received his drama degree from the Central Drama Academy, Beijing. He has extensive
experience in writing scripts. Many lyrics in Xiaoxiang Film Studio's recent productions were
written by him.
Most recently, Kang Jianmin produced and directed the film "The Road to Anyuan (Mao Zedong
Qu Anyuan)" , which depicts how the young Chairman Mao organized the well-known miners'
strike back to the early 1920's to commemorate the 110th anniversary of the birth of Mao Zedong.
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HUO JIANQI
Director
As a popular Chinese saying goes, "Great minds mature slowly." Huo Jianqi showed his talent
for directing movies very late. The amateur burst onto the international scene in at the age of 40,
with the release of the impressive, heart-warming, small- budget production "Postman in the
Mountains (Nashan, Naren, Nagou). It is perhaps for that reason that Huo is frequently addressed
by many as a "young director," despite the fact that he is actually the peer of the country's famous
"fifth generation." In fact, many paramount fifth generation directors who are currently
dominating Chinese cinema, for example Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige, were his schoolmates
back in the late 1970s and early 1980s at the Beijing Film Academy.
In 1995, Huo made his directorial debut with "The Winner (Ying Jia)," which won several
critical awards in China. The play was written by his wife Qiu Shi, an MA graduate of Beijing
Normal University. "I was yearning to shoot my own movies, but I had no money to employ
playwrights, so I had to let her write them," Huo said. Following that, he made "The Singer (Ge
Shou)," "Postman in the Mountains ," "A Love of Blueness " and "Life Show (Shenghuo Xiu)."
The scripts of these movies were all written by Qiu Shi. All have at least one thing in common
they all focus on sincere relationships between people. Together, they establish a unique,
unaffected style with a minimum of the theatrical elements.
Huo strives to find answers to questions engendered during China's transition from a traditional
society into a modern, Western-style, hurried one. Huo's two latest works, "Life Show" and
"Nuan" continue this tradition. The former is about a divorced woman in her 30s who runs a
small restaurant in an old section of Wuhan in Central China's Hubei Province. The film offers a
glimpse into the confusing times of such transformation. "Nuan," which won the Tokyo Grand
Prix, the Governor of Tokyo Award, at the 16th Tokyo International Film Festival last
November, is about a young man who, after 10 years in the city, returns to his childhood village
where he reunites with his old love. All the movies convey sentiments that seem to arise from
deep inside the characters, overflowing to the surface -an effect that many Chinese directors fail
to achieve, and that has been viewed as Huo Jianqi's unique flavour.
SI WU
Screenwriter
Si Wu is the pen name of SU XIAOWEI, who is the best partner of director Huo Jianqi not only
in films, but also in life (They've been married for 17 years). Her works include "The Winner
(Ying Jia)" 1995 (winner of 2 awards at the Golden Rooster Awards China), "Life Show (Sheng
Huo Xiu)" 2002 (winner of 3 awards at the 6th Shanghai International Film Festival China),
"Nuan" 2003 (winner of the Golden Kylin Award-Best Feature Film Award at the 16th Tokyo
International Film Festival Japan).
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