Lou Ye’s compelling if controversial tale of politics and sex is built upon the exceptional performance by Hao Lei, who plays a disoriented university student torn between lust and love as the political consciousness of Chinese youths takes root.

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This film was notorious for getting Lou Ye banned from filmmaking for five years.  If it hadn’t also been withdrawn from the Cannes Film Festival, lead actress Hao Lei might have had a good shot at winning Best Actress. 

Here, she plays Yu Hong, a young woman who leaves her home village to start her university studies in Beijing.  Over there, she finds unbridled freedom, hooking up with several guys, including Zhou Wei, whose romantic liaison with her would consume both of them. 

Torn between lust and love, Yu Hong finds solace in the intense and regular sexual encounters, which Lou shows with somewhat exhibitionistic interest. 

“I want to live more and more intensely.”

Part of the controversy came from the explicit nudity, but the more serious matter, at least in the eyes of the Chinese government, was the film’s inclusion of footage from the 1989 Tiananmen Square demonstrations. 

Shot in a raw, unadorned handheld style reminiscent of his early work, Suzhou River (2000), Summer Palace is a compelling tale of politics and sex, built upon not just Hao Lei’s exceptional performance but the director’s ambition to set a love story against the rise of political consciousness in Chinese youths. 

Part of Lou’s film also depicts the years after Tiananmen, as Chinese graduates seek greener pastures overseas, notably Germany in this case. 

As much as it is about the heady days of youthful idealism, Summer Palace also asks us to reflect on the concessions of maturity, that is to say, what do we have to give up in order to grow up? 

Grade: A-

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