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Zhou Yu's Train
EMAILPRINTSony Pictures Classics

Mixed or average reviews
Based on 23 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 6 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama | Foreign | Romance
Written by:
Be Cun
Sun Zhou
Zhang Mei
Directed by: Sun Zhou
Release Date:
Theatrical: July 16, 2004
DVD: November 23, 2004
Running Time: 97 minutes, Color
Origin: China / Hong Kong
Language(s): Mandarin (with English subtitles)
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for sexuality
Starring Gong Li, Tony Leung Ka Fai, Sun Honglei, and Li Zhixiong
Driven by three remarkable performances and a multi-layered narrative structure, this film reveals the intimate parallels within the folds of a love triangle. (Sony Pictures Classics)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Washington Post Stephen Hunter
It's a terrific film because each of the characters is so fiercely felt.
Read Full Review >New York Post V.A. Musetto
Breathtakingly filmed (lots of slow-motion) by Wang Yu, but then it would be difficult to go wrong when your star is one of the world's most beautiful women.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Bill White
Full of mystery, romance and ambiguity, Zhou Yu's Train is a tight mosaic of a film.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Ella Taylor
If Zhou Yus Train is finally no more than whimsy, its classy, delicate whimsy, a testament to the way romantic love, however unsatisfied, continues to drive itself.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas
Seems at once overwhelmingly romantic and elliptical, yet all the while it has been building to a conclusion that is surprisingly affecting in the jolt of recognition it elicits.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey
Lyrical, dreamy and too complicated for its own good.
Read Full Review >Variety Derek Elley
Chinese thesp Gong Li goes for a striking career makeover in Zhou Yu's Train, a sensual, slickly packaged slice of Euro-style metaphysical cinema centered on a free-thinking woman and the two men in her life.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
The movie follows convoluted narrative tracks. By the end of the drowsy journey, the characters are indistinguishable from the scenery.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Wesley Morris
These are not the marks of true cinema; they're the makings of a droopy karaoke video.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias
An empty lake, drained of any tangible substance and refilled with wispy, pseudo-poetic metaphor.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
Like some of Joan Crawford's and Bette Davis's studio vehicles, this soapy romance exists only for what Gong Li can bring to it: a certain amount of soul and nuance.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
Tells a pointlessly convoluted version of a love story that would really be very simple, if anyone in the movie possessed common sense.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
Sadly, the combination of gauzy photography and cheesy music gives the film the aura of a fragrance commercial.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
Before dismissing Zhou Yu's Train as the over-conceived, over-edited, under-written perfume ad that it is, the following must be said: It's great to see Gong Li onscreen again.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten
It just may be a movie that has difficulty transcending national borders.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Ken Fox
While the film's erotic symbolism is surprisingly obvious -- all those trains and tunnels! -- it's otherwise bafflingly vague.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Richard James Havis
It's an unusual idea but fails -- Sun spends so much time on the mood and atmosphere that he forgets about the story.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Dave Kehr
Comes to seem less a movie than a memory of movies -- or, at worst, a commercial Frankenstein's monster, sewn together to fill a perceived gap in the market.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jack Mathews
A ticket to this movie is a season's pass on that train - and you must complete every ride.
Read Full Review >Village Voice David Blaylock
Devolves from opaque mystery into boring melodramatics and incoherent contrivances.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan
Less a tale of mysterious, tragic love than a three-way Harlequin romance.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 5.8 (out of 10) based on 6 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
ian m gave it an8:
I thought it was good.i agree, the plot was hard to follow, nut with the following of several characters on separate timeliness its not gonna be easy. quite a few of the shots were really very artistic and well done.
Krystyna gave it a5:
Director seems obsessed with the camera, less so with the plot. As the movie was nearing the end, I was frantically trying to make sense of the plot, but when the movie came to an end, all I could say was "huh"? I then ran for the computer and did a search for film reviews. Upon reading some reviews I was reassured that it wasn't my fault I couldn't follow the plot.
Michael B. gave it a5:
Zhou Sun directs Gong Li in dual roles in a New China soap opera. Every weekend Zhou Yu (Li) takes a long train ride to see her lover Chu Qing, a low-level bureaucrat and sensitive poet. Although we see no evidence of passion between them, Zhou Yu sacrifices family heirlooms and some of her best ceramic creations to get a book of his poetry published. Concurrently, she has a passionate affair with the rather shallow veterinarian Zhang Chiang. Neither relationship is completely satisfying to her. Chu Qing ends up as a schoolteacher in Tibet, living with a girl from his hometown who is unremarkable except for her resemblance to Zhou Yu with a different hairstyle. It seems to be a trope on the ancient belief that we each have two souls, one animal and the other spiritual. A truly great love would then demand one person who excites equal passion in both our souls.
Chad S. gave it a 4:
Even before we arrive at "The Double Life of Veronique" nonsense, "Zhou Yu's Train" wasn't working for me, largely because of Zhou Yu's (Gong Li) high-maintenance personality, which would be more compatable with an investment banker than a poet. Zhou never struck me as a romantic, and someone who would tolerate a man who generates a low income. As a result, the love affair she conducts with Cheng Qing (Tony Leung Ka Fai) never ignites, or feel the least bit convincing. When he moves to Taipei, "Zhou Yu's Train" really starts to drag, as we're greeted by scene after scene of her moping. Director Sun Zhou has some talent, but he runs out of interesting camera set-ups and angles with that damn train after Zhou Yu's sixth, or seventh trip.
Vince H. gave it a 3:
A ponderous, Wong Kar-Wei wannabe that often bores and frustrates more than intrigues. I must go back to the Wong reference mainly because this movie is so CLEARLY influenced stylistically and thematically by Wong's masterpiece "In the Mood For Love", but instead of homage it comes off more like a Tarantino-ish ripoff. A block of music that is repeated throughout, slow dreamy pan shots & close-ups and abstract compositions, etc. The only reason I give this a 3 is because Gong Li is the most beautiful woman to ever grace the planet Earth.
