City of Life and Death

Harrowing and unflinching, a savage nightmare so consuming and claustrophobic you will want to leave but fear to go, City of Life and Death is a cinematic experience unlike any you've had before. It's a film strong enough to change your life, if you can bear to watch it at all.

City of Life and Death isn't cathartic: it offers no uplifting moments, just the immodest balm of art. The horrors it represents can be almost too difficult to watch, yet you keep watching because Mr. Lu makes the case that you must.

Both arduous and artful, City of Life and Death is the best imaginable movie about the genocidal siege that's now called the Rape of Nanking. Anything more explicit would be unwatchable; anything more contemplative would be a betrayal of the sustained suffering.

Here the Japanese senses of honor and of shame are particularly entangled. Later in the film, Lu mounts an Imperial Army parade through the Nanking ruins. It's something to see.

The film never feels entirely staid: Lu wriggles out of convention where he can, especially in the first half, and engages with history as an artist, not a hagiographer.

It's a muscular, physical movie, pieced together from arresting imagery and revelatory gestures, large and small.

The movie skips along episodically; it's not quite as sharp as a war narrative needs to be, even if its nightmarish psychology feels spot-on.

A true masterpiece. A Schindler's List for the Nanking civilians. The black and white added to the authenticity of the movie. A true eye opener into the other conflict during WW2 .

As of Agust, this is the best film I have seen this year. Grim but realistic, I was informed and horrified. Several questions kept running through my mind. Why did China take so long to clear this film for release? Did every Japanese have to be a devil? Why have the Japanese resisted admitting the truth about their actions during the 1930's and 40's? Why are they so stubborn? What happened to John Rabe when he returned to **** Germany and how did this affect his views. I also like the way the "comfort women's conditions were shown. No sugarcoating it as we men need to realize what is going on. This film will be on my 2011 Top Ten list.

From my perspective, "City of Life and Death" is a profoundly challenging film to watch. It's a raw and unflinching portrayal of a period in history filled with unimaginable horrors. The scenes are difficult to witness, as they force me to confront the atrocities of war and the suffering endured by countless individuals. This film isn't just hard to see; it's emotionally taxing, leaving me deeply affected as I grapple with the weight of the events depicted. "City of Life and Death" serves as a stark reminder of the depths of human cruelty and the importance of remembering the past to prevent such tragedies from happening again.

The film is about the chinise village of Natking during world war 2 and the shocking truth of one of the jappanse worse war crimes. The film dipicts the truth so well of how the jappanese and chinise would of acted in this dreadful carnage and atrosity, But the fine line of filming this movie in black and white was a perfect desition that kinda reminded me of Schindlers List, aswell as many other war film classics. A truly must see film with splended acting, directing and cinemtography it will leave you breathless to the final scene.