The Chinese film "The World" is set in an amusement park that offers its patrons the opportunity to "experience the whole world without ever leaving Beijing." This it accomplishes through monorail tours of miniaturized replicas of the Eiffel Tower, The Taj Mahal, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the Vatican, even the Manhattan skyline complete with a pair of still-intact Twin Towers. The movie focuses primarily on a young woman named Tao, who works as one of the performers who roams from "country" to "country" throughout the park performing native dances (her specialty appears to be Indian), and her rocky relationship with a security guard named Taisheng.
The main problem with "The World" is that the setting is so intriguing and visually arresting that it winds up completely dominating the drama, which is as diffuse, meandering and plodding as the direction by Zhang Ke Jia, who shoots his scenes almost exclusively in impersonal medium shots. There's a certain sad irony in the fact that the movie's characters are stuck working in a bizarre facsimile of the world when all they really yearn for is to travel to exciting and far-off places - and start new lives - beyond their own land (the park even features, as one of its attractions, an old defunct jetliner that people can sit in and pretend they're actually going somewhere). Unfortunately, with the movie clocking in at a seemingly interminable 138-minute running time, it is WE THE VIEWERS who ultimately feel trapped by the experience.
There are a number of lyrical moments and haunting images in the film, and Ke Jia does capture with full force the astonishing strides China has made in joining the technological revolution (all the characters have the most up-to-date cell phones, for instance). But all the peripheral virtues of setting and theme can't compensate for the overweening dullness and listlessness of the drama at the core.
The main problem with "The World" is that the setting is so intriguing and visually arresting that it winds up completely dominating the drama, which is as diffuse, meandering and plodding as the direction by Zhang Ke Jia, who shoots his scenes almost exclusively in impersonal medium shots. There's a certain sad irony in the fact that the movie's characters are stuck working in a bizarre facsimile of the world when all they really yearn for is to travel to exciting and far-off places - and start new lives - beyond their own land (the park even features, as one of its attractions, an old defunct jetliner that people can sit in and pretend they're actually going somewhere). Unfortunately, with the movie clocking in at a seemingly interminable 138-minute running time, it is WE THE VIEWERS who ultimately feel trapped by the experience.
There are a number of lyrical moments and haunting images in the film, and Ke Jia does capture with full force the astonishing strides China has made in joining the technological revolution (all the characters have the most up-to-date cell phones, for instance). But all the peripheral virtues of setting and theme can't compensate for the overweening dullness and listlessness of the drama at the core.