Buddha Mountain is the film that requires that its spectators look deep within themselves, to explore suffering and pain in all its forms, and to re-evaluate themselves in their various states of mind.
Shot in Chengdu, the capital of the Szechuan province, scene of one of the most violent earthquakes in history in 2008, the film entrusts the task of telling the story to the protagonists: three young friends, Nan Feng, Ding Bo and Fei Zao and their landlady, Chang Yueqin. On the lookout for a leg up into a future that increasingly resembles a reconstruction rather than a reality, they hanker for stability and affirmation, neither of which seem to come to them, and have a need to find love that can be counted on, memories with real meaning. When the three friends, each with an unhappy family background, find themselves sharing their new apartment with a volatile landlady, the four of them find a new equilibrium which fills the chasms and shortcomings accumulated along their individual paths.
Mrs. Chang, a retired, widowed opera singer, alone since the death of her 18-year-old son in a car crash, desperately fights the pain of her loss. She juxtaposes an existence made up of regular appointments — morning singing practice, calligraphy in the afternoon — in a house where order and cleanliness reign, but emotions are sadly lacking, with moments of great solitude and depression, when she takes refuge and finds an outlet for her pain in the car involved in the accident which took her son’s life.
Nan Feng works as a singer in a bar, Ding Bo and Fei Zao live hand to mouth after having taken university entrance exams. Two generations measuring compared and contrasted, both trying to discover, or rediscover, their faith in life.
The director, Li Yu, takes us on an uncommon journey, a metaphor to re-establish links with the present through memories of the past. Mrs. Chang represents the fear of forgetting and keeps her perpetual pain alive because forgetting is impossible, unacceptable, unforgiveable, for her the future is an unbearable thought. The three youngsters, each suffering in their own small way, represent the generation without memories, for them the future is unknown, filled with confusion and uncertainties. Mount Guan Yin is a stop-off point between two destinations or it is the end of the line, and it is for each to decide which.
Maria Ruggieri