Cow (film)
| Cow | |
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| Directed by | Guan Hu |
| Written by | Guan Hu |
| Story by | Zhao Dongling |
| Starring |
Huang Bo Yan Ni |
| Music by | Li Ke |
| Cinematography | Song Xiaofei |
| Edited by | Kong Jinlei |
| Distributed by | United Star Corp. |
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Release date
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Running time
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93 minutes |
| Country | China |
| Language | Mandarin |
Cow (simplified Chinese: 斗牛; traditional Chinese: 鬥牛; pinyin: dòu niú; literally: "Fighting for cow") is a 2009 Chinese film directed by Guan Hu. A black comedy, Cow takes place during the midst of the Second Sino-Japanese War. A villager, played by Huang Bo, has been entrusted to care for a Dutch cow when a Japanese attack leaves him and the cow the only survivors.
The film premiered at the 66th Venice International Film Festival as part of its "Horizons" program.
The film takes its story from oral traditions of Shandong. A bumbling villager, Niu'er (Huang Bo), is charged with caring for a Dutch cow, considered an object of awe to the village given its larger size and ability to produce large amounts of milk, they forced Niu'er to take care of the cow, when the village head and members of 8th Route Army members that holds out the village before retreating. When the village is bombed by the Japanese, Niu'er flees from his home, only to return to devastation and a mass grave, containing all villagers killed by a Japanese unit, including Niu'er's love, Jiu. The cow, however, has survived, and the two make their way across the landscape, although they return to the village, just holding on, avoiding Japanese troops, hungry survivors and mountain bandits before eventually meeting with the Communist 8th Route Army. They met first some Japanese wounded, unknown to them that there is a survivor of the village. He almost killed by the squad leader by bayonet until some 8th Route Army soldiers attack the village, killing the holdouts, except one and some Chinese soldiers. They left, leaving the Japanese corpses and Niu'er's body covered in uniform. Some time later, they met some refugees, Niu'er gave the villagers some milk, resulting in the cow being over-milked and becoming sick. Some refugees want to kill the cow at any means possible, dying due to the landmines and tripwire that were leftover and planted by Japanese troops. He entered a tunnel, when he spotted a survivor, he prepared to kill the soldier when he saw the Japanese soldier trying to heal the cow's inflammation by massaging the udder. While on a pass, they saw some 8th Route Army and Japanese corpses and met a wounded Kuomintang soldier. When the Nationalist soldier found the Japanese soldier, he shot him, wounding Niu'er and killing both of them. He buried both of them in a grave. Upon returning to the village, he was thrown on a well, and forcing the cow to mate a Chinese cow. He later exits the well, prepared to die in a final stand, holding a bomb, while the village is in chaos, bandits fighting somebody. The cow uses itself as cover while the firefight intensifies. Flashbacks occur, including Jiu singing while wearing his bracelet and taking it to her dead body while covering her with sand. After the fight forced to make the cow stand up, while sobbing. He decided to leave village for good, having only the cow, the document, some seeds and the payment money. He travels the area, settling at a mountain for 7 years until he was found by People's Liberation Army troops leaving the at the area. The commander refuses to take the cow. The commander took his fingerprint on the document. He also made words "in memory of Niu'er" in a paper.
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