Cloudy Mountain (2021)

A different kind of disaster movie

What I really liked about this movie is that compared to most it's relatively low stakes. It's not humanity vs the end of the world, it's about saving one town. It was nice to see that the only 'villain' of the story is nature. There's no evil capitalist putting money ahead of people's lives. Instead everyone comes together to do what they can to help regardless of the financial impact. It's refreshing to see when the news seems to be full of people being selfish at the moment.

The acting was fantastic, especially Zhu Yilong, Huang Zhizhong and Chen Shu.

This movie isn't going to be a life-altering experience but for the genre I found it very enjoyable.

Read More

A typical disaster movie (but that's not a bad thing!)

I was lucky enough to see this at an actual cinema here in the UK, and I'm glad I did.

It had everything you expect from a disaster movie, including grand heroic gestures, last-minute relationship reconciliations, and a rousing speech to convince a group of people to do the right thing. It also had some great acting from Zhu Yilong (although that was also to be expected) and just enough actual peril to keep me questioning whether he would survive or not.

Some of the plot aspects were a little formulaic, but that's pretty much the genre. Not a lot of re-watch value once you know how it's going to end though.

Overall, it was a fun watch and was great to be able to see a Chinese movie on the big screen.

Read More