The Fourth Wall

Language: Mandarin, with English subtitles

第四面墙

UK Premiere

Synopsis Liu Lu is leading a dreary and seemingly mundane life, working at a deer breeding farm. A friend, Ma Hai, keeps trying in vain to win her affections. It’s as if she’s isolating and banishing herself from any kind of human warmth or love. Ma Hai confesses he knows another Liu Lu and another himself in a ‘parallel world’. The more she learns about the other ‘her’, the more Liu Lu discovers about the long suppressed memories from her past.

Director’s Statement As we travelled with the crew to Africa, we became deeply moved when facing the primal earth. Everything seemed unreal, we were stunned by the beauty and our anxiety vanished. That experience was magical, it changed us, so we created this story that tries to help people overcome their psychological barriers.

Curators’ Notes Despite its high-concept premise, The Fourth Wall has the patience and subtlety of the deftest arthouse films. Co-directors Bo Zhang and Chong Zhang balance out the futurist concept of parallel universe with a restrained visual style, fluently slipping between the two worlds with sci-fi realism. At the core of the film stands their complex relationship – defined in one world by obsessive love and in another by deep animosity. As the boundary between the universes breaks down, the film enters a noirish mode, dramatically investigating the butterfly effect: if one fateful day had gone differently for Lu and Hai, what kind of people would they have become?

Festivals & Awards

22nd Shanghai International Film Festival - Nominee of Asian New Talent Award (World Premiere)

13th First International Film Festival - Main Competition

41st Cairo International Film Festival - the Bronze Pyramid Award