Before Sandstorm
听，鸟儿在叫
In a vast expanse of desert sands two men exchange health tips: “Wild boar meat is good for your lungs,” says one. “Wild boars and groundhogs,” replies the other. They press bunches of straw into the sand to combat the desertification and sandstorms here in the Tengger Desert of northwest China. A little later we see other people, men and women, doing the same work. In this immense swathe of sand—the Tengger is about the size of the Netherlands— their labor looks like a Sisyphean task. Perhaps it is due to the resulting sense of pointlessness that the conversations start to take on a more serious tone. One of the two men tells of how his wife left him, and how he had to raise his child alone. He once envisioned a different kind of life, but things go as they go. “Our fate is like an unbreakable wall,” he observes, with a resigned tone.
Cast
Similar
In the Realms of the UnrealFilm, 2004Rated 7.2 on TMDB
In the Realms of the Unreal is a documentary about the reclusive Chicago-based artist Henry Darger. Henry Darger was so reclusive that when he died his neighbors were surprised to find a 15,145-page manuscript along with hundreds of paintings depicting The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glodeco-Angelinnian War Storm, Cased by the Child Slave Rebellion.
