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When Night Falls
Here's a movie that China doesn’t want you to see... It's a fictionalized account of a true story, concerning a young man, Yang Jia, who was convicted, in 2008, of stabbing and slashing six police officers to death. Later in the year, he was executed. The background to these incidents (or accusations) concerns Yang's arrest for riding an unlicensed bicycle; he charged that he was beaten in police custody and his attempts to bring charges or seek other redress were rejected...
WHEN NIGHT FALLS is a work of memory, reconstruction, and empathy that blends a coolly analytical style with a fierce yet quiet passion. Its precise and intimate scope, its canny sense of refracted representations, turns its lightly idealized modernism into a powerful version of political documentary. No wonder the Chinese government is unhappy with it.
Richard Brody, The New Yorker, October 23, 2012