Discipline, Rigor, and the Meditative Process of watching Oxhide II

Liu Jiayin is a filmmaker who I am still not very familiar with. A factor in this is my ignorance of the Chinese film industry as a whole, and indeed, contemporary Chinese culture. Nevertheless, I stumbled upon this sequel to a film that, as of yet, I still have not seen. But although I have not seen Oxhide, Jiayin’s debut feature, I do not feel that any prior knowledge or context is necessary to connect with Oxhide II, or to even, very quickly, develop a deeply personal relationship with this fantastic sequel.

Oxhide II is an almost structural film. One that Sitney might describe as a “film that insists on its shape”. And although this is not a traditionally avant-garde film, is does combine the intense rigor and dedication to form that the Structuralist Avant-Garde posits, with a narrative progression and a universally relatable character study.

A simple synopsis should illuminate what I mean. Oxhide II is a narrative film about a family who are preparing New Years Eve dumplings over the course of almost two hours, and then they eat them. The action, over the course of the entire film, unfolds in real time.

In the first shot, the father is working leather at this work bench, but as his family returns home, the work bench becomes a dinner table, with which they will center their food preparations around. During this labor, already steeped in cultural and traditional subtext, the members of the family; father, mother, and daughter, discuss various topics ranging from tense discussions of the father’s failing leather bag business, to the changing world around them, although mainly discussing the very labor of cooking dumplings which they are performing.

The entire film takes place within a single room in the family’s apartment. The structural nature that I mentioned is manifest in the form with which this location-specific narrative takes shape.

The entire 2 hour long film consists of 9 static shots. Each shot rotates clockwise around the dinner table at 45 degree increments and each shot lasts, on average, 15 minutes.

The shots vary in height and tilt, but they consistently follow the pattern with which this film is restrained. With such a long average shot length, this film proposes an inherently demanding request of its audience. Not only is the shot duration overly long, but thanks to the squished 2.35 aspect ratio, the static frames often only feature the working hands of the protagonists. Such a set up might immediately put some audiences off for the fear of committing to such a demanding form, for such a long period of time.

However, the magical, meditative, and exceptionally rewarding nature of this film springs forth from the very fact that the performances, the cultural and socio-political content, and the simplicity of the structure makes the entire film utterly watchable and captivating.

The characters, played by Jiayin and her real-life parents, are incredibly pleasant to observe and their nuanced performances express so many emotions and stresses that often need no elaboration or explanation. Textually, the film is about the marginalization of working class Chinese citizens who are underrepresented and unsupported by a increasingly capitalist society. It gives equal time to expressing the nostalgia associated with the inability to stave off the progression of time as well as the difficulty and virtue of holding on to traditions passed down from generation to generation. The exploration of these two thematic strains, combines to form a melancholy illustration of the strength and value of the nuclear family. Although simple, this is a truly focused, pointed, heartfelt, and deeply personal story.

Oxhide II has been difficult shake. For the past couple weeks, I have been unable to either get it out of my head, or to truly discern why it had such an impact on me. It is simultaneously simple/minimalist and extremely detailed, filled to the brim with meaningful content. The form is dedicated, ambitious, rigorous, yet the content is naturalistic, even meandering. Not for a moment, is it boring. It is a film that is about tradition, the past, but it is unmistakably contemporary, a film that could only be made in the 21st century.

By reconciling these apparent ironies, this film exemplifies something I find intensely exciting about contemporary art film, and specifically Slow Cinema. Jiayin has such a confident artistic voice which she uses to command vision through persistence of image. Her confidence allows her to back up such a highly structured concept with the content to make the endeavor worth while. She is so strong in her ability and sure of herself, that she can rely on her structure to carry her and give her the room and patience necessary to fill the frame with imagery that facilitates and provokes the meditative experience many strive to capture, but few realize. By removing any and all traditional bells and whistles, she leaves the audience with a purified narrative, which, as it is expertly captured, acts as a healing cleanser on the mind.

To put it simply, I am in total admiration and jealousy of her ability, although mainly I am overjoyed to have found such a strong voice to be another inspiration to my own.