After a rather eventful path to the international audience, after its pulling from the 69th Berlin International Film Festival for “technical difficulties encountered during post-production” and a score of rumors regarding extensive cuts, “One Second” finally found its place in festivals and cinemas in 2020, winning a number of awards all over the world.
The story is set in 1975 and revolves around two misfits. One is a nameless fugitive who has just escaped a prison near Dunhuang, a remote desert town, in a desperate effort to see the 1964 propaganda epic “Heroic Sons and Daughters, “ where his alienated daughter makes a brief appearance. Despite his struggle, he misses the screening and just watches a motorbike taking the reels to the next town, without knowing which or how far it is. Even more to his disappointment and surprise, he witnesses a rather dirty-looking girl stealing the film and running off to the darkness, initiating a manic chase that, through many trials and tribulations, brings both of them in the town the movie is to screen next. Eventually, it is revealed that the girl, Liu, needs the celluloid to fix a lamp her brother broke, and that the two of them are actually orphans living in poverty in the particular town.
The convict is still set on giving the full film to the local projectionist, nicknamed Mr Movie, who thinks of himself as much more than he actually is, creating a series of problems that are also heightened by the fact that the local audience are desperate for something to watch that particular night.
Zhang Yimou directs a movie that is essentially split in two parts that occasionally intermingle, with one following the “rules” of the road movie and the other of the social drama about the poor people of remote areas so frequently coming out of the Chinese movie industry, with him actually being responsible for some of the best entries in the category. Regarding the first one, the desert areas that surround the two towns appearing in the movie offer a great setting for such an approach, inducing the narrative with a dystopian essence that is quite appealing. At the same time, Zhao Xiaoding has captured the whole area excellently, both through his long and medium shots, while the events that take place here are the main aspects of the comedy that is also part of the narrative.
The events in the city also follow humoristic paths on occasion, in a fashion closer to a fable this time, but the drama soon kicks in, as the situation of both protagonists and their desperation to achieve their goals takes over the story. It is in this part that the sociopolitical comments of Zhang kick in, with a pointedness that makes one wonder how the film would look without any cuts. The low-level government employees who consider themselves grander than they are are mirrored perfectly in the persona of Mr Film, who eventually emerges as the main “villain” here. The poverty that was a direct result of the Cultural Revolution, particularly in the rural areas of the country is also depicted in the most eloquent fashion, as much as the inadequacies of a system that did not seem to work at all, both due to administrative and material issues. In that regard, the escaped convict and the orphan girl serve as excellent sources for these remarks to appear in all their glory, in a testament to the quality of writing of Zhang himself, and also Zou Jingzhi and Zhou Xiaofeng, who co-wrote the script.
At the same time, and beyond all the aforementioned elements, “One Second” is also a film about the magic of cinema, and how much it can offer in troubled times, with the impact it has in the various protagonists highlighting this aspect quite eloquently. Zhao Xiaoding portrays this factor equally excellently, through a number of memorable shots.
Zhang Yi as the convict gives a great performance as a desperate man with a good heart, while his antithesis with the quirky but equally desperate Liu Haocun’s Liu, both in demeanor and appearance, works greatly here, particularly in terms of entertainment. Fan Wei is also convincing as “Mr Movie”.
“One Second” does not reach the levels of Zhang Yimou’s masterpieces of the category, as in the case of “Raise the Red Lanterns”, “To Live” etc, but remains a rather well-shot, well acted movie that manages to make a number of pointy comments while entertaining its audience.
