Buddha Mountain

BUDDHA MOUNTAIN is a brilliantly acted film about aimless youth confronting grievous loss. Nan Feng is a tough girl who works as a club singer to send money home to the provinces, where her alcoholic dad is beating her mom. Ding Bo is a handsome motorbike delivery boy who can't accept the new marriage of his deadbeat father. Fei Zao is a constant eater and a childish Michael Jackson fan. After these three slacker friends are evicted from their apartment, they find new digs with Madam Chang, an old-fashioned devotee of the Peking Opera who runs a tight ship. The young people bait their new landlady, taking her money and “borrowing” her car for joyrides through the countryside. But not long after they stumble across a mountaintop Buddhist temple dedicated to the goddess of compassion, they realize that Madam Chang's rigidity actually masks a deep unhappiness. Veteran Taiwanese actress Sylvia Chang's portrayal of the grief-stricken landlady is heartbreakingly convincing. (In Mandarin with subtitles) – B.B.