Thursday, May 30 | 8 pm
There is nowhere else today producing as many visionary new films and filmmakers as Mainland China. Qiu Sheng’s “spectacular” directorial debut, in the words of New York Times critic Glenn Kenny, ingenuously pursues two lightly overlapping stories: a team of young engineers are summoned to investigate a series of craters that are opening up on the edge of town; and a group of tweens make a long journey across a marginal suburban landscape to check on a missing friend. Equal parts tantalizing mystery and bittersweet coming of age story, all set against the backdrop of China’s rapid urbanization, Suburban Birds is, for Pulitzer finalist and New York Times chief critic Manohla Dargis, “so good—and delightfully kinked—that it’s well worth catching now (and watching twice).” But catch it at OKCMOA while you can: Suburban Birds was briefly pulled from U.S. exhibition earlier this year.
Director Qiu Sheng | 2018 | In Mandarin with English subtitles | 113 minutes | NR | DCP