An Unfinished Film (2024)

Sometimes I go into a screening knowing absolutely nothing about the film and ‘An Unfinished Film’ was one of those times. An Unfinished Film sees Director Xiaorui try and finish a movie that got abandoned a decade earlier. We see some of what was shot and it's clear that even if they do remake the film it will never get past the censors and so it is more of a personal mission to tie up a loose end. As the film is close to being completed, Covid his and the hotel is placed in lockdown and the rest of the film becomes about the remaining crew trying to keep their spirits up which for Jiang Chen’s (Qin Ho) is tougher than for others as he has a new baby at home.

As I didn’t know anything about this film I genuinely thought that this was a documentary. It was only during a skirmish with some officials that I saw there was no cameraman when there would have been one that would have appeared in shot. Truth be told, there were a couple of shots that looked too well framed to be a documentary but it was the skirmish that made the penny drop in my mind. 

The performances are really good. Qin Ho is the lead as Jiang Cheng who we spend pretty much the rest of the film once Covid hits and his slow descent into depression. It’s hard as well for his wife and bearing in mind that all of the scenes with Sang Qi (Qi Xi) are on a phone, she still manages to feel a big part of the film and it's hard to not feel sympathetic towards the pair of them. The film doesn't have a huge amount of upbeat moments once Covid hits but there is a great moment when they celebrate Chinese New Year and they all celebrate things in their own way with Jiang Cheng doing the Baby Shark dance which along with Hugh Grant doing a Jar Jar Binks impression in ‘Heretic’ might be one of the more random things seen in a movie. That brief moment ends with everyone dancing in the corridor before being threatened with legal challenges if they don’t return to their rooms immediately.

An Unfinished Film is a very good film. Despite being five years ago the cloud of Covid still seems to hang over us all and I can remember being furloughed when the country like the world had been put into lockdown. I had a house with my family to keep me going but the horrors of having to go through this alone even with zoom and social media keeping us connected is shown in harrowing detail thanks to Lou Ye. Bearing in mind that I didn’t know anything going into this film, I thought thet despite an air of confusion about the film, this was well worth the risk and I think sadly this probably wont get  seen by a huge number of people but if you get a chance to see it then you should.