Return to Dust

Name: Return to Dust
Genre: Drama
Released: July 21, 2023
Duration: 134 min
Rating: 79
Cast: Cailan Wang, Caixia Xu, Cuilan Wang, Dengping Zhao, Guangrui Yang

2023

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Generally favorable reviews based on 11 Critic Reviews

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Return To Dust (US Trailer 1)

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Movie Details & Credits

Film Movement | Release Date: July 21, 2023 | Not Rated

Starring: Cailan Wang, Caixia Xu, Cuilan Wang, Dengping Zhao, Guangrui Yang, Hai-Qing, Jiangui Zeng, Renlin Wu, Yunzhi Wu, Zhanhong Ma

Summary: In rural Gaotai county, two lonely, middle-aged outcasts are pushed into an arranged marriage by their families. Ma (Wu Renlin) is a humble farmer with little to offer his timid and sickly wife, Cao (Hai Qing), except for a small abandoned house on a barren patch of land. From just a few seeds, their newly planted crops take root andIn rural Gaotai county, two lonely, middle-aged outcasts are pushed into an arranged marriage by their families. Ma (Wu Renlin) is a humble farmer with little to offer his timid and sickly wife, Cao (Hai Qing), except for a small abandoned house on a barren patch of land. From just a few seeds, their newly planted crops take root and flourish; and similarly, an unexpected bond between the two starts to blossom. As seasons pass their dedication to each other grows stronger, but change and adversity soon threaten the idyllic existence they share.… Expand

Director: Ruijun Li

Genre(s): Drama

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 134 min

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Critic Reviews

100

Tara Brady

Jul 21, 2023

The stoical, quiet, affecting beast of burden in Li Ruijun’s much-admired drama is emblematic of the film’s larger appeal. Read full review

Sumner Forbes

Aug 3, 2023

The heart of Return to Dust is centered on the married couple’s efforts to construct a new home by hand. It’s grueling work, but through Li’s stunning visuals and mastery of pacing, we become engrossed by the details not only of the labor but by their burgeoning love. Read full review

The Observer (UK) Wendy Ide

Jul 21, 2023

It’s a gorgeous, quietly affecting film that finds an unassuming beauty in this simple life in rural China, but which doesn’t shy away from the extreme hardships faced by the very poorest. Read full review

Austin Considine

Jul 20, 2023

China’s leadership has a history of suppressing art that spotlights the failings of its ruling class and ideology, which is exactly what Li’s film does, with a script that feels only occasionally overwritten. That he succeeds without making it feel like homework — which is to say beautifully, humanely — is presumably what made the film so threatening. Read full review

The Guardian Phuong Le

Jul 21, 2023

With a cast largely made up of the director’s relatives as well as villagers from the landlocked province, this deeply personal work on the plight of rural farmers has a striking feel of authenticity and poetry. Read full review

Jessica Kiang

Jul 21, 2023

A later-life love story of the gentlest kind, Li Ruijun’s Return to Dust is an absorbing, beautifully framed drama that makes a virtue — possibly too much a virtue — of simplicity. Read full review

David Jenkins

Jul 21, 2023

Despite these subtle barbs, Return to Dust ends up as an elegiac love story as the unlikely couple form a bond built on a foundation of total understanding and empathy. Read full review

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