Where Nothing Grows

荒原

China, 2022, colour, 2.35:1, 92 mins.

Director: Zuo Zhiguo 左志国.

Rating: 5/10.

Despite impressive photography and a game performance by actress Ren Suxi, there’s a lack of involving drama in this desert survival movie.

STORY

Somewhere in the Gobi desert, northwest China, the present day. Cong Lin (Ren Suxi), in her early 30s, is on another of her annual motorbike expeditions – this time with her elder brother Cong Lai (Li Chen), a surgeon – to find any trace of their father who went missing 10 years ago. She lightly scolds him for being more invested in his medical studies rather than join her in the past. Suddenly the pair are engulfed by a sandstorm. Afterwards, Cong Lin finds her motorbike is almost buried in the sand and Cong Lai has been stabbed in the ribs by a branch as he fell. He coughs up blood but hides it from his sister. They have rations for four days. He tells her that next day she must walk south on her own to a supply point nearby and, if there is nothing there, then head west 120 kilometres to Tafeng lake where a group led by a female friend, Du (Wang Jing), will be arriving in four days’ time. He stresses that is the only solution to them surviving, and as a surgeon he knows all about his wound. First Day 第一天. It’s 50°C. Cong Lin walks four kilometres to the supply base, an abandoned bus, but finds nothing there. During the night her campfire accidentally burns the bus down. Second Day 第二天. It’s 60°C. Cong Lin heads west towards Tafeng lake. En route she fails to attract the attention of a passing helicopter, and during the night her water bag is punctured. She has travelled 38 kilometres. Third Day 第三天. It’s 56°C. She walks 62 kilometres with no water supplies. After being caught in a sandstorm, she thinks she sees Tafeng lake ahead but it’s only in her imagination. That night, in her backpack, she discovers a video message from her brother telling her not to come back as he’ll already be dead. He knew his injury would kill him, so he hid his portion of the rations, including some water, in her backpack. Fourth Day 第四天. It’s 62°C. She sets off more purposefully now, and also generates some more water through plant condensation. She travels 82 kilometres, and at night is scared when she thinks she hears wild animals nearby. Fifth Day 第五天. It’s 62°C. She travels 102 kilometres, en route falling into a gully and gashing her shin. She drinks the last of her water. Sixth Day 第六天. It’s 62°C. Walking slowly with a stick and dragging her backpack behind her, she travels 115 kilometres, making an unexpected discovery along the way. Seventh Day 第七天. It’s 63°C. Setting off with no water, she crosses sandy desert, eventually drinking her own urine in desperation. She travels 123 kilometres. Half dead as night falls, she hears a familiar sound in the distance that motivates her to press on.

REVIEW

A survival drama in which a plucky woman treks across the burning Gobi desert in search of help for her wounded brother, Where Nothing Grows 荒原 is likely to be remembered more for its desert photography by French-trained d.p. Lu Sheng 卢晟 than for its human drama, though offbeat actress Ren Suxi 任素汐 makes the best fist possible of the thin script. This second feature by Hebei-born director Zuo Zhiguo 左志国 is in complete contrast to his impressive debut, the interlocking crime drama Out of Crimes 云雾笼罩的山峰 (2018): where Crimes was a script-driven brain-teaser with a labyrinthine plot and plenty of characters and dialogue, Nothing is spare and arid, with the simplest of plots, little dialogue, and just a single actress on screen for 70% of the time. Local box office was a nothing RMB1.9 million, as Ren, despite being one of the Mainland’s finest light comediennes, still has little pull with the mass public, especially in unfamiliar casting like this.

Most of the character drama is set up in the first 18 minutes as Cong Lin (Ren) and her older brother Cong Lai (the always solid Li Chen 李晨, one of the experienced platoon leaders in The Battle at Lake Changjin 长津湖, 2021) careen across the stark, rocky landscape on smart motorbikes, exchanging banter on the way. It turns out they’re on an annual expedition to find traces of their father, who disappeared 10 years ago, though quite how they expect to find those traces at such high speed is never explained. Cong Lin chides Cong Lai for prioritising his medical studies and not coming regularly with her; she’s clearly the more wilful of the pair, and more experienced in desert expeditions. However, everything suddenly goes pear-shaped when a VFX sandstorm overwhelms them, the brother ends up wounded, and the sister, with four days’ rations, treks off to get help.

Apart from a few dream sequences, the rest of the film is just Cong Lin and the landscape, divided into days and with the temperature and distance she walks noted on screen. The desert is largely barren rock rather than photogenic sand dunes, but in Lu’s widescreen photography it’s always vast and unforgiving. The Shanghai-born d.p., who returned from Paris in 2005, made an over-artsy foray into directing with Here There 这里   那里 (2011) that’s best forgotten; but over the years he’s worked fruitfully with indie directors like Yin Lichuan 尹丽川 (The Park 公园, 2007), Guo Xiaolu 郭小橹 (She, a Chinese 中国姑娘, 2009) and Kong Lingchen 孔令晨 (City Monkey 玩酷青春, 2010) as well as on more mainstream movies. His work on Nothing creates memorable imagery without ever losing sight of the desert’s bleakness and dryness, though there’s little sense of the extreme daytime temperatures shown on screen (60°C+).

Ren, 34, ditches her usual goofy comic persona (Mr. Donkey 驴得水, 2016; A Cool Fish 无名之辈, 2018; Almost a Comedy 半个喜剧, 2019; Miss Mom 寻汉计, 2021) in favour of a physical role to which her gangling frame and tomboyish demeanour are well suited. The theatre-trained actress is utterly convincing as a plucky survivor with some knowledge of desert survival. The problem is that the script by Zuo – who’s since worked with Ren again in the so-far-unreleased family drama Everything Is Unknown 意外人生, aka 繁华将至 – doesn’t give her much to do apart from climbing up rocky escarpments, looking woozy, and having occasional memories of her father. There’s also little sense of the long distances her character walks some days (around 100 kilometres) or of any geography. It’s not enough just to show the desert as it is: the best survival movies have a sense of direction and travel, as well as well as interesting perils to overcome.

The film was shot in northwestern Gansu province, around Guazhou county and Dunhuang. The ethnic-flavoured score by Ma Fei 马飞 (Almost a Comedy), with atmospheric chords and Tibetan/Buddhist flavours, is effective. The film’s English title isn’t exactly true, as our heroine sometimes encounters (and makes practical use of) green shoots growing in crevices. The Chinese title means “Wasteland”.

CREDITS

Presented by MaxTimes (Hubei) (CN), Beijing Booy Legend Media (CN), Beijing Linxi Film (CN). Produced by MaxTimes (Hubei) (CN).

Script: Zuo Zhiguo. Photography: Lu Sheng. Editing: Zhou Xinxia. Music: Ma Fei. Art direction: Yang Zhao. Styling: Zhang Juan. Sound: Liu Xinli, Zhang Zhen’an. Visual effects: You Tao. Survival advice: Sun Quan. Executive direction: Dong Yusheng.

Cast: Ren Suxi (Cong Lin), Li Chen (Cong Lai), Zhou Shen (traveller), Wang Jing (Du), Sun Quan (Cong Lin’s father), Li Xiang (young Cong Lin), Wang Yuzhuo (young Cong Lai).

Premiere: Warsaw Film Festival (International Competition), 18 Oct 2022.

Release: China, 3 Mar 2023.