Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress

A charming if not exactly groundbreaking tale of two men who love the same woman. Unfortunately, they love her during Mao’s cultural revolution, when both of them have been sent to a tiny mountain village to be “re-educated.” Taking solace in a stash of forbidden books, the three form an illegal love triangle against the most beautiful landscape in the world. The film is basically a combination of Jules et Jim and Fahrenheit 451, but without Truffaut’s annoying pretense. It’s pretty and compelling, though not terribly original.