Note d’intention de Dai SIjie concernant Chine Ma douleur-662
NIU PENG, the film’s title, is the pronunciation of two Chinese ideograms that literally mean "ox yard".
During the Cultural Revolution this expression designated a re-education centre since, at the time, the enemies of the people were deemed to be "spirits with the head of oxen". For a Chinese person, these are the most evil demons existing in the world.
Through the lives of a few of these spirits, I have tried to show a minute part of a huge iceberg: the Cultural Revolution, in its tragic-comic dimension, without judging it but simply by approaching it through my intense compassion for the characters that I have created.