To Kill a Mongolian Horse (Drama)
Director: Xiaoxuan Jiang
Producer: Tan Chui Mui,Zhulin Mo
Screenwriter: Xiaoxuan Jiang
Cinematographer: Tao Kio Qiu
Composer: Unur
Editor: Zhong Zheng
Production Designer: Zongjian Hou
A cowboy-in-winter western set on the plains of Inner Mongolia, this acclaimed drama depicts the slow demise of traditional cultures in modern China.
Saina is the latest in a long line of Mongolian herdsmen. But when he’s forced to sell his sheep to pay his bills – so he can keep caring for his debt-ridden, alcoholic father and supporting his young son who lives with his ex-wife in the city – he turns to a different way of making money: performing in a tourist show built on the myths of Mongolian soldiers and horsemen. Wishing he could be left alone to ride his beloved white stallion across the plains, Saina is a man out of time, caught amid the many tides of change: social, economic and even, as crops and livestock suffer, climatic.
With shades of Chloé Zhao’s elegiac breakout The Rider (MIFF 2018), Xiaoxuan Jiang’s debut feature expertly mixes documentary with drama, utilising a cast of largely non-professional actors to paint a unique, heart-rending portrait of a vanishing culture within the jurisdiction of contemporary China. Winning the Venice Film Festival’s Authors Under 40 Best Directing and Screenwriting Award, To Kill a Mongolian Horse is an affecting, deeply human tale set against an incredible visual landscape.
“Touching … Jiang’s film is immersed in the testing landscapes and traditions of Mongolia, but her assured storytelling makes it resonate more widely as she draws us into Saina’s dilemma.” – Screen Daily