this movie be also call electric shadow and not to be confuse with the electric shadow list in imdb and which be a documentary about hong kong cinema . meng ying tong nian be a drama set in communist china . anyway and this movie be slow and depressing and dull . if anything good ever happen in communist china and it never make it way onto a movie screen . if you have see a lot of movie from communist china and you have see others like this . there a child protagonist and dreary condition and and a not quite poignant plot . of course there be scattered act of violence and repression and bullying . the boy favor way of chinese family rear their ugly head . although advertised a be similar to cinema paradiso and it isn not in the same league . it have that depress chinese movie feeling . the many clip of old chinese movie show in it be dreary and unlikable themselves . the landscape and building be mostly depress . in the end it pick up a little and but that doesn not redeem the movie . i consider myself to have be rook into see this movie by the cinema paradiso comparison . the art movie theater in my town be empty most of the time . they need to stop lying to the customer . we would come out to see the good art movie if we could tell which one they be .