Brief Encounter (1974 film) Brief Encounter (1974 film) Brief Encounter is a 1974 British-Italian television film starring Richard Burton and Sophia Loren, adapted from the play "Still Life" by Noël Coward. The plot of the film is about two strangers, both married to others, who meet in a railway station and find themselves in a brief but intense affair. The material was previously the basis for the David Lean film "Brief Encounter" (1945). Burton was cast at the last moment, after Robert Shaw dropped out. The film had its premiere on U.S. television on 12 November 1974 as part of the "Hallmark Hall of
Still Life (2006 film) contemporaries (and indeed unlike many of Jia's own films), "Still Life" was approved by the Chinese Film Bureau, SARFT, and was co-produced by the state-operated Shanghai Film Studio. Jia himself suggested that this support was due to the fact that "[t]he impact of the Three Gorges project is phenomenal. It’s not something the government can cover up." "Still Life" was therefore given a brief theatrical run in China (opening on the same day as the big-budget "Curse of the Golden Flower") and was also heavily bootlegged. Like many of Jia's works, "Still Life"<nowiki>'s pacing is stately but slow. Unlike his