Together
Director Chen Kaige moves from the epic sweep ofFarewell My  Concubineto a small, intimate story about a boy and his father--but  creates just as rich an emotional impact. Liu Cheng (Liu Peiqi) takes his  13-year-old son Xiaochung (Tang Yun) to Beijing in the hope of finding a  teacher who will foster the boy's talent on the violin. The adolescent  boy soon becomes infatuated with one of their neighbors, a golddigger  named Lili (the lovely Chen Hong), and becomes a pupil of Professor Jiang  (Wang Zhiwen). But Liu discovers that a good teacher is not enough; if  Xiaochung is to succeed in the world, he must have a teacher with  connections--even if this ambition threatens to pull father and son apart.Togetherwould be sappy if it weren't for the emotional honesty of  the actors; under Kaige's clean direction, the movie is graceful and  deeply moving.--Bret Fetzer