Why so much hype?

Fantastic!

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

There are at least a few moments in "Suffocation" at which I literally jumped in my chair. Unfortunately, these were all related to the soundtrack, which can be quite jarring. In fact, I stopped the DVD twice simply to back up and see why the musical director had inserted a particularly loud chord at those spots. In both cases, it was apparently just an effort to generate tension, as nothing much was actually happening on-screen.The cinematography is not bad and the ghost/non-ghost is done fairly well, but the overall effect is more stylish than scary. The underwater scenes, for example, look like they were shot in a pool (which they undoubtedly were) and a lot of the night scenes are too cleverly lit for their own good. The film is also poorly-paced, with no sense of momentum.Overall, this is a fairly creepy film, but it's not what many audiences expect when they hear "psychological horror." I recommend this movie only for those viewers who are interested in seeing something a little bit different and who feel comfortable watching flawed films for the sake of what might have been.

I saw this during the Gotenburg Film Festival. Apparently horror films are not really permitted in mainland China so Bingjian Zhang tries to get around this by making a horror film which is not really a horror film at all, rather a Freudian fantasy where you really don't know where the dreams end and reality begins. Sounds weird? Well, you'll get it :) Visually it's a very beautiful film with stunning images although it's a little too obvious the underwater scenes are shot in a pool. But none the less it's filled with impressive scenes with lots of water, rain and dramatically lit fog.Unfortunately the film fails miserably being a horror film (or as the poster claimed "Chinas first psycho movie"). It is, by western standards, not even remotely scary. The few scenes that actually gave me any real "gut feeling" were to few and too far apart to create any real atmosphere in the film. And without that you cant really care for the characters and their feelings either.Maybe I should blame the Chinese censorship instead of the director. But no matter what the cause this films weakest point is that it's way too tame. If it would have had that paranoid feeling like for example "the Machinist" had and succeeded in giving the audience a real taste of the characters fears and paranoia it would have been an instant 9 but without that key ingredient I can't give it more than 6/10.

This film is also known as 'Suffocation'.On the cover of the DVD, 'Suffocation' is labeled 'The First Chinese Psycho Movie'. This, for me, conjured up the ideas of Halloween or Friday the 13th and other 'slasher' films. Having the benefit of hindsight, what I think is meant, is 'psychological' movie, which it certainly is, with a surrealistic blending of fact and fantasy which proves very satisfying in how it is all worked out in the end. Lead actor Ge You plays (as he did in 'Butterfly Smile') a photographer. He is in almost all the scenes, and it is very much his movie. He is certainly talented enough to pull it off, though he is also well-supported by the rest of the cast. I don't wish to give any plot details away, since putting it all together is part of the fun. The story itself is presented in sections, arranged non-chronologically and often with nightmarish visuals. This allows for some quite innovative camera-work, giving it an expressionistic, almost 'art-house' feel.Overall, a recommended novelty from mainland Chinese cinema.