Product Review

Winner of more than 25 top honors at international film festivals, revered Chinese director Wu Tianming's The King of Masks is a poignant tale about how a lonely old magician and a luckless child are bound together by fate and suffering, and redeemed by the power of love. The King of Masks is an elderly street performer, a master of the Sichuan opera art of changing silk masks so quickly that it appears to be magic. Bereft from the loss of his son many years ago, he searches for an heir to impart his talents and skills upon. But tradition dictates that this secret art can only be passed to a direct male heir. Living in the 1930's in a time of famine and social disruption, The King of Masks adopts an impoverished street urchin, "Doggie," and sets out to train him in the art, at great personal costs. After Doggie's secret identity is revealed, the pair embarks on a journey to find a new heir, to disastrous consequences.