China: Beyond the Clouds [2 Discs]

This intimate, arresting examination of one family's life in Lijang, a small southwestern Chinese market town, was filmed (and beautifully so) with unprecedented cooperation from the Chinese government. It offers--as when Mr. Mu negotiates his way through a plodding and complex bureaucracy following his nephew's murder--rare glimpses of a chaotic, decaying system intertwined with an old and vibrant culture.