Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined

SpunkySelfTwitter It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

Maidexpl Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

arzewski Saw it after seeing the bill board of a spectacular image of row boats in a steep and narrow gorge, and thinking it was going to be a beautifully-landscaped documentary, was looking forward for it with great expectations. Turned out to be a dud: it was slow, with many almost-still images. On the other hand, it was interesting to see the personalities of the workers on the ship. But the scenes of the shack along the river, the carrying of furniture and belongings, and the river rising, were just to "classic" documentary style, and just too boring (leave those for public television). I guess, what I am trying to say, when making a documentary, think about addressing an audience of 17-year old. Put some jazzy stuff in it, move it a bit, make it more dynamic. Ironically, this documentary's audience, the mid-aged good-feeling fellas in their mid-50's, is the same population profile that fits the Canadian and American tourists to the boats as shown in the documentary. Maybe they should give copies of this documentary to the tourists...

Ron Chow I finally watched this film during its third run at a local art-house cinema, having missed it on two previous occasions. I enjoyed the film, but at the same time felt it could have been done better. The knitting could have been tighter.Ten years ago I took a boat trip up the Yangtze, starting from ChongQing. No, I was not on a 5-star cruiser depicted in this film. My boat was much more modest, and smaller. At night I could hear rats racing across the ceiling. But it was, nevertheless, an enjoyable trip. The water level was much lower at that time, so the cliff faces were higher and more impressive. What I once saw is now mostly submerged, as was chronicled in this film. Taking this trip 'Up the Yangtze' again on the big screen sure brought back fond memories.Overall I find the focus on the demise of a poor family affected by the rising water level, and the activities surrounding large cruise ships catering to well-off visitors from around the world to be a good and relevant backdrop to this informative documentary. The acting and interviews were well conducted, with unforced ease and human sentiment. At the end, you draw your own conclusion who to sympathize with, whether you want to point fingers at the establishment, or just resign to the fact that progress toward modernization, in any country, comes with a price.As the end credits rolled on the screen, a band played 'To traverse a big sea you need a good navigator', a song composed and forced into the ears of every Chinese national during the Culteral Revolution - in praise of Mao, the 'Navigator'. It was a great propaganda song but the band, using inappropriate instruments, made a mess of it and it sounded like white noise. I don't know why the director did not chose the far more superior 'choir' version, which would have been more becoming to close out a good documentary. This is just one example of how some fine-tuning and refinements could have brought this film one step closer to being a masterpiece.

wanderingstar "Up the Yangtze" is a documentary which is at its heart, about a poor Chinese family and the impact the Three Gorges Dam project is having on their lives. In a broader sense it is about a rapidly changing China and the huge disparity in rich & poor that exists there.The Three Gorges Dam is a colossal hydroelectric project. The hydro plant on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls, "wonder of the world", generates 2,300 MW of electricity. The Three Gorges project will be 26,000 MW, a dam two km wide, and when complete will displace 2 million people and empty about 9 large cities.One such displaced family is featured in the film. The daughter of the family goes to work on a cruise ship on the Yangtze which caters to rich Westerners. The story is told from the point of view of the daughter, and various people we meet along the trip.The film made me laugh, and cry a couple of times too. (Which was embarrassing because I watched it on an Air Canada flight to Vancouver) If you want to get a little window on what is going on in China right now, the corruption of officials, the disparity between rich and poor, the treatment of peasants by the government, beyond the newspaper headlines, then this film is for you.

albertrchen The biggest fear with documentaries is that they got bogged down in the boring details that don't do enough to tell a story. This film, however, is always intriguing because although it tackles a large issue, the impact the flooding of the Yangtze river valley that displaced millions of residents, it does it through the very human story of one family. There are some nice panoramic shots, and interlaced among the genuinely touching moments was a wry humour. It's a great film for those who want to see a portrait of the lives of contemporary Chinese in transition, and for those who want to see the aspirations of China, and the challenges that it faces.