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‘Brief History of a Family’ Review: Suspenseful Chinese Drama Puts a Twist on the Family Infiltrator Plot
Jianjie Lin’s sleek and stimulating feature debut follows a teenager gaining the trust of his friend’s moneyed parents.
Elevated by its consistent visual inventiveness, Chinese writer-director Jianjie Lin ’s suspenseful drama “ Brief History of a Family ” could appear, at first glance, as a clear-cut case of a cunning infiltrator wreaking havoc in an unsuspecting household. Yet the closer we observe, the more it reveals itself as a tale of wish fulfillment for everyone involved.No doubt comparisons to “Saltburn,” “The Killing of a Sacred Deer” or “The Talented Mr. Ripley” will abound, but what Lin conceived is far more subcutaneous, with a sobering tone and disinterested in building up to a grand plot twist — though the resolution is unexpected. Numerous other instances of thematically relevant imagery populate the film, such as the way DP Jiahao Zhang captures the sleek and gray clinical symmetry of modern buildings, a symbol of progress and stability that Shou want to belong to.
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