What makes it different from others?

i know i wasted 90 mins of my life.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

I'm very down to earth about Chinese films. There's a few good ones like Suzhou River and Zhang Yimou's 'Huozhe' (Life). The rest I find to be overly catered for Western tastes, i.e. plenty of peasants and moralising tales of how bad Communism was for the tiny minority of privileged intellectuals.This film is definitely an exception. It is about a boy growing up in the Cultural Revolution, but shows the era with a kind of nostalgia that perhaps may be somewhat alien to the Western psyche. If you really want to learn something about how China experienced 'the Sixties,' then watch this if you can get a hold of it.On the down side, this film appears to be almost completely unavailable. If anyone knows of a DVD or video release anywhere, it would be much appreciated.

I have many classemates that come from Jun Qv Da Yuan(military region), who act exactly as those in the film. In those days(since 1972), there wasnt so much on concern in our mind, hence fighting against the children from other section in the military region became the only extracurriculum activity. Here Id like to express my admire for Jiang Wen, who shot this movie successfully from the first point of view. Thanks!

it's a good movie, but if u had watched "Once Upon a Time in America ", u will find "YCR" is like a part of the "OUTA".maybe the two directors have same childhoods both...i real like the both movies.

I saw this film for three times, 6 times of videos. this is the best chinese film i saw. the beautiful music is from Mascarnni's Rustical Calvary(???) also used in Raging Bull by Martin Scorsese