During the three years Qi Zhao spent filming “Fallen City,” he captured his subject — the town of Beichuan, wiped out in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, two-thirds of its people killed and 80 percent of its buildings destroyed — as it slowly disappeared. In time-lapse images, fields of rubble become fields of grass. Part of the old city is turned into an earthquake museum, with railings installed in front of piles of shattered concrete.
在赵琦拍摄《殇城》的三年时间里，他看着自己的拍摄对象北川县慢慢消失。北川在2008年的四川地震中被毁，三分之二的居民死亡，80%的建筑被毁。在电影画面中，随着时间的流逝，瓦砾场变成了草场。旧城的一部分被改成了地震博物馆，一堆堆破碎的混凝土前安上了围栏。

“Fallen City,” showing Monday in PBS’s “POV” series, looks both forward and back. It’s a conventional aftermath story, following three families devastated by the earthquake as they deal with the emotional and logistical aftershocks: intense, sometimes paralyzing mourning along with the need to relocate while a new Beichuan is being built. But it’s also an elegy for the former Beichuan, once a picturesque town nestled along a riverbank. Mr. Qi’s subjects keep returning to the ruins to commune with their dead children, parents and siblings, and his camera lingers over the wreckage, turning the debris and the scattered buildings into misty brush paintings. (The cinematography was by Shaoguang Sun.)
《殇城》周一在PBS频道的POV系列中播出。它既展望未来，也回顾过去。它是个讲述灾难余波的传统故事，记录了三个遭到地震重创的家庭应对震后情绪波动和生活安置的过程：他们情绪激动，有时因哀伤而昏厥，还要考虑重新安家的问题，当时新北川正在建设中。不过这部纪录片也是旧北川的挽歌，它曾是个秀丽的河畔小城。主人公们不断返回废墟，与死去的孩子、父母和兄弟姐妹谈心。镜头长时间停留在废墟上，把瓦砾和破碎的建筑变成朦胧的水墨画（该片的摄影指导是孙少光）。
Of the three stories, one, about a teenage boy, is touching but a little generic; his alienation can be attributed to his father’s death in the quake, but you suspect he might have turned against school and parents regardless. One, about a civil servant who lost a daughter and three sisters, has the sort of unexpected twist that’s a documentarian’s dream. And the third, about the Pengs, a likable couple who lost their only child, is simply heartbreaking. A scene in which soldiers prevent them from re-entering the old town to visit the makeshift tomb they’ve built for their daughter is brutal in its despair.
这三个故事中有一个讲述的是一个十多岁的男孩，这个故事很感人，但也有点俗套。他的孤僻可能是因为父亲在地震中去世，但是你也怀疑他可能本来对学校和父母都有点敌视。第二个故事讲述的是一个公务员，她失去了女儿和三个姐妹，这个故事有个意外的情节突变，这是纪录片制作人们最希望遇到的。第三个故事讲述的是可爱的彭氏夫妇，他们失去了独子，伤痛欲绝。在其中一幕里，士兵们阻止他们再次进入旧城探望他们给女儿修建的临时墓地，这很残忍，令人绝望。
Mr. Qi’s background is in Chinese television, and “Fallen City,” his first film as a director, is not the sort of formally inventive or tough-minded documentary associated with filmmakers like Wang Bing or Jia Zhangke. It’s a bit slick in its mournfulness, and it tactfully avoids subjects like the efficacy of the government’s response in the immediate aftermath of the quake. Mr. Qi makes clear, though, from his portrayal of the bleak new Beichuan and his inclusion of banal newscasts celebrating its construction that his sympathy lies with the survivors who sneak past guards and clamber over dangerous debris just to feel at home.
赵琦来自中国电视圈，《殇城》是他导演的第一部影片。这部电影不是王冰或贾樟柯的那种在形式上很有创意或者很冷酷的纪录片。它的悲凉有点老套，它巧妙避开政府的震后应对效率等主题。不过，赵琦描绘了荒凉的新北川，并加入了新闻报道对其落成的陈腐赞美，这些都清楚地表明他同情的是那些幸存者——他们偷偷绕过卫兵，爬上危险的废墟，只是为了有家的感觉。