Pun Salad

Millions of people were killed during the Cultural Revolution in China. You'll be happy to know that sort of thing is pretty much absent from this movie, which follows a couple of kids—a would-be dentist and violinist—sent to a tiny village up in the mountains for Maoist re-education. They both fall for the "little Chinese seamstress" of the title, the daugher of the local tailor. They also are in love with Western culture, a pretty dangerous habit for that time.

The whole movie is beautifully shot. Some comedy comes from their efforts to disguise Mozart and Flaubert from the Red Guard, transforming them into paeans to Mao. The movie wraps up with a flash-forward to the present, where the now-adults return to the village as it's about to be drowned by the Three Gorges Dam.