This poetic documentary chronicles the four seasons of a remote mountain village in China. At the village entrance, there is a rock formation that resembles a turtle. The film visualizes the village life by bringing together static and dynamic moments. The black and white images of the landscape retain aesthetic independence. They are not only visual but also synaesthetic, comprising of minute details of daily life such as the sound of a cock crowing, a bird chirping, and raindrops falling. Meanwhile, the actions of people are filled with liveliness: an elderly lady climbs the hill, a mother keeps busy in the kitchen, and men cut bamboo and fix the roof. The combination of static and dynamic moments establishes the unique spatio-temporal order of the village, which is closer to continuation than interruption. If the ritual at the end of the film is a conscious custom that looks back on the past and predicts the future, then time in this film is constantly circular. This cyclical time is at once the way of life in the village and the film’s aesthetic form. [LEE Dohoon]