Wendy Ide 

The Road to Mandalay review – potent migrant drama

This story of a young Burmese couple fleeing to Thailand is full of touching details
  
  

kai ko and ke xi wu in the road to mandalay
‘Unflinchingly bold’: Kai Ko and Ke-Xi Wu in The Road to Mandalay. Photograph: Bombay Berlin Film

This potent drama about two migrants who meet as they flee the civil war in Burma for a new life in Thailand hits many of the expected beats of stories about the stateless displaced. Even so, the stylistically bold approach that director Midi Z brings to the struggle of Lianqing and Guo, the boy who loves her, sets this apart. A combination of tender details – the way Guo carefully picks the fibres from his girlfriend’s skin after a gruelling shift at the factory – and a strikingly surreal approach to a scene in which Lianqing prostitutes herself for the first time makes this unflinching picture a notable addition to the ever-swelling list of films that deal with migration.

Watch a trailer for The Road to Mandalay.
 

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