‘The Story of Qiu Ju’ (PG)

Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou attempts to skirt the newly zealous communist censors by shooting his latest work, "The Story of Qiu Ju," as a quasi-documentary. A not-quite-seamless blend of scripted scenes and footage shot "Candid Camera"-style, this cheaply produced and repetitious yarn is bound to disappoint admirers of his ravishing foreign-backed films, "Raise the Red Lantern" and "Ju Dou."

Like Zhang's previous 1920-era films, "The Story of Qiu Ju" is a woman's fable set in the remote northwest province of Shaanxi. Only this time, the story is a contemporary and humorous one about a pregnant peasant's defense of the family jewels; it seems her husband suffered a kick in the crotch during a brawl with the chief of the village.

Gong Li, so compelling as the voluptuous schemer of "Ju Dou," has an altogether different challenge here as the waddling justice-seeker that is Qiu Ju. Swaddled in a quilted jacket against the weather, the enormously pregnant Qiu Ju seems on the verge of giving birth from the opening scene. She and her stalwart young sister-in-law (Yang Liu Chun) have just carted her ailing husband, Qing Lai (Liu Pei Qi), a docile pepper farmer, to see the village doctor.

The doctor assures them that the damage is minimal. Qiu Ju, who suspects the doctor is a veterinarian, is not reassured. Sure she's pregnant, but what if she's carrying a girl instead of a much-preferred jewel-bearer junior? What if she, like the chief's wife, gives birth to a "flock of hens," a failing that Qing had earlier ascribed to the chief's equipment (a taunt for which the chief exacted the aforementioned retaliation).

"I can understand a beating, but you shouldn't have kicked him there," says Qiu Ju to the chief (crusty Lei Lao Sheng), who refuses to apologize for his actions. Not one to walk two paces behind her man, Qiu Ju sets tongues wagging when she asks the Public Security Bureau to mediate the case. The bureau, headed by a friend of the chief, decides the chief should pay Qing's medical bills and lost wages. They rule that both parties were wrong and no apology is called for.

Qiu Ju makes repeated appeals, which involve many identical arduous treks from her rustic farm house into the province's bustling capital city. After getting the runaround from various arms of the bureaucracy, she decides to take the chief to court again, but to no avail. An appeal is underway when Qiu Ju finally goes into a difficult labor and nearly dies, but she and her newborn son are saved by the chief.

The antithesis of the passive Chinese female, Qiu Ju is a marvelous figure, as globular and fixed in her path as Mother Earth herself. Though the question at hand has to do with the nature of justice, whether poetic or proscribed, the film also explores the surprising fecundity of this featureless, dun-colored land. Garlands of bright red pepper and cobs of maize decorate the rugged farmhouses, which are crowded with old folks and young children -- never mind the repeated references to legal limits on reproduction.

"The Story of Qiu Ju" has its bawdy pleasures, but it's far too litigious to be especially entertaining, and is at its best in its documentary mode.

"The Story of Qiu Ju" is rated PG and is in Mandarin with English subtitles.