Color/89min/DV/2007
By: Gu Tao
E-mail: gutao.gutao1#163.com (instead # with #)
Cinematography: Gu Tao
Editing: Zhou Yu
Script: Zhao Jiewei

Program Note:
In the Greater Xing’ an Mountain of northern China, there is a group of people who share their lives with the reindeer. The Ewenki people came from Siberia over three hundred years ago and have been living in the dense primeval forest and surviving on herding reindeer ever since.
In 2003, the Reindeer Ewenki came out of the forest and moved to a new settlement built by the government. Now with hunting also banned, the Reindeer Ewenki find themselves in a dilemma: they can either stay or return to the forest. Reindeer cannot survive in the city, and a small number of the tribe people move back into the mountains again, back into their forest.
Liuxia is a widow who seeks solace at the bottom of a bottle. Besides the reindeer and her son who lives far away, she has nothing left in this world. Her younger brother, Vijia, is an alcoholic artist who is increasingly disorientated about life. He Xie expresses the sadness in his heart through his harmonica.
Time goes by…the sound of deer bells fades in the distance…Maria Suo, the last chief of the tribe, watches as times change, helpless to do anything about it.
But does the forest the Ewenki used to know still belong to them?

Festivals and Awards：
Most Promising Export, 2007 Guangzhou International Film Festival

Director Expatiation：
In my understanding, documentaries need life experience. When I begin to film, I feel like I am spying, but after a while it starts to feel like my own life. Everyone has their own personality, and they express themselves in very different ways, such as in their attitudes towards love and towards life. The Ewenki follow the Eastern Orthodox Church, and they let me right into their group. Suddenly I had found a means of expression. My early confusion, sadness and aimless suffering disappeared as soon as I entered Aoluguya. It wasn’t that I was interested in making this movie, it just naturally came about through the passing of the seasons and the years.
In making documentary films, one can work on a single topic for a lifetime and never finish. But life is more important. If you are breathing, then you are living.

Director:
Gu Tao (b. 1970. Hulunbeier, Inner Mongolia)
Gu Tao majored in oil painting at the Inner Mongolia Art School before launching himself into documentary filmmaking with Aoluguya, Aoluguya in 2003. His documentary Throat Singers in Beijing was shown at the Fourth REEL CHINA Documentary Festival in New York. His more recent work Songzghuang China was shown at the Fourth Chinese Documentary Exchange Week and was awarded the Most Promising Project Award at the Guangzhou International Film Festival.

Filmography：
Throat Singers in Beijing (“Hu mai Beijing”)
Songzhuang, China (“Zhongguo Songzhuang” )
Aoluguya, Aoluguya (“Aoluguya… Aoluguya” )