Troubling combination of the wooden and the hysterical, this film...
Kawashima/Aisin Gioro Xianyu/Jin Bihui (a Qing princess brought up in Japan after 1913, who returned to Manchuria to work with the Japanese and was executed after the end of the war as a traitor) may well have been a more interesting character than Pu Yi, but she's not well served on film. She appears in The Last Emperor as a rather bizarre caricature ("I'm a traitor and I don't care who knows it!"), and here - where she holds centre stage for a full 96 minutes - she is neither appealing nor even particularly interesting.
And she should be fascinating. While Pu Yi is holed up in the Forbidden City she is being educated in Japan; after she returns to China she moves (or is moved) into the forefront of Sino-Japanese collaborations in Manzhouguo, and by the end of the film she is identifying herself as Japanese. Although the film chooses to portray her as an independent actor, it doesn't explore the implications of that portrayal and she is generally shown through her relationships with men (dull and shouty affairs).
The contemporary films are piling up on my shelves but this month I have mostly been watching historical pieces: Last Emperor, Devils on the Doorstep, To Live, and 55 Days at Peking (bit incongruous that one, but I was sort of asked to show it). 55 Days is quite a beast. I was quite surprised at how late it was made - having caught part of it on TV, I imagined it was a 1950s production, but, no, they were still making films about the Boxers in 1963. I was showing it for the Boxer images, but it contained a whole mush of references to films of every genre you can think of: Charlton Heston as John Wayne; heroic young soldier who doesn't want to live if he loses his leg; noble wives; acres of stiff upper lips. And you look at the whole thing and think that by this time the US had troops in Vietnam...
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Not really about Postmen in the Mountains
I loved this film (slow, gentle, beautiful... set in Hunan) - like Sunflower it revolves around a father-son relationship, and it also considers the changes that rural China is beginning to see under reform - practically and in terms of values. It is also a deeply moral film (maturity, responsibility, community)... And it reminded me in a completely dumb way of my various encounters with other outposts of the post office experience in China. Every visit I have made there since 1984-85 has ended with visits to post offices, this being what happens when you have serious book-buying habit. The only time that I think I encountered a blatant attempt at fraud in China was in a post office in Nanjing, but otherwise post offices have seemed like oases of calm and certainty (how sad is that? but how true?)... even though rules can vary from one place to another (do we wrap books in cloth or paper? what are we allowed to put in a box and how heavy can each box be?) there is a strong sense that those rules are stable, and that they work. Compared to, for example, railway ticket offices (in spring 1985, I heard someone behind me in a queue in the foreigners ticket office in Beijing station declare "Communism's ruining this country" ['cos it was lovely before 1949, eh?]), post offices are a paradise of public service. Watch me eat my words and big chunks of carpet if I lose a parcel of books on my next visit, but right now I love the Chinese post office.
I'm also quite fond of NHS paramedics, but that's another story.
I'm also quite fond of NHS paramedics, but that's another story.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Soul Haunted by Painting 画魂
Where were we? Yes, La Peintre (Huang Shuqing, 1995), based on the life of Pan Yuliang (1895-1977). One of China’s first generation of western-style painters, she attracted controversy not only as a female artist and painter of nudes, but also for her background – she was sold into prostitution after the death of her parents and became the second wife of an official before training as a painter. China Daily referred (2002, ref below) to the trad Chinese influences in her work, but the images that I found had a strong flavour of Gauguin – see Christies catalogue at http://www.christies.com/promos/nov05/2203/promo_gallery.asp?page=2
As she develops as a painter we see some of the familiar tensions of 1920s/1930s China refracted through her career, from the opposition that the painting of nudes provoked, to distrust of working women, as Pan is parachuted into a prestigious post at Nanjing University. Eveninghawk, another blogger writing on the film, commented that many discussions of Pan have focused on her past, sidelining her significance as a painter (see post at http://www.eveninghawk.com/links/index.php?p=70&c=1 and a China Daily article on exhibition of her work at http://www.china.org.cn/english/33608.htm). The film, on the other hand, gathers momentum as Pan’s attention shifts from home to studio. The earliest brothel passages seem stilted and theatrical, but the style and colour of the film change as Yuliang marries, moves to Shanghai, and begins painting.
In some senses this is a May Fourth liberation story: Yuliang finds happiness with a man who believes in marriage for love and does not hold her time in the brothel against her; and despite the hostility that her painting attracts, it gives her independence and status. But it also shows the continuing vulnerability of women at the hands of self-consciously ‘progressive’ artists in Paris as well as the conservative establishment of Nanjing University. That conservatism forces Yuliang back to Paris because she cannot paint what she wants in China, and it seems more plausible than Zanhua’s tolerance of Yuliang’s painting, which runs out only when she includes a nude self-portrait in her Nanjing exhibition.
Zanhua’s story, on the other hand, which runs in the background of Yuliang’s shows some of the stresses that men experienced – again the Lu Xun problems (what is art for? freedom of expression &c &c) are quite familiar to us, but Zanhua’s problems are different. We first meet him as an official (important enough for the brothel staff to offer him Yuliang), and later see him leaving to fight (Yunnan?), but it is obvious as the film progresses that his career is stalling, and his professional decline mirrors Yuliang’s blossoming as an artist. After 1949, Zanhua remains in China, navigating the new political landscape, in which Yuliang’s teacher and Muni are condemned as rightists. So while Yuliang wins autonomy through her art, Zanhua’s life is – throughout the film – a negotiation with necessity (is that Dorothy Ko on footbinding?) of the kind that was more commonly imposed on women.
What really struck me about the film, though, was the portrayal of the marriages – Zanhua, first wife and Yuliang. We are often given the Lu Xun line on first/arranged marriages in this era (that an unwilling young man was shackled to a woman who was unfit, emotionally or intellectually, to be a true companion; who was, functionally or essentially, part of the oppressive old order … and that he was not only entitled but also in a sense obliged to escape from the marriage in interest of abstract progress as well as own happiness) but this was a much subtler picture, and we see the cohabitation of husband and two wives as a situation that is stressful and at times demeaning for all three. While, emotionally, Zanhua’s attachment to Yuliang appears unchallenged, he is shown as experiencing genuine conflict between love and his obligations to his first wife. There is a beautiful passage after Yuliang returns from studying in Paris in which she is trying to build bridges with Zanhua’s son Muni, and thinking – on an idyllic boat trip one afternoon – that she is succeeding; but his joy on seeing his mother when she returns to Nanjing is a reminder that relationship with Yuliang is built on convention, not love.
I’m not a serious Gong Li fan, but I think this shows what she can do when she is given a role that goes beyond muse or decoration.
Mei Ah, on the other hand, deserve a fat smack for making a DVD that simply stopped playing in the last ??half hour of the film. Sigh.
As she develops as a painter we see some of the familiar tensions of 1920s/1930s China refracted through her career, from the opposition that the painting of nudes provoked, to distrust of working women, as Pan is parachuted into a prestigious post at Nanjing University. Eveninghawk, another blogger writing on the film, commented that many discussions of Pan have focused on her past, sidelining her significance as a painter (see post at http://www.eveninghawk.com/links/index.php?p=70&c=1 and a China Daily article on exhibition of her work at http://www.china.org.cn/english/33608.htm). The film, on the other hand, gathers momentum as Pan’s attention shifts from home to studio. The earliest brothel passages seem stilted and theatrical, but the style and colour of the film change as Yuliang marries, moves to Shanghai, and begins painting.
In some senses this is a May Fourth liberation story: Yuliang finds happiness with a man who believes in marriage for love and does not hold her time in the brothel against her; and despite the hostility that her painting attracts, it gives her independence and status. But it also shows the continuing vulnerability of women at the hands of self-consciously ‘progressive’ artists in Paris as well as the conservative establishment of Nanjing University. That conservatism forces Yuliang back to Paris because she cannot paint what she wants in China, and it seems more plausible than Zanhua’s tolerance of Yuliang’s painting, which runs out only when she includes a nude self-portrait in her Nanjing exhibition.
Zanhua’s story, on the other hand, which runs in the background of Yuliang’s shows some of the stresses that men experienced – again the Lu Xun problems (what is art for? freedom of expression &c &c) are quite familiar to us, but Zanhua’s problems are different. We first meet him as an official (important enough for the brothel staff to offer him Yuliang), and later see him leaving to fight (Yunnan?), but it is obvious as the film progresses that his career is stalling, and his professional decline mirrors Yuliang’s blossoming as an artist. After 1949, Zanhua remains in China, navigating the new political landscape, in which Yuliang’s teacher and Muni are condemned as rightists. So while Yuliang wins autonomy through her art, Zanhua’s life is – throughout the film – a negotiation with necessity (is that Dorothy Ko on footbinding?) of the kind that was more commonly imposed on women.
What really struck me about the film, though, was the portrayal of the marriages – Zanhua, first wife and Yuliang. We are often given the Lu Xun line on first/arranged marriages in this era (that an unwilling young man was shackled to a woman who was unfit, emotionally or intellectually, to be a true companion; who was, functionally or essentially, part of the oppressive old order … and that he was not only entitled but also in a sense obliged to escape from the marriage in interest of abstract progress as well as own happiness) but this was a much subtler picture, and we see the cohabitation of husband and two wives as a situation that is stressful and at times demeaning for all three. While, emotionally, Zanhua’s attachment to Yuliang appears unchallenged, he is shown as experiencing genuine conflict between love and his obligations to his first wife. There is a beautiful passage after Yuliang returns from studying in Paris in which she is trying to build bridges with Zanhua’s son Muni, and thinking – on an idyllic boat trip one afternoon – that she is succeeding; but his joy on seeing his mother when she returns to Nanjing is a reminder that relationship with Yuliang is built on convention, not love.
I’m not a serious Gong Li fan, but I think this shows what she can do when she is given a role that goes beyond muse or decoration.
Mei Ah, on the other hand, deserve a fat smack for making a DVD that simply stopped playing in the last ??half hour of the film. Sigh.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Fathers and sons – Sunflower
‘Why don’t you start a Chinese film blog?’
‘Because I don’t have enough time to watch Chinese films.’
‘Hm.’
Possibly a little unfair in the circs – sorry, love. I'm actually developing a bit of a backlog of films to write about, and more are (YesAsia assures me) in the post.
Sunflower (Zhang Yang 200?) should be powerful and engaging. However. (Are we getting negative in our old age?) Xiangyang’s father, Gengnian, coming back to Beijing after years in countryside during Cultural Revolution, is dismayed at nine-year-old Xiangyang’s unruliness and determined that he is not going to waste talent as painter (Gengnian himself is a former painter whose hands were ruined by beatings). After Xiangyang (nearly?) blinds son of neighbour with catapult, Gengnian forces him to stay in drawing and drives him on through art school. Teenage Xiangyang resists father’s plans – skips class to sell greetings cards, tries to escape to Guangzhou – but Gengnian retrieves him and compels Xiangyang’s girlfriend to terminate her pregnancy. Twelve years later, adult Xiangyang and his wife end another pregnancy because – Xiangyang tells his father – he does not feel ready to be a good parent and does not want to blight his own child’s life by being as bad a father as Gengnian. Resolution and a form of reconciliation come only once Gengnian disappears, allowing Xiangyang to think of him as a benign absence rather than a suffocating presence.
The film shows us the pressures of China in transition – fractured families, tensions between neighbours, conflicting desires (Do we want a model child? Do we want a new apartment? Do we want love or do we want our own way?), battles over authority; but in the three central characters (Gengnian, Xiangyang, and his mother [always a bad sign if you can’t remember a central character’s name]) we see three people who seem to change only to become more fixed in their ways, on divergent paths. Gengnian’s relationship with neighbour Old Liu (who wrote the appraisal that led to his exile) is more compelling, but develops largely off-camera.
In themes and setting, Sunflower invites comparison with Blue Kite (Tian Zhuangzhuang) and Together (Chen Kaige) but lacks the strong central relationship that characterises and humanises those films. Sunflower is honest in showing the long-term damage that the Cultural Revolution could do to families and to individuals (not that Blue Kite was coy on that point as far as it went), but it does not draw us (me) in. It is as if we see the worst in each of the central characters – we can see signs that they must have a warmer side but the film rarely shows it.
Who was it who said you have to blog every day? What kind of a life...............?
‘Because I don’t have enough time to watch Chinese films.’
‘Hm.’
Possibly a little unfair in the circs – sorry, love. I'm actually developing a bit of a backlog of films to write about, and more are (YesAsia assures me) in the post.
Sunflower (Zhang Yang 200?) should be powerful and engaging. However. (Are we getting negative in our old age?) Xiangyang’s father, Gengnian, coming back to Beijing after years in countryside during Cultural Revolution, is dismayed at nine-year-old Xiangyang’s unruliness and determined that he is not going to waste talent as painter (Gengnian himself is a former painter whose hands were ruined by beatings). After Xiangyang (nearly?) blinds son of neighbour with catapult, Gengnian forces him to stay in drawing and drives him on through art school. Teenage Xiangyang resists father’s plans – skips class to sell greetings cards, tries to escape to Guangzhou – but Gengnian retrieves him and compels Xiangyang’s girlfriend to terminate her pregnancy. Twelve years later, adult Xiangyang and his wife end another pregnancy because – Xiangyang tells his father – he does not feel ready to be a good parent and does not want to blight his own child’s life by being as bad a father as Gengnian. Resolution and a form of reconciliation come only once Gengnian disappears, allowing Xiangyang to think of him as a benign absence rather than a suffocating presence.
The film shows us the pressures of China in transition – fractured families, tensions between neighbours, conflicting desires (Do we want a model child? Do we want a new apartment? Do we want love or do we want our own way?), battles over authority; but in the three central characters (Gengnian, Xiangyang, and his mother [always a bad sign if you can’t remember a central character’s name]) we see three people who seem to change only to become more fixed in their ways, on divergent paths. Gengnian’s relationship with neighbour Old Liu (who wrote the appraisal that led to his exile) is more compelling, but develops largely off-camera.
In themes and setting, Sunflower invites comparison with Blue Kite (Tian Zhuangzhuang) and Together (Chen Kaige) but lacks the strong central relationship that characterises and humanises those films. Sunflower is honest in showing the long-term damage that the Cultural Revolution could do to families and to individuals (not that Blue Kite was coy on that point as far as it went), but it does not draw us (me) in. It is as if we see the worst in each of the central characters – we can see signs that they must have a warmer side but the film rarely shows it.
Who was it who said you have to blog every day? What kind of a life...............?
Monday, May 01, 2006
Chinese films to which you should not expose a spouse who is not (much) interested in China (or films)
Spouse's reaction to Rainbow (Gao Xiaosong): "So you've spent all these years working on this stuff, and two hours watching this film on a Saturday night and you still can't tell me what it's about?"
Rainbow looks as if it ought to be interesting and - in parts - it is... but the parts don't really work as a whole, and it is quite hard to feel engaged either by narrative or characters, and to work out what the whole thing is about. Themes suggested in director's blurb (do we fight or accept our destiny? love and arranged marriage) aren't developed in any satisfying way through the film and we have very little sense (I had very little sense, and I was awake and sober) of who the three central characters were beyond their interactions with each other. We saw, for example, Twilight's passivity ('如果。。。' - making decisions large and small on basis of others' actions, as if tossing a coin) without any clue as to how he came to be that way and how he inhabited that passivity; or Twinkle's rather curious combination of helpfulness and acquisitiveness.
And the sound-track and the computer-game quality of the killing scenes? Hmmmm.
But if it's a choice between Rainbow and Life on a String, I'd recommend Rainbow any day (shorter, for starters....) - spouse's reaction to Life probably best not repeated.
Rainbow looks as if it ought to be interesting and - in parts - it is... but the parts don't really work as a whole, and it is quite hard to feel engaged either by narrative or characters, and to work out what the whole thing is about. Themes suggested in director's blurb (do we fight or accept our destiny? love and arranged marriage) aren't developed in any satisfying way through the film and we have very little sense (I had very little sense, and I was awake and sober) of who the three central characters were beyond their interactions with each other. We saw, for example, Twilight's passivity ('如果。。。' - making decisions large and small on basis of others' actions, as if tossing a coin) without any clue as to how he came to be that way and how he inhabited that passivity; or Twinkle's rather curious combination of helpfulness and acquisitiveness.
And the sound-track and the computer-game quality of the killing scenes? Hmmmm.
But if it's a choice between Rainbow and Life on a String, I'd recommend Rainbow any day (shorter, for starters....) - spouse's reaction to Life probably best not repeated.
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Talking about the war (2)
Purple Butterfly is an entirely different kettle of fish. Whereas Guizi is shot (apart from final frames) in black and white and is quite straightforward in presentation of narrative, Butterfly is a film noir shot in colour (though often in near darkness) and uses flashback & jumpy editing to interrupt narrative flow. Put simply, this makes it quite confusing (did we see Yiling get shot? Has she survived or is this a flashback?) but, on the other hand, this means that film plays with what we think we know about the unfolding plot, which is as good a way of approaching the war as I can think of.
I think it's slightly puzzling that Butterfly attracted less criticism as a film-set-during-war than Guizi. Release was somewhat delayed by SARS outbreak (where did I read that?), but unlike Guizi it doesn't seem to have been banned. But if we subject it to same kind of reading (and admit again that this not what Lou Ye aiming for - his statement on the Zhang Ziyi site seems almost deliberately delphic) it makes some equally troubling suggestions about the war/pre-war period.
The affair between Itami and Xinxia is (in context of 1920s Manchuria, and esp in light of subsequent events) moderately controversial, but that is defused by Xinxia's subsequent choices - after Itami's return to Tokyo and her brother's death at hands of Japanese, she chooses resistance to Japan over love for Itami and while we may see internal conflicts over that choice I don't think there is any suggestion that she seriously doubts what she is doing so - in conventional terms - her earlier mistake is redeemed, and Itami's reversion to stock Japanese imperialist confirms the rightness of that decision.
But although Itami plays to type, it's less certain that Xinxia (as Ding Hui) and other resistance fighters do. These, after all, are supposed (according to the master narrative of war) to be the noble defenders of China's sovereignty and dignity, yet Lou Ye does not seem at all interested in pursuing that line. The resistance cell members are allowed to be flawed and self-interested (human...), and indeed they seem even less sympathetic than stereotype in contrast to Situ and Xiling, who radiate a warmth and innocence lacking anywhere else in film but who are destroyed accidentally (casually?) in crossfire of struggle against Japanese.
So is Lou Ye more respectful than Jiang Wen of the sensitivities of those who feel that the war has to be portrayed 'correctly'? I'm not sure he is. He shows a lot more (tangentially, but inevitably because of where film is set) of orthodox story in terms of popular resistance to Japan, and leaves us in no doubt of Japanese brutalities in war and pre-war period (the final sequence of archive footage, for example); but like Jiang he declines to assign leadership of resistance explicitly to CCP; he allows Xinxia's question as she leaves for the pivotal encounter at the railway station 'What are we fighting for?' to hang in the air unanswered; and the question of responsibility for the destruction of Situ and Xiling is also left open.
So why the difference? Can you say things (hide things) in a convoluted noirish thriller that you can't in a film that visually echoes early postwar patriotic drama and tells an unorthodox story straight through from beginning to end? Can the masters of the master narrative simply not keep up with Lou Ye's style?
I think it's slightly puzzling that Butterfly attracted less criticism as a film-set-during-war than Guizi. Release was somewhat delayed by SARS outbreak (where did I read that?), but unlike Guizi it doesn't seem to have been banned. But if we subject it to same kind of reading (and admit again that this not what Lou Ye aiming for - his statement on the Zhang Ziyi site seems almost deliberately delphic) it makes some equally troubling suggestions about the war/pre-war period.
The affair between Itami and Xinxia is (in context of 1920s Manchuria, and esp in light of subsequent events) moderately controversial, but that is defused by Xinxia's subsequent choices - after Itami's return to Tokyo and her brother's death at hands of Japanese, she chooses resistance to Japan over love for Itami and while we may see internal conflicts over that choice I don't think there is any suggestion that she seriously doubts what she is doing so - in conventional terms - her earlier mistake is redeemed, and Itami's reversion to stock Japanese imperialist confirms the rightness of that decision.
But although Itami plays to type, it's less certain that Xinxia (as Ding Hui) and other resistance fighters do. These, after all, are supposed (according to the master narrative of war) to be the noble defenders of China's sovereignty and dignity, yet Lou Ye does not seem at all interested in pursuing that line. The resistance cell members are allowed to be flawed and self-interested (human...), and indeed they seem even less sympathetic than stereotype in contrast to Situ and Xiling, who radiate a warmth and innocence lacking anywhere else in film but who are destroyed accidentally (casually?) in crossfire of struggle against Japanese.
So is Lou Ye more respectful than Jiang Wen of the sensitivities of those who feel that the war has to be portrayed 'correctly'? I'm not sure he is. He shows a lot more (tangentially, but inevitably because of where film is set) of orthodox story in terms of popular resistance to Japan, and leaves us in no doubt of Japanese brutalities in war and pre-war period (the final sequence of archive footage, for example); but like Jiang he declines to assign leadership of resistance explicitly to CCP; he allows Xinxia's question as she leaves for the pivotal encounter at the railway station 'What are we fighting for?' to hang in the air unanswered; and the question of responsibility for the destruction of Situ and Xiling is also left open.
So why the difference? Can you say things (hide things) in a convoluted noirish thriller that you can't in a film that visually echoes early postwar patriotic drama and tells an unorthodox story straight through from beginning to end? Can the masters of the master narrative simply not keep up with Lou Ye's style?
Monday, April 24, 2006
Talking about the war
Chinese version of Guizi laile (Devils on the doorstep Jiang Wen) now available - does that mean that there is a time limit on ban or do opinions change on what can and can't be said about the war?
Discussing Guizi laile and comparing with Purple Butterfly (Lou Ye) suggests that boundaries of the sayable aren't entirely clear-cut. Guizi attracted criticism (they tell us) for whole range of reasons: showing Japanese soldiers giving sweets to Chinese children (Japanese forces published huge number of photos aiming to suggest peaceful co-existence during war and these have been reproduced in numerous Chinese discussions of wartime propaganda, so (a) it's not exactly a new image and (b) these actions/images already have an established place in Chinese narratives of the war as examples of duplicity); failure to show practical resistance/moral lead from Chinese Communist Party (see how that resonates with recent research on local politics in wartime...; though the fim doesn't read as a warming commentary on anyone involved in active resistance ["who?"]); showing Ma Dasan and Chinese villagers as 'buffoons' (and I think the sensitivities here are quite well known... but on the other hand the 'buffoon' thesis is based, I think, both on a profound mis-reading of the film, and on a fairly startling mis-reading of the historical context).
Obviously the film is not a historical document. But if we turn things around and read the history into the film (and equally possible that Jiang Wen would have his own objections to that), I think it gives us a more subtle reading of the history of the war as personal experience. First, let's look at where Jiang (as opposed to author of original short story on which film was based) set the film, in rural east Hebei. This area suffered endemic disorder in 1920s and was managed by a puppet (Japanese-controlled) regime in 1935 - so by end of war, locals would have been exposed to Japanese presence and a fair amount of pro-Japanese public discourse for several years longer than many occupied areas further south. So the clear message of resistance that we are told to expect all in occupied areas to have absorbed by later years of war would have been subject to fair amount of interference from other sources. And it is possible therefore that Ma Dasan cannot act with reference to a clear and widely accepted moral framework, because - there and then - there wasn't one. It's obvious that some of the common themes in wartime debate were familiar to characters in film - see references to 'traitors' - but it seems to me that Ma Dasan's basic problem is that he wants to do the right thing, but cannot work out what that is. And this is not buffoonery, but a source of communal/personal tension and anxiety. We see buffoonery in some places - the swordsman, for example - but overall I think the film says more about the unprecedented and intolerable moral pressures that the war placed on individuals.
Whereas Purple Butterfly is a different beast altogether - of which more next time.
Discussing Guizi laile and comparing with Purple Butterfly (Lou Ye) suggests that boundaries of the sayable aren't entirely clear-cut. Guizi attracted criticism (they tell us) for whole range of reasons: showing Japanese soldiers giving sweets to Chinese children (Japanese forces published huge number of photos aiming to suggest peaceful co-existence during war and these have been reproduced in numerous Chinese discussions of wartime propaganda, so (a) it's not exactly a new image and (b) these actions/images already have an established place in Chinese narratives of the war as examples of duplicity); failure to show practical resistance/moral lead from Chinese Communist Party (see how that resonates with recent research on local politics in wartime...; though the fim doesn't read as a warming commentary on anyone involved in active resistance ["who?"]); showing Ma Dasan and Chinese villagers as 'buffoons' (and I think the sensitivities here are quite well known... but on the other hand the 'buffoon' thesis is based, I think, both on a profound mis-reading of the film, and on a fairly startling mis-reading of the historical context).
Obviously the film is not a historical document. But if we turn things around and read the history into the film (and equally possible that Jiang Wen would have his own objections to that), I think it gives us a more subtle reading of the history of the war as personal experience. First, let's look at where Jiang (as opposed to author of original short story on which film was based) set the film, in rural east Hebei. This area suffered endemic disorder in 1920s and was managed by a puppet (Japanese-controlled) regime in 1935 - so by end of war, locals would have been exposed to Japanese presence and a fair amount of pro-Japanese public discourse for several years longer than many occupied areas further south. So the clear message of resistance that we are told to expect all in occupied areas to have absorbed by later years of war would have been subject to fair amount of interference from other sources. And it is possible therefore that Ma Dasan cannot act with reference to a clear and widely accepted moral framework, because - there and then - there wasn't one. It's obvious that some of the common themes in wartime debate were familiar to characters in film - see references to 'traitors' - but it seems to me that Ma Dasan's basic problem is that he wants to do the right thing, but cannot work out what that is. And this is not buffoonery, but a source of communal/personal tension and anxiety. We see buffoonery in some places - the swordsman, for example - but overall I think the film says more about the unprecedented and intolerable moral pressures that the war placed on individuals.
Whereas Purple Butterfly is a different beast altogether - of which more next time.
Sunday, April 02, 2006
Chinese films
Continuing exploration of Chinese films - World without Thieves (Feng Xiaogang) and King of Masks (Wu Tianming) this week.
WWT was a lucky experiment and quite a strange film in some ways - first 20 minutes looked like a Chinese TV drama [of about 5 years ago]; next hour or so was a very slow road movie with pickpocketing sequences shot in style of martial arts film; last section had almost fairytale quality.
KoM much more conventional beast - traditional entertainer tries to adopt boy to train in dying art, discovers is in fact girl, rejects; reconciled; strong overtones of redemption all round.
Both are quite sentimental in places, though WWT gets away with it, whereas KoM on the whole doesn't and more interesting parts of film get submerged in what looks in the end like quite an arbitrary plot complication.
Unsentimental Chinese films: The World, Devils on the Doorstep...............?
(Mind you, after watching The Others last night I am feeling more than averagely kindly disposed towards the concept of the feel-good ending.)
WWT was a lucky experiment and quite a strange film in some ways - first 20 minutes looked like a Chinese TV drama [of about 5 years ago]; next hour or so was a very slow road movie with pickpocketing sequences shot in style of martial arts film; last section had almost fairytale quality.
KoM much more conventional beast - traditional entertainer tries to adopt boy to train in dying art, discovers is in fact girl, rejects; reconciled; strong overtones of redemption all round.
Both are quite sentimental in places, though WWT gets away with it, whereas KoM on the whole doesn't and more interesting parts of film get submerged in what looks in the end like quite an arbitrary plot complication.
Unsentimental Chinese films: The World, Devils on the Doorstep...............?
(Mind you, after watching The Others last night I am feeling more than averagely kindly disposed towards the concept of the feel-good ending.)
Thursday, March 30, 2006
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