In
the world of Chinese film, directors explored the interconnected themes of the
Westernization and modernism while creating their films. In Chen Kaige’s Yellow Earth, a solider for the
Communist forces enters the countryside and attempts to learn the songs of the
common people. However, as the he interacts with one family, he influences the
daughter, Cuiqiao, by telling her about the liberated women of the Communist
parties. While, in Zhang Yimou’s Raise
the Red Lantern, Songlian, a liberated young woman, marries a rich man to
ward off the request of her mother. Finally in Chen Kaige’s Farewell My Concubine shows the
evolution of the relationship between two actors in Peking opera, as they live
through the modernization of China in the 20th century. The films
explore the changes and combinations of how modernism and traditional values
can be work together or be in conflict with each other. Modernism can also work
through several of the social and political changes in China as depicted in the
film. Each of these films reacts to the changes in China in relation to the
government and social changes that occurred. The three films discussed above
each investigate the conflict between the traditional world and the encroaching
modernism that was found in China in the early 20th century. The
directors of the films used their personal experiences to try to reconcile the
conflict between modernism and the traditional world. Each of the films explores modernism through
the lens of many different characters that each explores modernism on their
own.
In Chen Kaige’s Yellow Earth,
Gu Qing arrives in a remote village during a wedding. The wedding shows how
traditional the village is with the processions of the bride and groom and the
first night together. As Gu begins to live with Cuiqiao and her family, he
begins to tell Cuiqiao about the girls from the cities that are given more
freedom in comparison to the country girls like Cuiqiao.
Cuiqiao wishes for the freedom to choose who marries whom they want. As the
ideas of the modernism enter Cuiqiao’s mind, she begs Gu to take her back with
him to the Communist camp. However, Cuiqiao must resign herself to getting
married in the traditional way without any choice in who she is marrying.
Cuiqiao’s marriage mirrors generations of women before her and she is forced to
submit to her new husband. As the film continues, Cuiqiao carves the modern
life that Gu described and she attempts to escape to the Communist camp,
possibly drowning in the Yellow River. Cuiqiao’s desire to live a more free
modern life leads to her refection of traditional society and her possible
death. Cuiqiao’s desire for freedom conflicted with the traditional life she
was living and escape or the possibility of death were ways for her to escape
the oppression she felt.
In Zhang Yimou’s Raise the Red
Lantern, Songlian enters a marriage after relenting to her stepmother’s
requests. Songlian, a former university student, enters the house of a rich man
as his fourth wife, rejecting the proposition of her stepmother for a possible
love match. At the beginning of the film, Songlian rejects the traditional
wedding procession, and proceeds to walk to her husband’s home. Songlian
establishes herself as the modern woman who has entered this marriage
reluctantly in contrast to the other wives. The other wives know Songlian as
the educated wife and they view her in an intrigued view. In the marriage,
Songlian is treated like a traditional wife would, purely to serve her husband
and produce male children, but Songlian’s postion is less than that as she is a
mistress. Her husband pushes traditional values on Songlian, and so she cannot
leave the house. While Songlian has modern views, she soon descends in to the
traditional values to further compete for the affections of her husband. The
traditional values of her husband destroy her will until she can no longer
function and finally goes insane. Songlian suffocates under the traditional patriarchy
and her own modern views are not enough to save her. Songlian cannot reconcile her modern outlook with the power
structure based on traditional values and so she goes insane from the conflict.
Another film that explores the relationship between traditional and
the modern is Chen Kaige’s Farewell My
Concubine. The film explores the relationship of two Peking opera stars as
they live through modern Chinese history. The film shows how China modernized
and changed through the 20th century. The relationship between Dieyi
and Xiaolou spans several decades as they continue to perform together. The
film begins in the Republic period and proceeds forward. As the actors in a
traditional art, they weather decades of regime changes, but the Communists
finally vilify them publically for their art. The performances remain the same
but audiences change with the regime. As the regimes change, their positions in
society change from higher class artists to lower class individuals. Finally,
when the Communists come in to power, they attempt to change the opera to
better fit their values. They also modernize the opera and infuse it with tales
of Communists values and reject the former operas of feudal China. The
modernization of the opera makes the old opera and the actors who appeared in
it become irrelevant to the new art form. Dieyi and Xiaolou become criminals
for the many years that they continued performing for the upper classes rather
than change the art form. In Farewell My
Concubine, modernization creates flux and possibly destruction for those
who do not follow it.
In China, the films are constantly changing and many of the films
grapple with incorporating the new with the old. Yellow Earth explores the traditional world as the Communism and
modernism slowly begin to influence the youth of the countryside, leading to
the rebellion against the pressures of the traditional world. While in Raise the Red Lantern, Songlian enters a
traditional marriage as the fourth wife and as the educated university student
who yearns for the modern world. However, Songlian cracks under the intense
pressure of tradition and ceases to function in her new environment. Finally,
in Farewell My Concubine, Dieyi and
Xiaolou navigate the many regime changes in China, as they perform opera
together. The opera represents their relationship in the various turbulent regime
changes of China, and modernism finally intrudes when the Communists gain
power. Each of the films attempts to reconcile the traditional aspects of life
with creeping modernism. Some of the films believe that modernism and tradition
are not compatible and only lead to the destruction of lives such as in the
cases of Cuiqiao and Songlian. Cuiqiao and Songlian both lost their lives while
trying to either escape the oppression of the traditional world or suffocating
under its grasp on their lives. While other films, believe that changing the
tradition makes it hollow and less meaningful for both the performer and
audience. Farewell My Concubine
allows for the viewer to observe and create their own opinion of the how
modernism affects the characters and if there is even a conflict between the
tradition and modernism. In the
Chinese films, the connection between the modern and tradition is explored thoroughly
and allows for the viewer to reconcile the relationship.
