Shadows & Reflections:
on "Temptress Moon"

by Jerlian Tsao



"Temptress Moon (Fengyue)," the new movie by director CHEN Kaige (Farewell My Concubine), is supposedly a story about the great house of the Pangs; the time is the 1920s, the locations Shanghai and a made-up small town nearby, called the Pang Estate .

In the uproarious Shanghai of the Twenties, one of the numerous urban trickeries was to have handsome men seducing wealthy married women and then blackmailing them. Lesli Cheung's (Farewell My Concubine) character is the star of this trade. In the movie, he is ordered by his gangster boss to return to the Pang family, into which his elder sister was married, and where he grew up and often helped preparing opium for his brother-in-law, the heir of the Pang clan. He was to bring the heiress of the Pang clan- GONG Li- back to Shanghai, presumably, as a bait for the wealth of the Pangs.

But, he fails his mission, for he falls in love with the beautiful and innocent and passionate and youthful Gong Li (her character is supposedly around 18 years of age) - a taboo of his profession. After that, the story spins into a tragedy. Gong Li discovers what Cheung really is and decides to marry herself off to her fiance, only to be poisoned, just like her brother a decade ago, by the vengeful Cheung. In the end, Cheung is killed by the gangsters, Gong Li is permanently damaged in the brain, and the Pang clan gathers again to find another heir for the family.

In terms of the people before and behind the scene, "Temptress Moon" has all the promise of a success--the talented director Chen Kaige, the dramatic Lesli Cheung, the beloved Gong Li, and the producer HSU "determined-to-win-an-Oscar" Feng, who has been providing unconditional support for Chen Kaige's films for years. And in terms of the contents of the movie, it has all the attractants that constitute exoticism: opium, adultery, big household with a young woman as the head, Shanghai, exquisite Chinese gardens, wide-eyed beauties in splendidly embroidered traditional Chinese robes (qipao), and of course, Gong Li, the only Chinese actress that has made an impression on Western eyes. Yet, despite all, "Temptress Moon" is a flop, and a grossly unbearable one.

THE CHINESE NEW WAVE

In recent years, nearly all Chinese films with a major theater release in the U.S. are about stories that were set in the Republican period (1911-1949). Politically, the Republican period was war-plagued; the corrupt central government never had much power over the entire country; and large parts of the local societies were threatened by bandits or famine, while in big cities crime thrived. In Mainland's stereotyped version (that is, the Chinese Communist version) of modern Chinese history, this period is devoid of any merits, with one exception -that the political and social degeneration helped pave the way for the great social revolution of 1949. Consequently, Mainland movies made after 1949 have only one way of depicting the Republican period, which is understandably pitch black and shining white, and with the oppressed always triumphing in the end. As for the bad guys in these movies, they are invariably connected with the Nationalist party, and are so sinister looking that you feel the word "vice" is written all over their faces.

However, a new generation of directors, who became prominent in the late 1980s, moved away from the old politically correct line and interpreted the Republican period with some new twists. Here I am referring to ZHANG Yimou (Red Sorghum, Ju Dou, Raise the Red Lantern, Shanghai Triad), CHEN Kaige (Yellow Earth, Life On A String, Farewell My Concubine, Temptress Moon), and HE Ping (Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker). For them, the Republican period, in between an imperial China and a socialist one, is a perfect moment that allows imagined dramas about conflicts between the control of tradition and the yearning for personal freedom. To achieve this dramatic climax, a convenient and attractive scenario is the seduction of otherwise nice women, who are confined in great houses and restricted by ancestral rules.

However, in these movies, the formidable ancestral rules are often invented by the screenwriters and the directors. In "Raise the Red Lantern," for instance, the elaborate ritual of announcing which concubine is to accompany the master to bed was actually director Zhang Yimou's creation. And in fact, in the original short story by the young writer SU Tong, there are no mentioning of red lanterns at all, nor the erotic foot massage.

The invention is only a creativity exercise on the director's part; however, the result can be too real or too fake for the audience. For the Chinese Communist authorities, once the villain is without a clear association with the condemnable, he/she is then viewed purely in symbolic terms. The way the authorities make their interpretation is often self-referential. "Are you referring to us?" so they believed, thus "Ju Dou" and "Raise the Red Lantern" were banned in Mainland China. Even so, the directors have still been able to keep on pursuing their careers - the problem is with their movies, not the artists themselves.

Yet, another kind of criticism has come from intellectuals in the Mainland, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, which is targeted at the films as well as at the intentions of these world-famous Chinese directors. Put in plain words, these directors have been accused of making movies not for their own people, but for the foreigners, and of being guilty of feeding on Westerners' "orientalist" understanding of China by romancing "feudal" elements from the degenerated past. The various film festival awards they have won seem to confirm these critical arguments. This line of criticism dogged Chen Kaige and Zhang Yimou for the most part of their careers, while both of them always denied it.

One of the strongest critics is FENG Jicai, a folk story writer based in Tianjin (near Beijing). He emphatically stated that these new Chinese movies, which expose the backward aspects in Chinese culture to the foreigners, is a disgrace. But, ironically, one of his short stories was made into a film (released in the US in 1995) - "Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker" by the director HE Ping. In this movie, again, a young woman becomes the head of a powerful family, and is attracted to an outsider, who goes through a ridiculous firecracker competition to win the right of marrying her. Frankly speaking, if not for a series of Zhang's films that ignited American audience's interest in Chinese films, He Ping's insignificant work could never have been shown in the US. It would be interesting to see Feng's reaction to this adaptation of his own work, which is as full of the same exotic subjects as in those films he dislikes.

Apparently, these grumpy critics only focused on the unpleasant subject matters - backward countryside, concubines, patriarchal oppressions - and believed that they were what attracted the foreigner's attention. The truth is, there are no short supply of Chinese films with these subject matters, and yet, none of them would ever make it into the West because they are just old-fashioned moral tales. What really separates Chen and Zhang from other Chinese directors is their distinctly new cinematic sensibility, which might have been influenced by the French New Wave; however, they have indeed successfully adopted the style to tell genuine Chinese stories. This new artistic sensitivity in Chinese films inevitably alienated many, who were simply not ready for anything different, but at the same time excited many - Chinese and foreigners alike.

To probe deeper, underneath all these accusations is actually a strong suspicion of the Chinese society being presented in the films, which again reflects a divided perception on the authenticity of a controversial past. The Republican period is gone but not far away. Whoever lived through it, was born at the end of it, has parents nostalgic about it, or has some faintest idea of it, would have a particular and subjective sense of what that period should have been, and should be - in fiction, and in movies. So, Chen and Zhang's movies were scrutinized subjectively and sometimes judged unfairly by numerous personal versions of the past, an honor Hong Kong movies about the same period would never have dreamt of. Directors, as artists, as fellow Chinese citizens, should also be entitled to their own understandings of this period gone. And their thoroughly Chinese works should be appreciated as their personal and sympathetic tribute to the people of the past - an individual work of art rather than the usual educational, propagandistic, "public" movies that have been "entertaining" the Mainland audience even till this day. For example, in the past few years, a series of Mainland movies with official blessings and generous support were films about the major battles fought during the Civil War period (1945-1949), and of course, in each of these long movies, the persevering Red Army heroically fights till the end and their final victory.

NOW TO TEMPTRESS MOON

In 1996, when released in Taiwan and Hong Kong (it is banned in Mainland), "Temptress Moon" was labeled, not surprisingly, as "made for foreigners." And as always, director Chen and producer Hsu strongly refuted these accusations. But this time, unfortunately, the critics do have a point.

The irony is, this made-for-the-foreigners film has not been seen by too many foreigners. To be more precise, this line of criticism actually conveys negative feelings toward the distorted and exaggerated representations of the past that are devoid of any sense of authenticity. And, the purpose for all that fabrication, as the critical audience think, is to please foreign judges at film festivals to win major film awards.

The real problem with "Temptress Moon" is that there is no trace of the director - Chen Kaige. His strong cultural conscience, which he is so famous for, is totally absent. The entire movie seems to have been left to the hands of his cinematographer, the Australian Christopher Doyle. A converted Chinese, Mr. Doyle, who often describes himself, in shockingly perfect Mandarin, as "a Chinese with skin disease," is well-known for his camera work in "Chungking Express" and "Fallen Angels" by the Hong Kong director WONG Kar-Wai. Overall, Mr. Doyle once again did a beautiful work with "Temptress Moon," but movie is not just nice shots, and cinematography should not overwhelm the narrative, which is exactly what happens in "Temptress Moon." For some aesthetic reasons, the whole film seems to have been shot in a thick haze. Was the weather always that bad in the 1920s? No, of course not. Soft-focused shots create a sense of distance, of a dream-like quality, and of melancholy - a perfect mood for nostalgia. This style is commonly employed in Chinese movies about this not-so-distant past. However, this time, Mr. Doyle sped up the usually slow tempo just right for savoring these crafted scenes. Freed from tripods and dollies, his fast-paced, hand-held camera style is perfect for contemporary Hong Kong movies or MTV, but for a movie about China in the 1920s, it is painful to watch and does serious damage to the narrative of the film. The characters are practically chased all over by Doyle's camera - there is literally no room left to act, and no time for the audience to have a clear glance of these figures to spawn any sort of attachment to them.

The weak screenplay did not help either. Chen Kaige and the Shanghai writer WANG Anyi developed the original story line, and the Hong Kong writer/director Shu Kei wrote the script. Mr. Shu's own movie of 1996, "Hu Du Men" - about a Cantonese Opera actress - is a very delicate work, and yet, his script for "Temtpress Moon" is below standard. Plenty of tantalizing psychological mysteries are scattered here and there - the potent effect of opium smoke, the incestuous love between sister and brother (Cheung and his elder sister; Gong Li and her adopted brother), but nothing really amounts to anything worth all that anguish. Instead of a complicated emotional drama as the movie proclaims to be, we only encounter many loose ends typical of unfulfilled ambitious works.

Lesli Cheung, the top actor from Hong Kong, has basically two acting styles. One is the feminine male, the other is the callous male. We have seen the first kind in his memorable performance in "Farewell My Concubine," and in "Temptress Moon" we get to see the second type. However, after the very first moment, viewers well-versed in Hong Kong films will at once recognize another Cheung's callous youth portrayal in Wong Kar-Wai's film - "Days of Being Wild" - identically narcissistic, identically angry, identically heartless, and having the identical problem of telling the woman who he really adores that he loves her. The same performance shines brilliantly in "Days of Being Wild," but in 1920s' Shanghai, it looks totally out-of-place and embarrassingly affected. Every cold glance, every cool gesture, and every slamming of door only remind people of the original crude youth in another time and place; Cheung did not bother to carve out a different and suitable performance for "Temptress Moon," he just slipped into one of his familiar attitudes - and that's not acting. You just can't take him seriously here.

With the leading man constantly alienating the audience, there isn't much for other actors to do to salvage the movie. Gong Li has done her best to portray a girl of eighteen. Innocent and pleasant, she is the heiress of the Pang family, longing to become a Shanghai-styled mature woman in order to capture the heart of Cheung. Her character should be more complicated than it appears, she should be a precious young lady growing up inhaling opium smoke - the symbol of traditional China, and then tempted by Cheung and the modern world he represents. There ought to be several levels of transformations in her, from a girl to a woman via sex, and modernization by seeing a Westernized Shanghai and learning how to ride a bicycle. But, instead of watching minute, sensitive and sensible psychological changes, we go through seemingly disconnected yet always beautiful moments: "she learning how to ride a bike," "she loosing her virginity," "she heart-breaking," and so on. All these scenes have the superficial air of a MTV, busily promoting the good-look but not the acting talent of the star. After breaking up with the director who knows her best, Gong Li is still as popular as ever; however, so far it seems that her best works are those done with Zhang Yimou. Compared with Maggie Cheung, the best Hong Kong actress, Gong Li is not as versatile. She just doesn't look very comfortable in some of her modern and urban roles. As Miss Gong is now engaged in an international film project ("China Box"), it would be interesting indeed to see how her career develops in the future.

One role that does stand out is that of Cheung's elder sister, played by HE Saifei, who also appears in "Raise the Red Lantern" as the third wife. Miss HE is a professional Chinese Opera singer, and, as a result, her body language is more elegant and richer than that of other actresses, including Gong Li. Despite this senseless script, HE still manages to instill some sincerity into her role, as a woman who loves her brother excessively.

Heart-broken by Cheung is a common experience inflicting nearly all the female characters in "Temptress Moon." To show their painful feelings, a patterned scene with different women in focus repeatedly appears throughout the film - it could be Gong Li or He Saifei or any of Cheung lovers - facing the camera, stunned in disbelief, and in seconds their eyes welling up with tears, and with a slight change of lighting, you can see a string of sparkling tear drops rolling down their cheeks like pearls. Why? Is this scene meant to be a profound and poetic statement of sorrow over love? Or was director Chen just too lazy to figure out the various ways to pinpoint sadness?

Resorting to patterns and cliches is the fatal weakness of "Temptress Moon." It feels like it was written and directed by a computer with a super AI (artificial intelligence) - sorting out all the successful ingredients and scrambling them up to make a new dish. You can sense a perspiring cameraman Doyle running all over the place, and all the actors working hard to look as beautiful as possible, no matter what mental state they are supposed to be in. But where is the director?

SEARCHING FOR CHEN KAIGE

In all of his works, Chen Kaige always tries to ask big questions about the essence of Chinese culture, or about the meanings of life. This ambitious task sometimes succeeds as in "Yellow Earth," and oftentimes fails, as in his 1991 film "Life On A String." In either case, he is still special. Movie, for him, has been a powerful medium to state his views on China, its people, its culture, and its history. He was not at all eager to entertain, he prefers recognition. In "Yellow Earth," with just a few strokes, he delineated a simple and yet profound story about people living on the Yellow Plateau, the origin of Han Chinese civilization. The landscape has never been more powerful, more out-spoken as in "Yellow Earth." And, we have yet to see another film so boldly and so subtly questioning the promise of Communism. In many ways, "Yellow Earth" broke away from the old-fashioned narrative, and marked a new epoch in the evolution of Chinese film. Too new and idiosyncratic to be categorized, "Yellow Earth" was therefore interpreted as "non-Chinese," not for the people, nor by the people.

This was the first reason behind the "made-for-the-foreigners" criticism. Sadly, also in Chen Kaige, we found the justification, however figuratively, for it now. Stories about the Republican period have accumulated quite a number of cliches by now, and "Temptress Moon" has them all. Chen Kaige merely rearranged them in his order, summoned a group of actors he likes, and then whipped all of them up into another beautiful, airy substance. Any Hollywood director could have done the job. It has been Chen's habit to use the apparent symbolism associated with his characters to tell a larger story. This method makes his older films lofty and meaningful. In "Temptress Moon," again, we see a lot of hard, intense and direct looks into the camera from each character, hinting at their troubled souls, not only as individuals, but also as the collective souls of China. But this time, in this formulaic melodrama, all cultural references are shut out. A look remains a look, it fails to inspire, nor can it move the audience. It might as well be directed by Bernardo Bertolucci; we would not have cared that much then.

A final note: Now that the Republican period is so clouded with soft-focused fantasies, all directors should try to stay away to avoid more career crash landings.