My China Adventure Travelogue

This was another great movie by director Zhang Yimou.  

This film is based in 1930's gangster underworld, and spans 7 days.

  

It is centered around the life of a young man, 14 yr old Shuisheng, who just recently moved to Shanghai from the country to get a job with his uncle.  Little did he know what he was getting into.  On his first day, he witnesses a murder over an opium delivery.  His uncle works for the major crime boss of Shanghai, "Boss" Tang.  "Boss" has a mistress, Jinbao,  who is now Shuisheng's duty to wait upon, as he is now her personal servant.  Wherever she goes, he goes.

Mistress is having an affair with Boss' right-hand man, Song.  It ends abruptly, the night before Boss and his men are attacked by Boss' rival, Fat Yu.  Among the men killed by Fat Yu's men, are Shuiseng's uncle, Liu.  Boss was stabbed during the battle.  

The next night, Boss and a few of his men, including Mistress and Shuisheng, are brought to a remote island where they can hide, and Boss can recuperate from his injuries.  There are only 2 other people living on the island.

Mistress befriends the peasant woman who lives on the island with her 9 yr old daughter, Ajiao.  Every time someone sees the child, they comment on how beautiful she is, and how she looks like Mistress when she was young.  Mistress unwittingly butts into the peasant Cuihao's life, mostly out of boredom, and causes destruction.  One night, she wonders over to Cuihao's hut, and sees her in bed with a man who had snuck onto the island at night to be with her.  When she jokes about it to Boss, he has his men kill the man, because his orders were that no one enters or leaves the island without his permission.  He blames Mistress for the death when she confronts him about it.

By the 7th day of Shuisheng's adventures in Shanghai, he witnesses a mahjong game between Boss, Mistress, Zheng (bosses other man), and Song.  Boss admits to having known the entire time that Song was working for Fat Yu, and having an affair with Mistress.  He has had  Song followed, and planned this night for months.  He admits he was never actually wounded.

Boss kills Song, and tells Mistress he is going to kill her, too.  She asks him to leave the little girl Ajiao alone, and he tells her no.  He plans on killing her mother, and bringing the little girl to Shanghai to raise as the next Mistress.

When Shuisheng tries to stop him, he gets strung upside down on the boat, and the last scene is of the little girl telling Boss that she wants to be just like Mistress.  It was sad that the whole cycle would repeat itself.

One thing I did not like about this movie (and Raise the Red Lantern) is that it's the men who put the women in horrible situations, but it's the women who get blamed for the horrible things that happen.

A movie with a message. This was a great film.

I can't believe the huge gap between poor and rich. Even after having traveled through China, I had no idea how crazy it could get.

Here is a 13 yr old girl, Wei Minzhi, who has been chosen to be the substitute teacher for a school in a small village in the mountains. Of course, the children will not listen to her, especially the young prankster, Zhang Huike.

Minzhi is told by the teacher before he leaves that she is not to lose one more student. If one student leaves while she is in charge, he will not pay her as much money. The only problem is that the mayor comes one day to take away a little girl to bring her to a sport school in the city. She tries to hide her so she can't leave, but it doesn't work.

Shortly after, Zhang Huike is missing from class. Minzhi finds out that he has gone to the city to help his sick mother pay off the debt she owes after his father has died.

Now that's 2 children who have left her class, and Minzhi starts to panic. She goes to the mayor to ask him for his help, but there's nothing he can do. She decides to ask the children for help getting into the city to search for Zhang Huike, but the children have no money. One of the children tell her about the factory in town, and how they can earn money by moving bricks. They all run over to the factory and start moving bricks, the manager takes pity on them and gives her money, but it's not enough.

Minzhi hitchhikes a ride to the city and begins her search. She is there for days, searching for Zhang, who became lost on his first day. After a few failed attempts at finding him, Minzhi goes to the nearest TV station to try to get on air. She is there for a day and a half asking for the station manager when she is finally let in, and goes on a TV program beseeching Zhang Huike to return to her. When he sees her tear streaked face begging him to come back, he does.

The TV crew follow Minzhi and Zhang on the way back to their village, in the car, during their interview, the reporter asks Zhang what he will always remember about the city. He pauses, and says, very seriously, the he "will always remember having to beg for food."
Many people have donated money and school supplies after having seen the TV program Minzhi was on. It turned out to be a happy ending.

At the end of the movie, the director gives us facts, saying that millions of children drop out of school each year, and only about 15% can return, thanks to donations.

"Light The Red Lantern"

  

This film is about a young woman, Songlian, a former student, who decides to become a rich man's 4th concubine.  She feels that she has no other choice, since her stepmother wants to get rid of her after her father's death, and she has no way of paying for school.

As soon as she moves in to her new quarter, she meets open hostility from some of the other women.  

The only friend she has is 2nd Mistress (or does she?)  3rd Mistress treats her unfairly from the start, and 1st Mistress really wants nothing to do with any of them.

The Master of the house has a long family tradition that dictates that red lanterns will be lit in the quarter of the woman whom he is going to spend the night with.  Everyday, each woman has to wait by the entranceof their quarter in the courtyard to see which one of them will be chosen.  Talk about cruel competition.  If that's not bad enough, to make the women even more jealous, only the one with red lanterns gets a foot massage.  After not getting a foot massage after having one for many days (as the new mistress) Songlian actually begins to crave it.  She plots a way to make sure that she will have a foot massage every night, by pretending to be pregnant.

When Songlian isn't dealing with pettiness from 3rd Mistress, she also has to deal with a jealous, vindictive maid.  The maid is jealous of 4th Mistress because she had delusions of being a Mistress because of the affair she is having with the Master.  Yang, the maid, hates 4th Mistress so much that she tells 2nd Mistress that she has had her period, which angers the Master so much that he covers her lanterns.  This means that he will not be lighting the lanterns for a very long time.

It turns out the 2nd Mistress was really a woman with "a buddha face, but the heart of a scorpion".  The whole time she was pretending to be friendly with Songlian, she was really plotting against her, as she was with 3rd Mistress.   3rd Mistress may have been mean to Songlian at first, but really she is the only nice one there.

On a day when she was not chosen, Songlian begins to explore the house.  On the farthest and highest roof she sees a locked room and wonders what is inside.  She finds out that that room was used for hanging women of past generations.

Everything about this house is slowly changing Songlian.  One day she gets drunk because she is depressed about causing the maid's death (in a fit of rage and vengeance) and about having her lanterns covered.  She mistakingly tells 2nd Mistress a secret about 3rd Mistress that causes the Master to "send her away" (to the room-top room).

In the end, Songlian looses her mind.

I found it interesting that the Master's face was never clearly seen.  He is almost seen when he is in the bed of Songlian, but the camera only ever focuses on the women.  They are the main focus of the film.  The face of the man is unimportant.  Because in actuality, it didn't matter which man it was who they were bound to, they would have had the same problems if they had married any other rich man.