In his 1984 film Yellow Earth, how does Chen Kaige depict Chinas relationship with the Communist

cause? How does the film draw connections between the failures of Communism and Chinese culture? Hailed as Chinas debut into the international film market, Yellow Earth represents the birth of a new era in Chinese filmmaking. Yellow Earth was the first of many films made by fifth-generation filmmakers that took a culturally self-reflective view of China. They were seeking the roots of their country that had been lost in the disaster of Communism. These films were controversial as they

presented an historical and cultural reading that was divorced from those of the Chinese state. Indeed, this generation had been

subjected to turbulent changes in the Communist Chinese state that allowed them to form unique and individualistic views of their nation. Chen Kaige and other fifth-generation filmmakers survived exile in the countryside1, the Cultural Revolution, the fall of Mao Zedong and the rise of Deng Xiaoping. Yellow Earth is one of the first examples of films from this period of cultural critique. Set in 1939 Japanese occupied China, the film depicts the story of a young Communist soldiers sojourn in a peasant household in North Shaanxi. In Yellow Earth, Chen Kaige uses various cinematic techniques to depict his view that Communism was a tragic historical failure. He also attributes the failure of Communism to its A. Lam, Identity, Tradition and Globalism: Post-Cultural Revolution Chinese Feature Films 1977-1996, VDM Aktiengesellschaft, Germany, 2008, p. 129
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inability to pull the Chinese people out of their oppressive communitarian culture. He also greatly emphasizes the close

relationship between Chinese traditional culture and the land, citing the land as part of the tyrannical bind that keeps his people in primitive obscurity2. Despite its subtle cinematography and storyline, Yellow Earths depicts a scathing critique of the dire failure of Communism. The relationship between Gu Qing, the Communist soldier, and Cuiqiao, daughter of the peasant households patriarch, portrays the relationship between the communist doctrine and the Chinese people. Cuiqiaos life and death as a poor peasants daughter, her sufferings, yearnings, and futile struggle are solicited to reflect the fate of Chinese people3, writes Chinese cinema academic Yi Zheng. Throughout the film, Gu Qing caresses Cuiqiaos yearnings with stories of womens liberation in the Communist Eighth Route army. For example, when Gu Qing first arrives in the peasant he begins discussing the wedding ceremony he

household

witnessed earlier that day.

He tells Cuiqiaos father our women This custom must be

arent worthless, and we dont sell them.

changed. Cuiqiaos father responds bitterly we farmers have our rules, while Cuiqiao listens intently in the background. Young

Cuiqiao is waiting her own dreaded arranged marriage, and begins Baum, G., Minford, J, Seeds of Fire: Chinese Voices of Conscience, Bloodaxe Books, UK, 1989, 3 Hsiao-peng Lu, S., Transnational Chinese Cinemas: Identity, Nationhood and Gender, University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1997, p. 349.
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to look at Gu Qin as her saviour from her terrible fate. But as the film progresses, Chen Kaige reveals hypocrisy and impotence in the young Communist soldier. Gu Qing actively fosters Cuiqiaos He tells

admiration for him, but nonetheless decides to leave.

Cuiqiao he will be back in a few months. Cuiqiao, heartbroken, goes to Gu Qing in her bridal dress and implores him to take her with him. Gu Qing explains to her that he cant because we officials are bound by regulationswe abide by these rules to fight for our country, before promising to come back and get her.

Paradoxically, Gu Qings obligation to rules mirrors that of Cuiqiaos father, seen earlier in their discussion of child marriage with Cuiqiaos father. Gu Qin is thus exposed as powerless against the rules of Chinese society. The Communist Party was also once full of promises for the nation. But as the film develops, Communism is gradually revealed as a product of the society it tries to fight against, and becomes impotent. Chen Kaige then uses the death of Cuiqiao to argue that the Communist Party was not only impotent, but that the promises it made to the Chinese people and its failure to meet them had calamitous consequences for the state. Cuiqiao, suffering in her

arranged marriage and forlorn that Gu Qin did not return to save her, decides to cross the Yellow River to join the Eighth Route army on the other side. She rows from the shore in her small boat and begins singing a Communist ditty, taught to her by Gu Qin: the piebald cock flies over the wall, the Communist Party shall save us

all! But she cannot finish the words Communist party before she drowns in the river. That Cuiqiao drowns in the river trying to join the Communist army implies her death can be blamed on Gu Qin. Therefore, it is evident that Chen Kaige used the relationship between Gu Qin and Cuiqiao in Yellow Earth to portray the immense failure of the Communist party in China, and emphasize the suffering the Chinese people endured as a result. In Yellow Earth, Chen Kaige uses a range of innovative

cinematography devices to depict the oppression of the individual in outdated, communitarian Chinese culture. The most controversial and quintessential of these techniques can be summed up in a single word: concealment4, says Chen Kaige. Moments in the film that are silent, faces and thoughts that are hidden and spaces that are empty are infinitely complex, and paradoxically contain some of the most important information of the film. Chen Kaige uses these aural and visual voids to emphasize the powerlessness,

voicelessness and isolation of the individual in traditional Chinese communitarian culture. Cuiqiao and Hanhan, the two child

protagonists, are the most voiceless and powerless characters in the film. They represent Chinas future, burdened by the countrys

culture and traditions5. Hanhan remains silent throughout most of the movie, which shocked critics of the time. [Hanhan]doesnt say a word for ages. This is completely unrealistic Childrenare Baum, G., Minford, J, Seeds of Fire: Chinese Voices of Conscience, Bloodaxe Books, UK, 1989, p. 88. 5 Hsiao-peng Lu, S., p. 111.
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energetic and loveable6, complained veteran director Han Shangyi. However, Chen Kaiges choice for Hanhan to be silent is important. Not only does it make him powerless and estranged, but the audience often only see Hanhan when he is labouring in the fields. This suggests that he is unnaturally silent because has been subjected to hard labour by his father to help support their poor family. In this, Hanhan becomes a symbol of the severity of Chinese communitarian culture. Significantly, when characters in Yellow Earth do talk to each other, they are almost never seen facing one another. One poignant

example of this is when Cuiqiaos father tells her she will soon be married off to pay for her mothers funeral and her brothers wedding. For the entirety of the scene, the camera focuses only on her face, while her father tells her she will be married off-screen. Every girl takes this pathanyway, you were promised as a child, he says, his voice cracking with tears. This alienating portrayal of a conversation is used throughout the film to exacerbate the characters inability to communicate with each other. In this scene, Cuiqiao is devastated by the news, while her father sobs with guilt of the decision he has been forced to make. They become so

weighted by their cultural ancestry that they cannot talk and are unable to help each other. Chen Kaige thus reveals the death of the individual in communitarian Chinese society.

Ibid., p. 90.

In Yellow Earth, Chen Kaige also uses emptiness and voicelessness to focus on the complex relationship between Chinese cultural heritages and the land, sky and water. He portrays the harsh earth as oppressive, and the Chinese peoples bind to it for sustenance. Zhang Yimou, Yellow Earths cinematographer, states in an

interview We wanted to express a number of things in Yellow Earth: the boundless magnificence of the heavens, the supporting vastness of the earth the endurance of a nation. The cry of a

people from the depths of primitive obscurity, and their strength7 Countless long shots of the dusty Loess plateau with a single tiny figure drowning in the undulations of the earth visually portray the limitless, oppressive land. Shots of the earth and sky without a

focal point allows the camera to get lost in the vastness of the natural surrounds, a disorientating technique so foreign to Western filmmaking. The voice of the ill-fated Cuiqiao echoes eternally over the plateau to reach Gu Qin, who nonetheless leaves her. Beyond oppression, Chen Kaige also depicts the Chinese peoples

dependence on their land and sky, and thus their respect for it. In this, the Chinese people become enduring, like their harsh communitarian cultural legacy. For example, Gu Qin sits with the family for a meal of millet gruel in the field. Cuiqiaos father rises to look at the opaque sky. In a masterfully composed shot, Cuiqiaos father becomes inferior to the heavens that stretch up two-thirds of the frame above him. This emptiness emphasizes the sheer power
7

Ibid., p. 88.

of the sky against the Chinese people. Cuiqiaos father then says always clouds, no rain. Looks like drought this year, no harvest, before reciting a prayer to the dragon god for rain. Gu Qin laughs at this superstition, but Cuiqiaos father tells him this old yellow earth, it lets you tread on it, plough it up. Would you? Have you no respect for it? This scene depicts the Chinese peoples respect for their land, and their deep-rooted strength amongst the harsh elements. Chen Kaige also uses many other filmic techniques to depict the raging currents of the Yellow River, and the Chinese peoples dependence on it for water. The endless shots of the rivers muddy currents, not unlike those used to portray the Loess plateau, depict the rivers eternal, weighted presence. Cuiqiaos infinite trips to the river to collect water, her small shoulders bearing the weight of huge water vessels, depicts Cuiqiao as not only enslaved to the river, but enslaved to her family to provide water. Also, Cuiqiaos voice that drifts across the Yellow River as she toils is a very important symbol in a movie that is mostly silent. She sings of her powerlessness Cuiqiao wants to speak, but how, she doesnt know! Cuiqiao sings wonderfully and without any audience but the river, emphasizing the sad loss of her fertile beauty in an oppressive land and backward culture that endeavours to imprison her. This loss is exacerbated when Cuiqiao tragically drowns in the Yellow River. That Cuiqiao ironically drowns in an area plagued by drought further conveys the mercilessness of the land. In this scene Chen

Kaige identifies her death with the unforgiving river and Chinese traditional society. Chinese traditional society is represented by the Yellow River, the cradle of Chinese civilisation8, and that Cuiqiao is escaping her arranged marriage. Hence, in Yellow Earth, Chen

Kaige uses a range of cinematic techniques to portray oppressive Chinese traditional culture, and the harsh land that formed the Chinese nation. In Yellow Earth, Chen Kaige argues that Communism failed because of its inability to bring the Chinese people out of their oppressive, cyclical relationship with their outdated culture and harsh land. The very last scene where the village prays to the dragon king for rain exemplifies this. The peasants, adorned in leaf crowns, wail and Hanhan

kowtow, then rise to run to the statue of the river god.

stands up and turns to see Gu Qin coming over the hill. Hanhan, who is still mourning the death of his sister, runs toward Gu Qin. But he cannot push through the crowd of running villagers and Gu Qin cannot make it up over the hill. Despite their eternal struggle, Hanhan and Gu Qin never reach each other. In this powerful scene, the rushing peasants parallel the rushing Yellow River. Chen Kaige depicts Hanhan and Cuiqiao meeting the same fate. They both

drown in the muddy, leaden waters of Chinese culture trying to reach Gu Qin, who represents Communism. The eternal endurance of the peasantry tramples the promises of Communism and children of Chinas future. The Hong Kong based film scholar, Yingjin Zhang,
8

Hsiao-peng Lu, S., p. 111.

wrote of Yellow Earth the Communist cadre is no longer competent in his ideological indoctrination in a village plagued by drought and peasants are no longer spontaneous in their response to call for revolution, but instead deeply entrenched in their superstitious belief in the forever powerful dragon king9. This statement

perfectly encapsulates Chen Kaiges message that he depicts in this final scene. Communism failed because it could not meets the

needs of the people, who were steeped in backward Chinese communitarian culture. Chen Kaige, also portrays that the cost of this historical disaster was the lives and futures of many Chinese people, and that the nation now stood in a cultural black hole. Yellow Earth is a masterful portrayal of Chen Kaiges understanding of the Communist cause before the 1980s. Prior to the new era,

Communism was a doctrinal catastrophe that impacted greatly on Chen Kaiges life. His re-education by Yunan peasants on a rubber farm in 1968 particularly influenced his understanding of the realities of the Communist doctrine and his countrys cultural roots. It is in fact the cultural roots of China that Chen Kaige searches for in Yellow Earth. He was one of the first amongst the fifth-generation filmmakers to ask the question what is wrong with our culture that led to our disgraceful recent history?10 What Chen Kaige offers in Yellow Earth is his own answer to that question. He uses a range of cinematographic techniques to argue that Communism was such a Zhang, Y., J., Chinese National Cinemas, Routledge, New York, 2004, p. 236 10 Lam, A., p. 141.
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dire failure because it promised to liberate the Chinese people from their oppressive, traditional culture. But eventually, the weight of the land and the legacy of thousands of years of Chinese tradition prevailed and the collapse of Communism had huge costs on Chinese society. But Chen Kaiges depiction of Communism and

Chinese culture is not at all didactic. Conversely, he conveys the Chinese people as strong and enduring, but burdened by their cultural heritage. He depicts the great potential of their energy if properly tapped and directed11. In this, Chen Kaige finally asks what possibilities lay over the horizon for such an immensely powerful but terribly scarred country as China.

11

Baum, G., p. 93.

Bibliography Yellow Earth, 1984, motion picture, released by Ronin Films, Canberra. Baum, G., Minford, J, Seeds of Fire: Chinese Voices of Conscience, Bloodaxe Books, UK, 1989. Hsiao-peng Lu, S., Transnational Chinese Cinemas: Identity,

Nationhood and Gender, University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1997. Lam, A., Identity, Tradition and Globalism: Post-Cultural Revolution Chinese Feature Films 1977-1996, VDM Aktiengesellschaft,

Germany, 2008. Zhang, Y., J., Chinese National Cinemas, Routledge, New York, 2004.