Themes: Arranged Marriages, Culture Clash, Social Injustice
Main Cast: Xue Bai, Wang Xueqi, Tan Tuo, Liu Qiang
Release Year: 1984
Country: CN
Run Time: 89 minutes
Plot
Young Red Army soldier Gu Qing is sent to the northern Shaanxi region of China to learn local folk songs in 1939. He stays with a poor grumpy widower, along with his son Hanhan and his precocious teenage daughter Cuiqiao. The three are initially suspicious of the stranger, but they warm to him after hearing of the new ideas of the Communist party. Soon he teaches the silent Hanhan a song with the line, "Only the Communists can save the poor," but it is with Cuiqiao -- who will soon be sold into marriage to an older man who she has been betrothed to since infancy -- that Gu's talk of a new society has the most effect. She is no longer willing to accept her fate; she wants to join the Communist party where women are given the same treatment as men. When Gu leaves the village, he tells her that he will return to take her to Yan'an, the Communist party stronghold. Unfortunately the officer arrives too late and the results are tragic. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Review
Yellow Earth's debut at the 1985 Hong Kong Film Festival forced international audiences to look seriously at Chinese cinema in a manner comparable to the earlier world cinema breakthroughs of Rashomon (1950) and Pather Panchali (1955). Like Breathless (1959) and Cruel Story of Youth (1960), Yellow Earth signaled the rise of a new generation of filmmakers, in this case China's "Fifth Generation." Its director Chen Kaige and cinematographer Zhang Yimou both went on to make some of the most acclaimed Chinese films of the 1980s and 1990s, including Farewell My Concubine (1993) and Raise the Red Lantern (1991). In contrast to earlier Communist-era Chinese films, which were largely vehicles for state ideology, relying on stock characters and cliché situations, Yellow Earth was both fresh and remarkably sophisticated, displaying the traits that would later mark other films of the Fifth Generation. The film features little dialogue, and its narrative is minimal, without melodramatic flourishes or contrived plot points; the drama simply unfolds at a measured pace. Its discourse was clearly shaped by the ravages of Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution. Instead of overt political propaganda, the commentary here is muted and ambivalent. Rather than focusing on the culture of the dominant Han Chinese, the film emphasizes vanishing traditions of remote, often ethnically different settlements. Stylistically, Yellow Earth features unexpected framings, carefully modulated colors, and long takes. Characters are frequently shot at a distance in the midst of the immense desolate landscape of northern China, in a manner that recalls Chinese landscape paintings. Unlike previous generations, who seemed to view film as an artform inferior to literature, Chen and Zhang clearly reveled in the medium, and they produced a masterpiece of world cinema that would prove highly influential for the increasingly important Chinese film industry. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Cast
Xue Bai - Ciu Qiao
Wang Xueqi - Gu Qing
Tan Tuo - The Father
Liu Qiang - Hanhan
Credit
He Qun - Art Director, Chen Kaige - Director, Zhao Jiping - Composer (Music Score), Zhang Yimou - Cinematographer, Chen Kaige - Screenwriter, Zhang Ziliang - Screenwriter, Ke Lan - Book Author
Yellow Earth begins with showing a communist soldier walking several miles. He reaches a small village where he is assigned to live with a poor family with the task of recording local folk songs for use in the army later. He learns the hardships of peasant life and especially of that of a peasant girl named Cui Qiao. The story then focues on the girl, who at only age 14 is forced to marry a significantly older man as her wedding dowry was used to pay for her mother's funeral and brother's engagement. The communist soldier "Brother Gu" eventually indoctrinates the girl into foolishly trying to desert her family to join the army. After her marriage, she crosses the Yellow River at night but fails and drowns. The story then fast forwards to a rain dance being performed by the villagers, as the land has dried up and people's crops have died.
Characters
Father - The village farmer who is the father of Cui Qiao, holds strictly to tradition regardless of his girl's feelings. Beats girl after she complains about her future marriage.
Cui Qiao - The main character and protagonist in the film. Cui Qiao starts out working hard bringing water to the farm and cooking for the family, and washing people's feet.
