Farewell my concubine

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Movie
German title Farewell my concubine
Original title 霸王别姬 Bàwáng Bié Jī
Country of production China
original language Mandarin
Publishing year 1993
length 171 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director Chen Kaige
script Lillian Lee ,
Lei Bik-Wa ,
Lu Wei
production Hsu Bin ,
Hsu Feng ,
Hsu Jade
music Zhao Jiping
camera Gu Changwei
cut Pei Xiaonan
occupation

Farewell, my concubine (Original title: 霸王別姬  /  霸王别姬 , Bàwáng Bié Jī ) is a Chinese film by Chen Kaige from 1993. It is one of the most important works of Chinese cinema by the fifth generation of directors. This film describes the upheavals in Chinese history in the 20th century. Essentially, it's about two stars of Chinese opera and a woman who gets between the two. The film is based on the novel Farewell, My Concubine by Bihua Lee .

action

In 1977, one year after the end of the Cultural Revolution , two men step onto the stage of a Peking Opera . A voice from the off reports that the two have not performed together for 22 years.

Then there is a cut. The action now takes place in 1924. Two orphans, Dieyi "Douzi" (bean) and Xiaolou "Shitou" (stone), are trained as Peking Opera artists by Master Guan - Douzi is trained in the role of a woman, Shitou as a man. Master Guan's training includes sadistic and inhuman methods.

After this episode you can see Douzi as an adult who has perfected the role of the concubine in the play "Farewell, My Concubine". Douzi and Shitou sing famous duets and the audience is thrilled, both of which are becoming famous opera stars. In the course of the plot, the political upheavals in China in the twentieth century play a role again and again: the Japanese occupation, the liberation by the communists and the terror among the communists. Shitou falls in love with a woman, which Douzi resents him. Peking Opera is his life and he loves shitou.

Role of Peking Opera

The plot of the film parallels the plot of the opera. The loyalty of the concubine to her emperor plays an important role. The transition between two dynasties can be found in the transition of China to the communist dictatorship. The concubine's fateful devotion to her emperor parallels Dieyi's devotion to Xiaolou.

Awards

literature

  • Clark, Paul. Reinventing China: A Generation and Its Films . Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 2005.
  • Zha, Jianying. China Pop: How Soap Operas, Tabloids, and Bestsellers Are Transforming a Culture . New York: New Press: Distributed by WW Norton, 1995.
  • Braester, Yomi. “Farewell My Concubine: National Myth and City Memories.” In Chinese Films in Focus: 25 New Takes , edited by Chris Berry, 89–96. London: British Film Institute, 2003.
  • Kaplan, Ann. "Reading Formations and Chen Kaige's Farewell My Concubine." In Sheldon Lu, ed., Transnational Chinese Cinema: Identity, Nationhood, Gender . Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1997.
  • Larson, Wendy. "The Concubine and the Figure of History: Chen Kaige's Farewell My Concubine." In Sheldon Lu, ed., Transnational Chinese Cinema: Identity, Nationhood, Gender . Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1997; also published as “Bawang bieji: Ji yu lishi xingxiang”, Qingxiang (1997); also in Harry Kuoshu, ed., Chinese Film, ed.Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2000.
  • Lau, Jenny Kwok Wah. “Farewell My Concubine: History, Melodrama, and Ideology in Contemporary Pan-Chinese Cinema.” Film Quarterly 49, 1 (Fall, 1995).
  • Lim, Song Hwee. "The Uses of Femininity: Chen Kaige's Farewell My Concubine and Zhang Yuan's East Palace, West Palace." In Lim, Celluloid Comrades: Representations of Male Homosexuality in Contemporary Chinese Cinemas . Honolulu: University of Hawai'i, 2006, 69-98.
  • Lu, Sheldon Hsiao-peng. "National Cinema, Cultural Critique, Transnational Capital: The Films of Zhang Yimou." In Transnational Chinese Cinema , edited by Sheldon Lu, 105-39. Honololu: University of Hawaii Press, 199.
  • McDougall, Bonnie S. "Cross-dressing and the Disappearing Woman in Modern Chinese Fiction, Drama and Film: Reflections on Chen Kaige's Farewell My Concubine." China Information 8, 4 (Summer 1994): 42-51.
  • Butcher, Sean. "Farewell My Fantasy." The Journal of Homosexuality 39, 3/4 (2000): 213-32. Rpt. in Andrew Grossman, ed. Queer Asian Cinema: Shadows in the Shade. NY: Harrington Press, 2000, 213-232.
  • Xu, Ben. "Farewell My Concubine and Its Western and Chinese Viewers." Quarterly Review of Film and Television 16, 2 (1997).
  • Zhang, Benzi. "Figures of Violence and Tropes of Homophobia: Reading Farewell My Concubine between East and West." Journal of Popular Culture: Comparative Studies in the World's Civilizations 33, 2 (1999): 101-109.

Web links