Henry Shoots, Henry also Blogs: 9/1/06

{This entry is very long. If you intend to read it, please finish the whole blog. There are no links to any of the movies, events on the text itself, because I belief readers should google/search them yourself to get more information. It’s limited, but if you should have a question, send me an email and I am happy to supply you with more background information}

I just saw Zhang Yi-mou’s “HERO” {he also did House of Flying Dagger, and other movies}.

Many western audiences, no doubt, have seen Jet Li and Jackie Chan movies. However, martial art movie themed movies were always considered a second-class citizen among Chinese-speaking directors and movie producers. Whenever a director take on a martial art movie, they use the formulas of wire-fu {people flying all over the place} and superficial combats, with zero storyline.

When Ang Lee’s “Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon” came out, suddenly, directors and producers in China and Hong Kong realized the potential of martial art movies to be “artistic.”

That, or ride on its success and make loads of cash.

Zhang Yi-mou, who had never produced a martial art movie, together with funding from the communist party of China, quickly produced “HERO.”

Zhang Yi-mou is famous to the western audience for his movies such as “Raise the Red Lantern,” a made-belief movie about ancient China {the writer admitted that he knew nothing of the era; he wanted something about women abusing each other when they are enclosed in a small space}.

Such sad and evil tales of “old” such as “Raise the Red Lantern” were always popular in communist China because it shows how the days of old were brutal, ruthless and inhumane, and how the “new” age with communist changed that.

The communist party in China came to power after WW2 after staging a civil war against the Nationalist Party. Many Chinese do not remember this bloody civil war between the parties, because its history had been re-written many times; it’s a subject for another time.

Since it came into power, the communist party purged China of any Chinese culture through the Cultural Revolution {I am sure many Chinese remember those years}, and state-controlled atheism in the education system. They mocked all aspects of Chinese heritage, and everything “cultural” had to be to “revolted.”

But recently there has been a revival of Chinese cultural among Chinese; a people can only go so far without any heritage; a people can go only so far by shouting “long live chairman Mao.”

To combat the Chinese’s yearning of 5,000 years of culture, which is infused with Taoist, Buddhist and Chan {“Zen”} believes, the communist party is constantly trying to redefine Chinese culture according to the party’s belief of atheism. Therefore, under its rule, the party’s “culture” is slowly becoming the “Chinese culture.”

You will see how “HERO” plays into this replacement.

Red, for example, was never a popular color in ancient China. It’s considered too strong, and it means danger and bloodshed. If one gets such a color, it’s considered unlucky. But ask any Chinese today, and they’ll say red is a lucky color.

If one reads any old text, red was never a prominent color in Chinese culture. But red is the color of international communist. With the intentions replacing the Chinese culture, text was altered, sections of paintings were repainted with red, the columns of buildings in Forbidden City were repainted with the color of the party; history was changed. Today, many Chinese actually believe that red is considered a lucky color, or that it represents Chinese.

Communist China had been haunted by the June 4th, 1989 massacre of Tiananmen Square. Although hundreds were slaughtered, many Chinese felt ashamed to admit that their government had done wrong. No doubt, if you ask a Chinese, they often find reasons to legitimize the killing, such as, “China is too big, you need control.” Or, “If the students gained power, there will be wars.”

What they failed to see is that the students did not ask for killing or wars. They asked for a peaceful transition into a new era of democratic rule. What the communist did, was to equate all change to war and bloodshed, therefore all change is bad.

But they are having a difficult time persuading. Internet had allowed more Chinese to understand their history and the truth of the massacre.

This is where “HERO” comes in. In the movie, the Emperor Qin is portrayed as a compassionate ruler who wanted to unite “Our Land” so that there will be no more warfare.

The assassins of the movie “HERO,” while contemplating an assassination attempt on the Emperor Qin’s life came to realize that if Qin ruled the land, there will be no more bloodshed; therefore they gave up their life instead of killing Qin. And hence they are called “heroes.”

That is, of course, no difference from saying, let’s give Hitler all of Europe, so that he won’t attack and there will be no more bloodshed.

The movie went on to say that Qin indeed conquered the 6 Kingdoms and ruled China.

But what it failed to say is that, Emperor Qin, being so afraid of death, was a mass murderer. He killed before he became the emperor, and he carried on killing all rulers and nobles throughout the land, as well as countless innocent citizens during his conquest. He killed “just in case,” he killed just because he could.

Qin’s killing never stopped until his death came to him. Throughout his time, he was searching for the medicine that will bring him eternal life. When that failed, he threw over 3,000 virgins and boys into the raging river.

Just because he could.

However, you won’t see that in the movie.

The land of Middle Kingdom before Qin had been enjoying many years of peace, with scattered battles here and there between small nations. There were many great teachings preaching peace, and people lived in a more harmonized era then what the communist wanted us to believe.

As soon as Qin died, China was sent into series of battles and wars that had never been seen in Chinese history, even before that of the 6 Kingdoms. Emperor Qin had started a chain of mass murder and brutality.

In the past, a war is often stopped by gift or concession, massive murder was never popular, and it was not meant to be part of the game of war. That’s why there is this Chinese saying of “turning blood-cloth into white like jade {to end a war with kind words or gift, instead of bloodshed}.”

However, Qin’s brutality did not unite China; it split China into actual war fares.

The actor Leung Chiu-wai, who played Broken-sword, the ultimate warrior who realized that the emperor must live, went back to Hong Kong proclaiming that the death in Tiananmen Square, 1989, were well-worth it in order to keep China “safe.”

The propaganda worked.

In Chinese culture, Emperor Qin was the bloodiest emperor of old, he was the Hitler of his time, but unlike Hitler, he killed with no discrimination whatsoever.

Now, he’s a “HERO.” The communist party had replaced yet another aspect of Chinese culture with their own “culture,” without anyone suspecting it.

Zhang Yi-mou’s intention to show Qin as the one who ended all wars is but a self-indulgence among his communist party colleagues, who gave him a good sum of money to spend on this project.

***

After Qin’s death, war broke out. It was not until the Emperor of Han, who indeed conquered all warlords created by Qin’s brutality, united China, established a court system, and called it the Han Dynasty.

That is why the people of China, Middle Kingdom, even today, called themselves the People of Han. The language we use is called “Han Language.” When Japanese learnt Chinese from the Tang Dynasty, they called it “Kanji,” or the “Text of Han.”

Of course, if the Emperor of Han went on a killing spree, most likely Zhang Yi-mou might have picked him to be the “HERO” of his film, because it would be easier for Hans/Chinese today to associate themselves with him.

But the Emperor of Han did not do so. In fact, most Chinese rulers of the past did not carry on a killing spree. Often, when a new emperor came into power, they spared prisoners of lesser crimes {“grand spare to the land below the Heaven,”} and gave food and money to the peasant to “ease the pains of the people.”

But that would make a tough tool of propaganda for the communist party, who intended to paint everything from the ancient as evil and wicked.

Zhang Yi-mou, who had never made martial art film, one who looked down on martial art themed movies, went on to make more martial art movies. But his underlying themes are always passion, murder, killing and betrayal. He has a new one coming out, with Chow Yun Fat and Gong Li. Again, it focuses on the bloodshed, betrayal and brutality of a made-believe “China of old.”

I am sure it makes his source of endless funds very happy.

It is not with out a heavy burden that I wrote this entry. Chinese, under many years of communist brainwash, sees that any one who questions the communist as anti-China. However, last time I checked, Karl Marx was never Chinese; Mao Ze-dong killed more Chinese than all the deaths, civilian and military, combined from both WW1 and WW2. How can their beliefs replaced our 5,000 years of cultural heritage? How can a Chinese feel proud of something like that? I, being a strong lover of my culture, carry a heavy burden. It sadden me that Zhang Yi-mou carries on to deface our culture the way he does.

And the most terrible thing of all, many believe that’s how the Chinese of Old were.

I was listening to WNYC's Soundcheck today and John Schaefer interviewed Arielle Dombasle {you can listen to the full interview on Soundcheck. It's highly recommended}.

WOW! What a character. She's a hopeless romantic who loves with a passion. That and the Spanish-French accent is a total killer.

What caught my attention was her singing Mama Cass's Dream a Little Dream of Me.

Arielle sings in early American swing/club tradition. Being French, she loves the American tradition, and gets herself in trouble for being so.

She's quite famous in Europe but in the States she's mostly unknown. But her voice brings you back to those times, even though most of us were not even bornt yet. I am a huge fan of the music from the 50s and earlier {ok, fine, I like those from the 60s, too, and once had Mamas and Papas as my ring tone, but it has since been replaced by SPAMALOT's Brave Sir Robin song {listen to the original Monty Python version here.}

Check out her site at http://www.arielle-dombasle.net/.

Get her CDs, they are simply intoxicating.