画魂7.3

网友热议

• 来自网友【他他】的评论Two Chinese motion pictures starring Gong Li, one of the best living actors in China, perhaps even in the world. A SOUL HAUNTED BY PAINTING is a standard biography about Chinese painter Pan Yuliang (1895-1977), helmed by Chinese Fourth Generation director Huang Shuqin, one of China's most talent woman directors. Meanwhile, COMING HOME marks her 9th collaboration with Zhang Yimou, the torchbearer among Chinese Fifth Generation directors. It is a quintessential tearjerker in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution.Pan Yuliang is deemed as the first Chinese woman painter adopting the Western style in her works. Hailed from an obscure provenance and sold to a brothel when she was only 14 after the passing of both parents, Yuliang's incredible real-life story has an innate tabloid quality which is juicy for a cinematic re-enactment. From a feminine viewpoint, the trajectory of her life is peppered with barriers erected from masculine, often macho bigotry and denigration. Her disreputable stint in the brothel and her portraits of female nudity, both are taboos during the rule of the Republic of China (1912-1949), which eventually put a kibosh on her career in her homeland. Even employed as an art professor in the National Central University after her works winning awards in France, Yuliang was still ostracized by her ivory tower colleagues. In 1937, she left China for France, and lived there until her death.In A SOUL HAUNTED BY PAINTING, Huang's chronological narrative makes light of Yuliang the artist, audience is none the wiser where her talent comes from, how her skill and style is nurtured and developed, her latter days in France is merely sketchily touched on. In lieu, the film is predominantly keen on showing up the injustice inflicted on her as a woman. From the horror in the bordello, she is no longer a virgo intacta (ravished by her pimp) and obliviously drugged to be sterile even before her very first client, to the wrongs piled on her after gaining fame for her paintings abroad when she is constantly at the receiving end of sexism and male chauvinism.Her domestic situation is another imbroglio, in spite of having a loving husband Zanhua (Yee, Hong Kong actor-turned-director), who buys her out of prostitution, Yuliang's concubine identity and infertility conduces to a polygamous predicament, where Zanhua's first wife (Shen) is also in the picture of their marriage, who bears an heir to Zanhua. However, Huang and her co-writers are astute enough not to let petty grievance or jealousy color the feminine rapport, whether it is in the brothel, or abroad in France, a sisterly bond is something Yuliang can always cherish and hold on to, although in both cases, they end up in sheer tragedy. Even between her and Zanhua's first wife, there is no overt bad blood, and Yuliang's decision to break out of the awkward ménage à trois trenchantly manifests her own independence as a full-fledged modern woman, who cannot be constrained by any feudal shibboleth.Gong Li, who was in the zenith of her youthful pulchritude and despite that she is a northerner (from Liaoning province) straining to play a southerner (Yuliang is from Jiangsu province), matures wonderfully with Yuliang's age, especially when sporting a short haircut in a snug cheongsam, her gamine, modern allure and pizzazz is a new look to contrast her default rustic screen images.Then, 20 years later, in COMING HOME, Gong Li plays a middle-aged woman Feng Wanyu, who is suffered from an unspeakable trauma, the resultant amnesia causes her incapable of recognizing her long-lost husband Lu Yanshi (Chen Daoming), a professor who returns home after 20 years in the 1970s, after the Cultural Revolution is over.Starting the film with a 30-minute heightened passage of Yanshi's failed attempt to meet Wanyu on account of the betrayal of their daughter Dandan (a fresh-faced Zhang Huiwen, showing off her terpsichorean aptitude as well as a rough-hewn quality in emoting) after escaping from the labor camp. The lion's share of COMING HOME is about Yanshi's relentless endeavor to resuscitate Wanyu's dormant memory and mend the broken tie between a parent and a daughter.In order not to challenge the censorship, screenwriter Zou Jingzhi maxes himself out to whittle away the part about the controversial Cultural Revolution from author Yan Geling's novel to the minimum, and entrusts audience to sense its pernicious consequences solely from one family's trial and tribulation. All three of them, Wanyu, Yanshi and Dandan are deluded and victimized by the persecution. It is a nifty strategy to secure the green light from the increasingly draconian censorship (it is dicey to confirm such a story can be made in year 2023).Therefore, Zhang Yimou condenses the major emotional impact to the tentative, heartwarming interactions between Yanshi and Wanyu, and both Chen Daoming and Gong Li swing for the fences with all their might and COMING HOME is a potent showcase for these two beloved thespians, both giving powerhouse performances, especially Gong Li, who has attained the stratospheric naturalness where artificial acting dissolving vanishingly into every line, expression, gesticulation and movement. Regard the way every time Chen Daoming's expectant gaze turns despondent, you can see the spark literally extinguished in his eyes, a feat conciliated appositely by Gong Li's unfeigned befuddlement, from which you can read behind her blurred memory, and she even rings the changes attuned to Wanyu's unpredictable states, including baring the bane of her misfortune in vehement defense.Visually, Zhang Yimou's supernatural acumen for period and palette remains reproachable, the muted color and homespun setting is diametrically against the lush, harlequin aesthetics which he is famous for. Tonally, COMING HOME aims for that elusive holy grail of a melodrama without sentimentality, and it sticks its landing fair and square. Eventually, a family is formed, albeit it is not what Yanshi hopes, still, it is a plausible, uplifting solution. The ending with Yanshi holding a paper board with his own name on it, in front of the exit of the train station with Wanyu, in their old person makeup, strikes a touching chord with audience, not just for its painful irony, also because it silently reminds us their affliction's unuttered causation, a protestation as reverberating as it can get.referential entries: Zhang Yimou's ONE SECOND (2020, 7.7/10), RAISE THE RED LANTERN (1991, 8.4/10), THE STORY OF QIUJU (1992, 8.0/10), TO LIVE (1994, 8.3/10); Xie Jin's HIBISCUS TOWN (1987, 8.2/10).English Title: A Soul Haunted by PaintingOriginal Title: Hua hun 画魂Year: 1994Genre: Biography, Drama, RomanceCountry: China, Taiwan, FranceLanguage: Mandarin, FrenchDirector: Huang Shuqin 黄蜀芹Screenwriters:Huang Shuqin 黄蜀芹Liu Heng 刘恒Li Ziyu 李子羽Min Anqi 闵安琪based on the novel by Shi Nan 石楠Music: Liu Yuan 刘湲Cinematography: Lü Yue 吕乐, Xia Lixing 夏力行Editor: Liu Jialin 刘嘉麟Cast:Gong Li 巩俐Yee Tung-Shing 尔冬升Da Shichang 达式常Shen Hai-Jung 沈海蓉Gao Juanxia 高俊霞Chou Shao-tung 周绍栋Chang Chiung-Tzu 张琼姿You Lihua 尤丽华Xu Jun 徐俊Tai-Bo 太保Xu Xing 徐幸Fang-Tsen 方岑Xu Caigen 徐才根Zhao Wei 赵薇Tien Feng 田丰Rating: 7.1/10English Title: Coming HomeOriginal Title: Gui lai 归来Year: 2014Genre: Drama, RomanceCountry: ChinaLanguage: MandarinDirector: Zhang Yimou 张艺谋Screenwriters: Zou Jingzhi 邹静之based on the novel by Yan Geling 严歌苓Music: Chen Qigang 陈其钢Cinematography: Zhao Xiaoding 赵小丁Editors: Peicong Meng 孟佩璁, Zhang Mo 张末Cast:Chen Daoming 陈道明Gong Li 巩俐Zhang Huiwen 张慧雯Guo Tao 郭涛Yan Ni 闫妮Liu Peiqi 刘佩琦Zu Feng 祖峰Xin Baiqing 辛柏青Zhang Jiayi 张嘉益Chen Xiaoyi 陈小艺Ding Jiali 丁嘉丽Li Chun 李纯Rating: 7.9/10