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David Parkinson succumbs to intoxicating perfection

The winner of Berlin’s Golden Bear, Zhang Yimou’s directorial debut introduced international arthouse audiences to Fifth Generation Chinese cinema. Zhang had cut his teeth behind the camera of Beijing Film Academy classmate Chen Kaige’s first features, and his mastery of CinemaScopic Eastmancolor is evident in every shot of this audiovisually sublime adaptation of Mo Yan’s novel. While most applauded this period epic for its intensity and intelligence and for its dramatic shift from folk fable to realist eulogy, some complained that the workers’ heroic resistance to the invading Japanese was nothing more than cheap, pro-Party propaganda. However, this completely misses the point that Red Sorghum is the Xi’an Studio equivalent of Gone With the Wind. Just as Scarlett O’Hara vowed to return Tara to its former glory, so Gong Li urges her workforce to transform the fortunes of the winery that had been allowed to decline by her leprous husband. Call it collectivism if you must, but surely Zhang is anticipating the free-market credo that would underpin the economic miracle of the ensuing decades? And what is the barbarity of the Japanese, but an echo of the Unionist incursion into Georgia during the Civil War sequences in David O. Selznick’s masterpiece? Even Gong’s romance with palanquin carrier Jiang Wen recalls Scarlett’s tempestuous relationship with Rhett Butler, who similarly resorted to force to impose his sexual will.

But where Red Sorghum most resembles the 1939 Hollywood classic is in the meticulous craftsmanship involved in its making. Yang Gang’s art direction and Zhao Jiping’s score are as impeccable as Gong and Jiang’s relishably mannered performances. But it’s Zhang who, not content with conveying the sights and sounds of the forbiddingly beautiful north-eastern landscape, invests Gu Changwei’s compositions and the uncredited sound design with a sensuality that almost enables the viewer to touch, taste and smell the wine (not that many would want to, given its secret ingredient). With so much cinematic viscerality currently computer-generated, the temptation of succumbing to the intoxicating perfection of the colours, passions and ideas on offer here is utterly irresistible.

 

David Parkinson on 20th December 2008
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