Film Pick of the Week: To Live

I will start off this discussion by saying without any apologies that this indeed one of my favorite Chinese language films of all time. Zhang Yimou's To Live is a complete work of art and beauty to this viewer. First of all, the acting is pitch perfect. Gong Li is one of the greatest actresses of our generation that few Americans know anything about (save possibly for her dynamic role in the otherwise flat and tepid Memoirs of a Geisha). Her character, Jiazhen, is beautifully portrayed, believable, and all-together heartbreaking. You Ge is also outstanding as Fugui, one of the best character studies that you'll see in Chinese film. As a character study, the film works fantastically well. Where To Live really shines though, in my opinion, is as a vivid historical piece of 20th century Chinese history that Americans are generally (and sadly) not exposed to. The first shining moment of the film where terms like masterpiece start popping into my head is during the Chinese Civil War. Zhang Yimou could have easily fallen into the trap of overproducing epic battle scenes, but instead he focuses in on the human aspect of war (something tragically missing from the majority of Hollywood blockbusters). We then go from Nationalist to Communist China after the war, and we get to see the vast changes that the country experiences through a single family. The emotions in the film are raw and brutally honest, especially as we see Fugui's children grow into adolescence and later adulthood, with all of life's setbacks and bad breaks, and all the while China's dramatic political serves as a important backdrop. The film's final scene is one of the painful reality as to where Mao had truly taken China by the Cultural Revolution. This film was banned for years in China and the final scene brings some sense as to why. I know of no other film that gives audiences such a candid look at the Cultural Revolution as this one does. Bernardo Bertolucci came close with The Last Emperor, but not even that grand acheivement is able to wring raw emotion from one's soul as does this film. When most adults and really all intellectuals have been ousted from their positions in society in a grand overhaul, what happens to society in general? Who will your doctors be? Should that be a real concern, especially in situations such as the delivery of a child? This is a film that explores those thoughts. It does this, remarkably, without ever being overtly judgemental and without shoving a message down the viewer's throat. That, and so much more, makes this film one of the unsung masterpieces of the 1990s. You can enjoy the trailer below.