The Volunteers: The Battle of Life and Death
志愿军 第二部 存亡之战
China, 2024, colour, 2.35:1, 142 mins.
Director: Chen Kaige 陈凯歌.
Rating: 6/10.
Second part of the Korean War trilogy again downplays the flagwaving and this time pivots on one family’s involvement in the conflict.
STORY
Beijing, 26 Jun 1950. PLA political instructor Li Xiang (Zhu Yilong) returns home from Xi’an and is greeted by his father Li Moyin (Xin Baiqing), a staff officer in the Military Commission’s Combat Section. Li Xiang learns his mother has died and that he has a younger sister, Li Xiao (Zhang Zifeng), who was found in Shanghai after the city was liberated, having been adopted by some foreign teachers. Li Moyin is suddenly called away on business to the Military Commission, where he learns that, following the outbreak of civil war in Korea the previous day, US President Truman (Bill Neenan) has declared US military support for South Korea’s army. Li Xiang leaves the next day to rejoin his unit, Li Moyin leaves that evening for North Korea, and Li Xiao is left alone. On 19 Oct the People’s Volunteer Army – PLA troops renamed, so as not to be seen to officially represent China – crosses the Yalu river into North Korea to fight the “UN Command” (largely US and South Korean troops) threatening the local army. On 31 Dec the PVA breaks through the 38th Parallel and the UN Command retreats, losing at least 19,000 men. Chinese forces liberate Seoul in a complete victory, and on 4 Jan 1951 the PVA occupies the city. On 25 Jan the PVA begins its “fourth campaign” but suffers a setback around Hoengseong and Chipyong-ni. On 13 Feb it launches an offensive against Chipyong-ni but suffers heavy casualties of over 3,000 men. PVA commander Peng Dehuai (Wang Yanhui) orders the offensive to stop but then learns the 3rd Army of the 19th Regiment has already crossed the Yalu River. By 17 Feb it has reached the war zone, and among its soldiers is Li Xiang. In Apr the US’ Lieutenant-General Matthew B. Ridgway (Andrew Rolfe) takes over from Douglas MacArthur as head of the UN Command and plans a huge offensive against the Chinese forces that will include cutting off their retreat. However, in the PVA’s “fifth campaign”, Peng Dehuai decides to attack first. Meanwhile, Li Xiao has arrived in North Korea as an English translator with the PVA. Li Moyin joins Li Xiang at a training camp on his way to join the 63rd Army at the front. Separately, Li Xiao, along with Sun Xing (Chen Feiyu), an army scout suffereing from shellshock, hitches a ride from the driver (Xiao Yang) of a supply truck going south. En route they encounter two US snipers, as well as military scholar Wu Benzheng (Zhu Yawen), his bodyguard Zhang Xiaoheng (Ou Hao) and PVA casualty recorder Yang Sandi (Zhang Youhao). All of them then get caught up in a night raid by some Chinese forces on some Belgian troops, during which Li Xiao finally meets her brother again. Meanwhile, at the front, the 63rd Army’s 189th Division, led by Li Moyin, realises that the UN Command has been leading it into a trap by always retreating and that its armoured division in now turning round to face north. The Chinese realise the plan of the UN Command is to capture their rear base at Cheolweon, a major strategic site. The UN Command comprises 50,000 men, while the Chinese have only half that number.
REVIEW
In The Volunteers: The Battle of Life and Death 志愿军 第二部 存亡之战, the second part of his Korean War trilogy, Mainland director Chen Kaige 陈凯歌 just about manages to pull off the same trick as he did in the first part – to make a flag-waving event picture not seem too much like one. After a fairly standard start, The Volunteers: To the War 志愿军 雄兵出击 (2023) had managed it by focusing on several individuals and making the second half a relentless downward spiral into a vision of hell as Chinese forces faced off against US-led ones. A year later, along comes The Battle of Life and Death which, free of any necessity to elaborate on China’s initial engagement in the war, starts on a personal level and pretty much stays there as it focuses on three members of the Li family and their involvement in the People’s Volunteer Army’s (i.e. PLA’s) “fifth campaign” in spring 1951. After the good but not spectacular takings of the first film (RMB868 million), the gamble to proceed with the trilogy has paid off, with this latest part taking The Volunteers into the box-office big time with RMB1.21 billion. That’s still nowhere close to the five-plus billion hawled in by previous Korean War blockbuster The Battle at Lake Changjin 长津湖 (2021) – on which Chen was one of three directors – but good enough.
The PVA’s “fifth campaign” was a spring offensive that was the last major attempt to drive so-called “UN Command” forces (mostly US) out of the peninsula. Despite some successes it ultimately failed; but it led to armistice negotiations that started that summer and then dragged on for two years as both sides dug in around the 38th Parallel. The Battle of Life and Death doesn’t even pretend to describe all the complicated ins-and-outs of the campaign, let alone provide historical balance; instead, in true war movie style, it simplifes things largely to events around Cheolweon where the PVA had a strategically important rear base.
More importantly the conflict brings together the three members of the Li family, all of whom had featured briefly in the first film: father Li Moyin, a staff officer, his son Li Xiang, an army political instructor, and his daughter Li Xiao, an English interpreter. The picture actually begins with the Li family at home in Beijing, whither Li Xiang has returned from Xi’an only to discover he has a younger sister, in her mid-20s, who had been found in Shanghai after it was liberated. After getting to know each other – with likeably spikey playing between Zhu Yilong 朱一龙 and Zhang Zifeng 张子枫 as the brother and sister – the three are immediately split up again as the Korean War starts. After a rapid recap of key events in the first film, The Battle of Life and Death is finally ready to get going by the 11-minute mark.
However, it’s to be another half-hour or so before the three Lis are reunited, as the movie’s main event (the fighting for Cheolweon) gets under way. From the 60-minute mark, the 142-minute movie is almost all action, with three days and two nights of fighting interspersed by pregnant pauses and climaxed by a Chinese assault on a US-guarded dam in order to flood a valley (shades of The Battle at Lake Changjin II 长津湖之水门桥, 2022, directed by Xu Ke 徐克 [Tsui Hark]). But the individuals in the action still come through, thanks to all the earlier backgrounding in the screenplay (again by Zhang Ke 张珂 and Lan Xiaolong 兰晓龙, but with Chen this time also taking a credit).
The other individuals are almost all familiar figures from the previous film: an eccentric military scholar (played for both comedy and pathos by Zhu Yawen 朱亚文), his taciturn bodyguard (Ou Hao 欧豪, playing against type as a gruff soldier), a “casualty recorder” who photographs PVA corpses (Zhang Youhao 张宥浩), a characterful supplies driver (sometime comic Xiao Yang 肖央, relishing the part) and an army scout suffering from shellshock (Chen Feiyu 陈飞宇). Among the top brass, Wang Yanhui 王砚辉 repeats his sympathetic performance as PVA commander Peng Dehuai, though in less detail than in the first film. The Americans are all undifferentiated cannon fodder barking lines like “Yessir!”, here led by new commander Ridgway (played by British actor Andrew Rolfe) who’s taken over from MacArthur and is written even more one-dimensionally.
One problem with telling much of the story via the Li family is that they are only briefly together to generate much emotional bonding. The film never really recovers the involving feel of the opening minutes, set in their Beijing courtyard house, though of the three Xin Baiqing 辛柏青 is the most simpatico as the strict but loving father. As the son who’s given his youth to the military, Zhu is okay but rather surfacey handsome; more characterful is Zhang Zifeng as his initially likeable but later annoyingly pushy sister. Hers is the only female role of any consequence in the picture and played full-on by the diminutive actress (who shot to fame with Sister 我的姐姐, 2021), seemingly in compensation.
The film has basically the same crew as the first one and on a technical level features the same inventive camerawork, led by d.p. Zhao Fei 赵非 and aerial d.p. Guo Chen 郭晨, to keep the action fresh and involving. From the first big battle – a night attack by Chinese forces on Belgian ones, some 30 minutes in – the action has a very visceral feel while still remaining filmy, with the editing, again by Li Dianshi 李点石, always kinetic. Only the music, this time credited to Guo Sida 郭思达 (an advisor on the first film), seems more standard military/inspirational, with only occasional attempts to play to the personal drama (as in the first attack on Cheolweon). Importantly, the visual effects do their job without glorying in their cleverness. As with the first film, the running time doesn’t seem excessive: only one sequence, where the military scholar steals a US tank and uses it on the enemy, seems slightly peripheral – though it does add some welcome humour.
CREDITS
Presented by China Film Creative (Beijing) Film (CN), China Film (CN), August First Film Studio (CN), Beijing Rongyou Film & TV Culture Media (CN), Beijing Bona Film Group (CN). Produced by Beijing Rongyou Film & TV Culture Media (CN).
Script: Chen Kaige, Zhang Ke. Original script: Lan Xiaolong. Photography: Zhao Fei. Aerial photography: Guo Chen. Editing: Li Dianshi. Music: Guo Sida. Art direction: Lu Wei. Costumes: Song Fengru. Styling: Chen Tongxun. Sound: Wang Danrong. Visual effects: Wang Lei. Action: Zheng Hong. Executive direction: Lin Jie, Chen Feihong, Chu Wenming.
Cast: Zhu Yilong (Li Xiang, PLA political instructor), Xin Baiqing (Li Moyin, Military Commission Combat Section staff officer), Zhang Zifeng (Li Xiao, English interpreter), Zhu Yawen (Wu Benzheng, military scholar), Chen Feiyu (Sun Xing, army scout), Wang Yanhui (Peng Dehuai, Northwest Military Area commander/PVA commander), Xiao Yang (Zhao Annan, driver), Wu Jing (Fu Chongbi, 63rd Army commander), Zhang Youhao (Yang Sandi, People’s Volunteer Army casualty recorder), Ou Hao (Zhang Xiaoheng, Wu Benzheng’s bodyguard), Han Dongjun (Cai Changyuan, 63rd Army political instructor), Guo Xiaodong (Jie Fang, People’s Volunteer Army chief of staff), Li Zhuoyang (Yang Chuanyu, 63rd Army soldier in camp), Ren Zhong (Zhang Yinghui, 63rd Army 188th Division commander), Li Naiwen (Han Xianchu, People’s Volunteer Army deputy commander), Ni Yuan (Hong Xuezhi, People’s Volunteer Army deputy commander), Tang Zeng (Yang Feng’an, Peng Dehuai’s military secretary), Wang Ting (Deng Hua, People’s Volunteer Army deputy commander), He Ziming (Zheng, battalion commander), Wang Yang (Long Daoquan, 63rd Army political instructor), Jia Bing (Li Tao, Military Commission Combat Section head), Bill Neenan (US President Truman), Andrew Rolfe (Lieutenant-General Matthew B. Ridgway).
Release: China, 30 Sep 2024.