Full River Red
满江红
China, 2023, colour, 2.35:1, 156 mins.
Director: Zhang Yimou 张艺谋.
Rating: 6/10.
A top cast, led by comedian Shen Teng, initially makes this costume super-whodunit entertaining viewing. But at 2½ hours it’s all way too long.
STORY
A fort near the border between the Southern Song and Jin (aka Jurchen) dynasties, east China, 3 Jul 1146, an hour before dawn. Qin Hui (Lei Jiayin), prime minister of the Southern Song, has led thousands of imperial guards to the fort to meet a delegation from the rival Jin in the north. Qin Hui had arrived at midnight and local officials had cleared a space for the meeting to take place the following day. However, an hour before dawn Hajab, one of the Jin diplomats, is found murdered in his quarters in the fort. Zhang Da (Shen Teng), a lowly corporal, is arrested by Household Battalion deputy commander Sun Jun (Yi Yangqianxi), who is actually Zhang Da’s “third uncle”, on suspicion of being the killer. He is taken to see the prime minister. Wang Biao (Guo Jingfei), commander of the Household Battalion who dislikes the ambitious Sun Jun, blocks his way and demands Sun Jun hands over his prisoner. To his displeasure, Wang Biao is overruled by He Li (Zhang Yi) and Wu Yichun (Yue Yunpeng), director and deputy director of the prime minister’s office, who allow Sun Jun to bring Zhang Da to see Qin Hui. He Li questions Zhang Da about an empty leather bag found in Hajab’s quarters that contained a top-secret official letter from the Jin that Hajab was to give Qin Hui when the two met that morning. Impressed by Zhang Da’s smart answers, Qin Hui gives him a special pass and two hours to find the letter. He also tells Sun Jun to accompany Zhang Da and to kill him whether he finds the letter or not. When they’ve left, he tells He Li to watch over both of them. (Since being captured some time earlier by the Jin and then miraculously escaped, Qin Hui had been suspected by many of being a traitor to the Southern Song, though he had the emperor’s confidence. Among his many enemies, he had also framed and executed a famous Song general, Yue Fei, five years earlier.) Zhang Da first questions Yaoqin (Wang Jiayi), a dancing girl who had been entertaining the previous evening. Her information leads him to question nightwatchman Ding Sanwang (Pan Binlong), who in turn casts suspicion on Wang Biao. Zhang Da and Sun Jun question Wang Biao and, during an argument, Sun Jun ends up killing Wang Biao. Sun Jun is given Wang Biao’s job thanks to the intervention of the wily He Li, who starts to suspect that either Wu Yichun, Zhang Da or Sun Jun may have been involved in the murder. But as the investigation continues, everyone in the household seems to be guilty of something, including prime minister Qin Hui.
REVIEW
Powerplay, deception, murder and intrigue – with Full River Red 满江红 veteran director Zhang Yimou 张艺谋 is back in the costume worlds of his earlier Hero 英雄 (2002) and Shadow 影 (2018), though here he has more of a smile on his face and seems more interested in creating the ultimate twist-filled whodunit than a serious dissertation on the psychology of power. A fictional story set among real historical characters, it’s still a good companion piece to those earlier movies, again set during a period of instability and also, like Deng Chao 邓超 in Shadow, featuring a popular comedian in the lead. In fact, it’s the beautifully modulated playing by Shen Teng 沈腾, a stalwart of Beijing comedy troupe Ma Hua FunAge 开心麻花, as well as the performances of several other top-flight actors, that makes Red watchable when the script doesn’t know when it’s time to wrap things up.
With rare exceptions (Snipers 狙击手, 2022), Zhang’s films now routinely gross in the billions. At RMB4.54 billion, Full River Red, released during CNY 2023, was the holiday’s top grosser as well as being Zhang’s biggest box-office success in his career. It’s still the sixth biggest Mainland movie ever, just below sci-fi spectacular The Wandering Earth (2019, RMB4.69 billion).
Zhang’s co-writer Chen Yu 陈宇 previously worked with him on the corruption thriller Under the Light 坚如磐石 (2023, but shot in 2019) and Korean War drama Snipers, both of which also had terrific first halves but rapidly fell off after that. Red starts with images that are to punctuate the film: imperial guards scurrying through the fort, a labyrinth of identical buildings and alleyways in which nothing seems to be marked. In tandem with the shadowy, almost neutral photography by regular d.p. Zhao Xiaoding 赵小丁 – almost halfway between the highly coloured Hero and super-monochrome Shadow – the anonymous look of the fort, an hour before dawn, is an apt metaphor for the murky games that are played within it.
As the body of a foreign diplomat is found, and lowly corporal Zhang Da (Shen) is conveniently arrested on suspicion of murder, everyone appears to have a skeleton in the cupboard – from the prime minister Qin Hui, through his various aides and officers, to even the dancing girls brought in for entertainment. The movie is basically about how Zhang Da, through sheer wiliness, manages to manipulate everyone above him, and even be put in charge of “solving” the murder and finding a mysterious missing letter that’s the film’s MacGuffin.
This requires an actor of major screen presence, and Shen fits the bill, capitalising on a gift for straight-faced comedy (Goodbye Mr. Loser 夏洛特烦恼, 2015; Hello Mr.Billionaire 西虹市首富, 2018; Pegasus 飞驰人生, 2019; Moon Man 独行月球, 2022) that’s made him, at 44, one of the country’s top comedians – and certainly the subtlest. As the plotting gets more and more convoluted, with deception and sub-plot piled on deception and sub-plot, it becomes clear that Red, far from being a costume drama or even a super-whodunit, is more a satire on power politics and top-level intrigue and jealousies.
More’s the pity, therefore, that writers Chen and Zhang don’t know when enough is enough. At least half-an-hour too long at 2½ hours, and saddled with an over-talky final section (set in daylight) in which the momentum is only sustained by constant cutting, the film loses the viewer’s goodwill way before the end. Apart from that, it’s the cast that one remembers: Shen subtly manipulating the whole drama until his own character is almost consumed by it; the fine performance by Lei Jiayin 雷佳音 as the sickly but ruthless prime minister Qin Hui; the hangdog-looking Zhang Yi 张译 perfectly cast as the PM’s equally ruthless no. 1 aide; portly comedian Yue Yunpeng 岳云鹏 as his duplicitous no. 2; and, most surprising of all, actor-boybander Yi Yangqianxi 易烊千玺, 23, almost unrecognisable in his first grown-up role as the troops’ deputy commander who’s actually Zhang Da’s uncle (one of several running jokes). Paired throughout much of the film with Shen, Yi manages to hold his own against the older and more experienced actor.
The film was shot in Taiyuan, Shanxi province, during summer 2022. The English title is a literal translation of the Chinese one which, as well as being the name of a type of invasive acquatic fern known as azolla, is one of the 526 traditional colours of China (a kind of rusty red). It’s also the name of a set of poems supposedly written by Song dynasty general Yue Fei, whose death five years earlier is referred to in the film. An alternate translation could be “The Whole River Red”, referring to a waterway filled with dead bodies, and in general the film doesn’t underplay the casual cruelty of the period.
CREDITS
Presented by Huanxi Media Group (Beijing) (CN), Huanxi Media Group (CN), Yixie (Qingdao) Pictures (CN), Beijing Huanxi Premiere Culture (CN), Beijing Lifeng Culture Development (CN), Tianjin Maoyan Weiying Cultural Media (CN), Beijing Enlight Pictures (CN), China Film (CN), Beijing Fun Age Pictures (CN), Beijing R.molle Culture Media (CN), MetaWay Art & Technology (CN). Produced by Huanxi Media Group (Beijing) (CN), Yixie (Qingdao) Pictures (CN), Beijing Huanxi Premiere Culture (CN), Huanxi Media Group (Taizhou) (CN).
Script: Chen Yu, Zhang Yimou. Original script: Chen Yu. Photography: Zhao Xiaoding. Editing: Li Yongyi. Music: Han Hong. Art direction: Lu Wei. Character styling: Chen Minzheng, Qin Xilin. Sound: Yang Jiang, Zhao Nan. Action: Sang Lin. Visual effects: Wang Xinghui (Base FX).
Cast: Shen Teng (Zhang Da, corporal), Yi Yangqianxi (Sun Jun, Household Battalion deputy commander), Zhang Yi (He Li, director of prime minister’s office), Lei Jiayin (Qin Hui, prime minister), Yue Yunpeng (Wu Yichun, deputy director of prime minister’s office), Wang Jiayi (Yaoqin/Zither, dancer), Pan Binlong (Ding Sanwang, nightwatchman), Yu Ailei (Liu Xi, horseman), Guo Jingfei (Wang Biao, Household Battalion commander), Ou Hao (Zheng Wan, deputy general), Wei Xiang (Haden, Jin interpreter), Zhang Chi (Chen Liang, adjutant general), Huang Yan (Hu Yong, adjutant general), Xu Jingya (Lanyu/Sapphire, prime minister’s maid), Jiang Pengyu (Lvzhu/Emerald, prime minister’s maid), Lin Boyang (Liu Yan/Swallow, dancer), Fei Fan (Qingmei/Plum, dancer), Ren Sinuo (Taoyatou/Peach, Liu Xi’s daughter), Chen Yongsheng (messenger), Zhang Yi’nan (Chen Xi, secretary).
Release: China, 22 Jan 2023.