The Seal of Love

秋之白华

China, 2011, colour, 1.85:1, 101 mins.

Director: Huo Jianqi 霍建起.

Rating: 6/10.

A luscious looking political biopic that’s intriguingly remoulded as a love story.

STORY

China, the early 1920s. Following the 4 May Movement in 1919, when students and radicals demontrated against foreign oppression, Yang Zhihua (Dong Jie) moves from Zhejiang province to Shanghai and ends up studying sociology at Shanghai University, where she becomes friends with Feng Xiaoxuan (Mi Zian), a student of English who’s come to the big city to escape a marriage. In class, Yang Zhihua falls under the spell of radical teacher Qu Qiubai (Dou Xiao) and perseveres with her studies despite the opposition of her husband Shen Jianlong (Guo Jiaming), by whom she has a young daughter, An’er. Yang Zhihua becomes Secretary of the Women’s Section of the KMT’s Shanghai Executive Branch, where she works with Xiang Jingyu (Yi Chunde), wife of Communist revolutionary Cai Hesen (Zhang Jie), at a time when the Communists were planning to unite with the KMT under Sun Yat-sen’s “Three Principles of the People” reform movement. Yang Zhihua’s husband finally leaves her in Shanghai and she joins the fledgling Communist Party of China, working closely alongside Qu Qiubai. Following the death of Qu Qiubai’s wife, in summer 1924 Yang Zhihua and Qu Qiubai visit her husband and arrange for her divorce. Following demonstrations in Shanghai, Qu Qiubai, now married to Yang Zhihua, becomes a wanted man but manages to escape arrest. In 1927 he and Yang are selected for the CPC’s Central Committee, but the party is torn by in-fighting. In 1928, they move to Moscow as CPC delegates, but in 1930 return to Shanghai, where Qu, ousted from the Central Committee, works as a translator with writer Lu Xun. But by 1933 Qu Qiubai’s safety is becoming more and more perilous and he’s forced to leave Yang in Shanghai and flee the city.

REVIEW

Not for the first time in his career, director Huo Jianqi 霍建起 (Postmen in the Mountains 那人那山那狗 , 1998; Life Show 生活秀, 2002) takes seemingly routine material – here a political biopic celebrating early CPC activist Qu Qiubai (1899-1935) and his second wife Yang Zhihua (1900-1973) – and transmutes it into something special through sheer force of technique plus a distinctly female sensibility towards the characters’ feelings by his regular scriptwriter (and wife) Su Xiaowei 苏小卫 (aka Si Wu 思芜). The films of Huo, who studied painting and fine arts, have always looked fabulous and, with d.p. Sun Ming 孙明 again behind the camera, The Seal of Love 秋之白华 is one after another burnished composition which sucks the viewer in emotionally even when the subject-matter seems relatively undramatic.

On its own, such high technique wouldn’t normally be enough. But Su’s scripts (which also include Aftershock 唐山大地震, 2010, by Feng Xiaogang 冯小刚, and Tell Me Your Secret 说出你的秘密, 1999, by Huang Jianxin 黄建新) have an ability to approach their subject from a purely metaphysical angle, often concentrating on feelings and emotions above plot and story. With strong performances the result can have a special magic – as in Huo’s Valentine’s Day movie A Time to Love 情人结 (2004), with Zhao Wei 赵薇, or Life Show, with Tao Hong 陶红 – and though Seal isn’t at the level of those films it stll remains involving thanks to the lead performance of Dong Jie 董洁 (the blind girl in Happy Times 幸福时光, 2000, by Zhang Yimou 张艺谋) as Yang, through whose eyes the story of her political awakening and love for Qu is told.

Apart from a slightly bumpy ride structurally, as their story traverses a decade, the main weakness of the film is the performance of young China-born, Canada-raised actor Dou Xiao 窦骁 [Shawn Dou] (another Zhang discovery, in Under the Hawthorn Tree 山楂树之恋, 2010), who brings over the charisma of Qu that first attracted Yang – an initial classroom scene is quite magical – but not an equivalent depth of feeling. (The eight-year age gap between the two actors, playing characters who were actually only a year apart, is also distracting in certain scenes, with Dong looking considerably older.) That apart, however, the movie is strongly cast, with subtle playing especially by experienced TV actress Yi Chunde 伊春德 as an older woman who takes Yang under her wing.

The film’s untranslatable Chinese title refers to the four characters on a seal that Qu makes to symbolise their love, intertwining their two names.

CREDITS

Presented by Jiangsu Provincial Committee Publicity Department (CN), Changzhou Prefectural Committee Publicity Deartment (CN), Changzhou Broadcasting (CN), Huaxia Film Distribution (CN). Produced by Tangde International Cultural Communication (CN), Tangde International Film Culture (CN), Jiangsu Broadcasting (CN), Changzhou Broadcasting (CN).

Script: Su Xiaowei. Photography: Sun Ming. Editing: Yu Xi. Music: Chang Xinnei. Vocals: Dou Xiao [Shawn Dou], Dong Jie. Art direction: Zhou Xinren, Li Jia. Costume design: He Qian. Sound: Chao Jun. Consultation: Yang Xinli, Fan Yanqing. Executive director: Xu Minyong.

Cast: Dong Jie (Yang Zhihua), Dou Xiao [Shawn Dou] (Qu Qiubai), Guo Jiaming (Shen Jianlong, Zhihua’s husband), Mi Zian (Feng Xiaoxuan), Yi Chunde (Xiang Jingyu, Cai Hesen’s wife), Zhang Jie (Cai Hesen), Wang Tongran (Zhang Tailei), Deng Fei (Deng Zhongxia), Lu Siyuan (Yun Daiying), Yao Keqin (Shen Xuanlu), Fei Fei (Sun Yat-sen), Tian Rui (Song Qingling, his wife), Miloslav Blahuš (Borodin), Zina Blahušová (Borodin’s wife), Li Wenlong (Chen Wangdao), Liao Jingfeng (Zhihua’s mother), Zhang Hua (Zhihua’s younger sister), Cao Guoming (Huang Ren), Ding Yujia (Yuan), Su De (old boatman).

Premiere: Beijing College Student Film Festival (Opening Film), 26 Mar 2011.

Release: China, 29 Jun 2011.

(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 16 Jun 2011.)