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- I am quite addicted to martial arts movies, which is odd when you consider that I hate violence. But when I declaim my love for these films my offline friends start back in horror and make warding motions with their hands. I am quite, quite alone in my obsession. My goal in joining Alive not Dead is to skulk around the forums and read other people’s pages and pick up some information on my favourite genre of films.
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Huh?
Sunday, Sep 5, 2010 7:04AM / Members only
I am quite addicted to martial arts fu movies, which is odd when you consider that I hate violence. But when I declaim my love for these films my offline friends start back in horror and make warding motions with their hands. I am quite, quite alone in my obsession. When I have the time, I turn to blogging about my favourite genre of films to offload some of the thoughts that have been cluttering up my brain for the last few years
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Swordsman 2′s Invincible Asia and the tradition of cross dressing in kung fu movies
Sunday, Sep 5, 2010 6:55AM / Members only
(My previous blog was about Brigitte Lin’s performance as Invincible Asia. This blog contains some thoughts about Swordsman 2′s transsexual villain Invincible Asia and the tradition of cross dressing in kung fu movies)
In his review of Swordsman 2, critic Paul Fonoroff states:
“The beautiful Brigitte Lin seems miscast – there is no way she can convincingly pass as a man.” p. 238, At the Hong Kong Movies
To be honest, I think Fonoroff has misunderstood the intention behind the way Invincible Asia is depicted. I don’t think this type of movie needs you to believe that Brigitte Lin is really a man and then really a woman – it is not The Crying Game but a very different type of movie.
An interesting thing about Asia is that s/he can be seen as either feminine or masculine depending on which characters s/he is talking to at the time. Ignorant of Asia’s castration and occult gender realignment, Asia’s own court have the idea fixed in their heads that Asia is the man he always was for much of the movie. When the film’s hero, Ling, meets Asia without knowing who s/he is, he assumes that Asia is a woman. It is a testament to the skill of the director Ching Siu Tung, Brigitte Lin, and the other actors who support her that the differentiation between when Asia is being seen as male or female is very clear.
One thing that strikes me when I think about the performance of Invincible Asia, and the challenge of signifying to the audience that Asia is seen as male by some of the characters some of the time (when Brigitte Lin is so indisputably female) is the body language of Brigitte Lin and Yu On On in their scenes together as Invincible Asia and Asia’s concubine Cici. Without ever tipping over into a display of girl-on-girl sleaze, the way these 2 actresses ‘handle’ each other effectively conveys the relationship between a powerful man and his woman. Whether it is the way Cici massages Asia’s shoulders, or the way Asia leans against Cici when she does, or the way Asia gently cups Cici’s face or sweeps her into Asia’s arms, this body language subtly reinforces the male that Asia was before his / her transformation and the way s/he continues to be seen as male by his / her court during most of the movie.
An interesting moment is Cici’s reaction to Asia when Cici first sees Asia wearing makeup and realises that Asia is transforming into a woman. In this scene Lin’s appearance is only subtly different – she has gained some eye shadow, a different hairstyle and a dress, but she just doesn’t look that different from how she looked when her character was ‘male’ at the beginning of the film. At the beginning of the film Asia’s male status is superficially indicated by Lin wearing male robes and hat, and miming dialogue delivered by a light tenor voice. But she has not been subjected to a transformative make up processes a la Cate Blanchett as Dylan Thomas in I’m not there. We know that it’s Brigitte Lin in pants we are seeing. We rely on the reactions and body language of the actors to tell us whether this character is functioning as a male or female in a particular scene. Cici’s shocked reaction tells us that Asia now looks different – shockingly female as opposed to male. Rather than trying to convince us that Asia was a man and is now a woman, this film wants to convince us that the other characters in the film saw Asia as a man and will now see Asia as a woman. This is all the information that we as an audience need to know to enjoy this film and character. Having an actress who is obviously female playing a character that straddles both male and female gender underlines Invincible Asia’s ambivalent sexual identity. The audience’s experience of Asia’s frequent switching from male to female is clearly defined by the acting, directing and mise en scene of this film.
Martial arts movies, especially wuxia pian (swordplay films in a fantasy historic setting), have unrealistic and fantastic characters and happenings and therefore realism is not a goal. As an art form, these films have more in common with pantomime, ballet, opera or commedia dell’arte than a classic Hollywood movie. The legacy of Chinese Opera and wuxia literature to this genre of cinema is well documented. I have always felt that the goal of these movies was to represent or symbolise certain characters, settings or actions rather than slavishly imitate or replicate them. In his book on Chinese Opera, Chinese Conception of the Theatre, Tao-Ching Hsu states “… action is indicated rather than imitated and there is little effort to disguise the pretence.” (page 95). Just as the martial arts shown in these films is not real martial arts that would be used in an actual street fight, so Brigitte Lin has not been cast to make us believe that she is a man at the beginning of the film. Rather she has been cast so that her handsome type of beauty, dignified glamour and otherworldly bearing can involve the audience in the fascinating, and confounding creature that is Invincible Asia.
It is worth bearing in mind that certain conventions exist in Asian cinema and theatre in regards to cross dressing and artists acting characters of a different gender:
“This convention can be traced back to Come Drink with Me, and it reflects a Peking Opera sensibility, wherein men played female roles and the audience was expected to accept their impersonation without question” p 118, From Chasing Dragons by David West.
There is a lot of cross dressing in martial arts films. For example, Jet Li drags up in Martial Arts of Shaolin and Dr Wai in the scrīpture with no Words, and even Jackie Chan does the same in City Hunter. Brigitte Lin dons men’s garb once again in New Dragon Gate Inn, and Josephine Siao (trained in Chinese Opera as a child), in her portrayal of Fong Sai Yuk’s mother, has her character impersonate a youth in both Fong Sai Yuk films. Her performance puts me in mind of principal boys, which were young boy characters that were always played by sexy young girls in English pantomimes from the 1800s into the 20th century. The audience was not expected to believe that the girl actresses were really boys, but rather they were expected to get a little thrill from the sight of a strapping young lass in tights. Interestingly, when Siao was a young actress she starred in a series of films with Connie Chan Po Chu – Siao often played the female lead with Chan dragging up to play her male romantic interest. Their films together were big mainstream hits in Hong Kong during the 60s.
When I lived in Japan I was taken to see the famous Takarazuka Review which, for decades, has been presenting glamorous and epic romantic musicals to packed houses. In the Takarazuka Review, all of the parts, including the males, are played by women. Certain Takarazuka Review performers specialise in male impersonation for the whole of their careers. The musicals are luscious and gorgeous, but are also the campest, queerest things I have ever seen. But the (mostly) middle class, heterosexual, female audiences who make up the Takarazuka Review’s enormous fan base don’t even blink at watching a cross dressing woman sweeping another woman off her feet. They accept the male impersonation without shame or question, and revel in the skill of the male impersonators in the Takarazuka Review’s companies.
“In Chinese theatre the sex of the players bears no relation to the sex of the characters they play: both actors and actresses can take male or female roles. This is possible because the style of acting is sophisticated and the professional players are highly trained.” p. 43, The Chinese Conception of Theatre by Tao-Ching Hsu
An interesting film to watch while bearing this in mind is Sammo Hung’s kung fu classic Prodigal Son starring Lam Ching Ying as a male Chinese Opera performer (and martial arts expert) who is famous for playing female roles. Lam gives a stunning performance, as he moves from acting the dignified and ascetic martial arts master offstage to playing coquettish Chinese Opera characters in full costume and makeup onstage. Lam, director and performer Sammo Hung, lead actor Yuen Biao and God knows how many other of the film’s cast were all trained in Chinese Opera. In the interviews in the Special Features on the DVD version of this film that I saw Sammo Hung mentions that he had faith in Lam to carry off his part, including the female Chinese Opera roles, because of his training in Chinese Opera. If you are interested in the influence of Chinese Opera on kung fu films, as I am, and particularly the traditions it may have bequeathed, such as cross dressing, then Prodigal Son is a fascinating film to watch. Entertaining overall, in Lam’s character it seems to pay homage to the Chinese Opera and kung fu movie convention of cross dressing, and the skill that directors and cast need to pull it off. Swordsman 2 is tapping into this convention in the casting of Brigitte Lin to play the character of Invincible Asia.
(My next, and final, blog on Swordsman 2, will be about grotesque bodies)
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Invincible Asia – notes on the performance of this character
Friday, Sep 3, 2010 9:56AM / Members only
(Invincible Asia is a character, played by Brigitte Lin out of the film Swordsman 2. I discussed this character in the blog before last. This blog contains some notes on Lin’s interpretation of this intriguing transsexual villain.)
As Invinvible Asia Brigitte Lin turns in a beautifully modulated performance. Moving from the male to the female, from the power mad to the emotionally vulnerable, from the creepy to the mysterious to the sexy, she has to cover a lot of ground in the performance of this part. But she seems to be completely anchored in the role and never gives in to the temptation to over act or be camp or forced. Given the bizarre nature of the role, it is surprising and impressive how understated Lin’s performance is for much of the film.
Invincible Asia is a male martial artist who castrates himself and transforms into a woman as part of an occult ritual that generates supernatural powers. I love Lin’s facial expressions as Asia encounters people who react to his / her sexual transformation and gender realignment in ways that confound or confront him / her. Sometimes s/he has to show hurt, such as when she is rebuffed by her concubine Cici (Yu On On) when Cici discovers his / her transformation. Sometimes s/he has to show that s/he is delightedly confused or borderline outraged such as when the film’s hero, Ling (played by Jet Li), bustles into his / her sphere and treats him / her as a fine bit of skirt he is going to chase after, rather than a martial arts supremo he should be frightened of. If you have a DVD of this film watch for Asia’s reaction after Ling asks him / her “are you married?” – it’s a classic (as are many of Lin’s reaction shots).
There is one quite lovely scene that showcases the excellent acting ability of Lin and Jet Li both. This occurs when their characters are sitting on a hillside at night together. This follows a slightly comic moment when Ling, not knowing he is addressing the notorious Invincible Asia but only caring that he can get his hands on the lovely lady in front of him, announces “Shit! Maybe Asia the Invincible has discovered me…” and sweeps Asia off to lurk on the hillside, supposedly out of harm’s way. They drink some wine and Asia plays a flute. Ling recites some poetry. Moved, Asia takes his hand. The sombre and poetic atmosphere of this little scene is in contrast to the more urgent energies of the rest of the film. Li and Lin impress with their ability to shift gears and modulate their performance so seamlessly to produce this sensitive moment without dropping character. In this scene Ling reveals to the audience a sadness and disaffection with the world that has motivated his intention of retreating to a life of seclusion and perhaps explains his cavalier behaviour in regards to romance. Asia reveals to us, and probably to him/herself, Asia’s burgeoning need for love and intimacy.
The casting of Brigitte Lin opposite Jet Li is interesting and effective. In all of his films, as a performer, Li’s persona is straightforwardly heterosexual, but in a low key and unobtrusive way. His screen persona seems to be refreshingly free of he-man type posturing. He isn’t the most blokey of blokes. By this I am not implying that he is gay or effete. Li is not macho but indisputably masculine. Brigitte Lin is all woman – beautiful, glamorous and elegant. But she has a strength about her that could never be called girly. If Li isn’t blokey, then Lin isn’t a chickybabe. In Jane Austen’s time she would have been called handsome rather than a beauty. Lin is neither butch nor girly but indisputably feminine. In this film, the cheek and boyishness of Li’s character, Ling, nicely contrasts to and plays off the gravitas and potential menace that informs Lin’s performance of Asia. A superficial interpretation of Chinese Taoist philosophy would inform us that male is yang, and female is yin. In this movie, with the pairing of Li and Lin and their characters’ dubious sexual behaviours, that reading would seem to be nicely and entertainingly subverted: male actor Li plays yin to female actress Lin’s yang. To good effect.
(The next blog I will post will be about Invincible Asia and the tradition of Cross Dressing in kung fu movies.)
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The Magic Blade
Saturday, Aug 28, 2010 6:56AM / Members only
This review was originally posted on jpfmovies blog as a guest review – thanks JP! The next blog I post will be a discussion of Brigitte Lin’s interpretation of the character of Invincible Asia in Swordsman 2.
Made in 1976
Director – Chor Yuen
Producer – Runme Shaw
Action directors – Wong Pau Gei, Tong Gai
Cast – Ti Lung, Lo Lieh, Ching Li, Tanny Tien Ni
I have spent the last couple of years ricocheting between brain dead temp work and stints on social security. Many nights I have returned home after enduring shifts of reception work that made me despair of the human race or interviews at my local Job Service Agency fending off attempts to get me to embrace a career in telemarketing. Fortunately this is all behind me now (I have recently been successful in landing a job I like). But my challenge over the last 2 years has been keeping the nasty grey world I have inhabited from eroding my sanity. Fortunately for me I had a way – I knew of the existence of kung fu and wu xia movies. I knew the answer to my problems was to collapse on the couch, suck back a cheap bottle of rotgut cleanskin red wine, and watch a chopsockie. Whether it’s an old Shaw Brothers extravaganza or a Jet Li New Wave spectacle, there is nothing in the world like a martial arts film to blast the cobwebs from your brain and purge the toxins from your soul. It’s amazing how much the Shaw Brothers fanfare at the beginning of one of this seminal production house’s films can cheer me up (what the hell is Shawscope anyway?). A favourite movie of mine – one that I have often reached for after the greyest days – is the wu xia pian The Magic Blade, produced by Shaw Brothers and made in 1976. The martial arts film genre is a huge and varied one that has something for everyone. Those who like their chopsockies flavoured with heavy doses of testosterone tend to favour the films of Bruce Lee or Chang Cheh. I prefer my martial arts films to be more on the fantastical or whimsical side. I feel that The Magic Blade delivers these qualities in spades.
I will not summarise the plot of this film as I do not want to give anything away. When I first watched this movie I knew nothing about it. As scene after scene unfolded, each more extravagant and imaginatively choreographed than the last, I literally felt my eyes widen. Many fans of the martial arts movie genre love these films for their creative audacity and The Magic Blade does not disappoint. Each scene has something that catches the attention. This might be a quirk of character, an aspect of staging, the way the choreography incorporates sets or props, or a plot development. The plot has been arranged so that the movie flows smoothly from one lavish set piece to another. The many villains of the film are enjoyably sinister to watch, and are a varied lot with each boasting a peculiar character trait. My personal favourite is the cannibalistic Devil Grandma – a vile, cackling octogenarian with a novel approach to food vending. A special mention must also go to Tanny Tien Ni, who, in her role as a femme fatale, raises smirking and sneering to Gold Medal Olympic level standards.
Against a cast of such dynamic baddies, Ti Lung holds his own as the hero of the movie. He wears a costume that, sadly, reminds me of the poncho made out of regulation blanket that my Girl Guide troop leader instructed me to make and wear to our camps when I was a wee slip of a girl. He carries this garment off with far more élan than I did, and manages to combine soulfulness and nobility in his depiction of a lone wandering swordsman. Ti Lung always ramps up the eye candy quotient in any movie he is in, but he is quite a good actor as well. There are 2 scenes which demonstrate this. The first is where Ti Lung and the film’s heroine (nicely played by Ching Li) discuss the lonely life of an itinerant swordsman in an idyllic setting bedecked with flowers. The second, set in a windswept alley, is where Ti Lung’s character interacts with a woman who has fallen on hard times and been forced to turn to prostitution. This scene is so moving it literally reduces me to tears. These 2 quite lovely and sensitively acted scenes are deftly incorporated into an otherwise pot boiling plot. They add dimension to the film without slowing it down.
A special mention must go to the art direction in this film – it is gorgeous. Exotic, beautiful, and sometimes gothic sets, props and costumes are a definite part of this film’s appeal. The colours are vivid and lush, and the detailing on many of the props and costumes is really nice. Overall, the film is very well shot. I often think of kung fu movies as being more like filmed physical theatre than the classic ‘realistic’ western films I grew up with. This sense of theatricality is pleasantly reinforced by the luscious art direction in The Magic Blade.
I am not sure what else I can say without giving too much information away. All you red blooded blokes out there will be rewarded with the sight of someone’s breasts and a tiny bit of lesbian fondling in the final scenes. All viewers (regardless of gender / sexual orientation) will find themselves rewarded with a stylishly made and well acted fantasy action that is jam packed with inventive fight choreography and leavened with doses of fruity melodrama. The Magic Blade is wu xia pian at its entertaining best. Get a DVD copy and save it up for the next time you have a particularly bad day.
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Swordsman 2′s Invincible Asia – notes on the character
Sunday, Aug 22, 2010 9:53AM / Members only
(The previous blog I posted was about the sexuality of some of the other characters in Swordsman 2).
Martial arts movies have often struck me as being very melodramatic, and I have subsequently been curious about the dramaturgical relationship between the lurid emotions on display in many of these movies and the carefully wrought and elaborate displays of action. I have been wondering whether one leads to or facilitates the other. After all, if you give over large chunks of your screen time to choreographed physical performance with minimal dialogue then this has to affect the structure and tone of the film, as well as the way you impart information to an audience, and the kinds of information that can be imparted. Choreography explicates very different things to dialogue. Emotion is more easily manifested through movement than are facts.
I have started to do a little reading in order to test some of my ideas out. I struck gold with a book called Melodrama by John Mercer and Martin Shingler. In this book Mercer and Shingler survey critical writing on classic American movies that have been designated as melodramas. The interesting thing is that I feel that they could often be (unwittingly) writing about Hong Kong kung fu movies.
I was particularly struck by the following quote:
“… melodrama… implicitly recognises the limits (inadequacies) of conventional representation… (its inability to express or articulate certain contradictions). In this way, the ‘beneath’ or ‘behind’ (the unthinkable or repressed) is evoked as metaphor through gesture, music and mise-en-scene. p. 79
I often feel in kung fu movies that unwieldy or atavistic emotions are not just articulated in dialogue but are strongly represented through “gesture, music and mise-en-scene” including fight choreography. Swordsman 2 is just one case in point. In exploring various sexual and gender dynamics it is touching on issues most humans find difficulty in comfortably articulating. The use of a transsexual martial arts master as a character and a device for further exploring this terrain just makes things messier and more difficult to articulate in text. In this movie the transsexual Invincible Asia’s newly discovered feminine side emerges from beneath or behind his original alpha male ambition to take over the world. Director Ching Siu Tung’s depiction of this emerges from beneath or behind the conventional structure of a wuxia pian (martial arts movie).
What is going on with Invincible Asia? When the film starts this character’s back story is of a man who has ambitions to be a ruler and the foremost martial arts practitioner in his country. In order to achieve the latter (and facilitate the former) he decides to follow the instructions of The Sacred Scroll – an arcane text that instructs on how to access martial arts powers on a supernatural level. The primary instruction requires Asia to castrate himself, which he secretly and willingly does. Thus, when the movie begins we find a newly ‘altered’ Invincible Asia in the possession of a recently acquired ability to channel his chi through his martial arts technique to achieve explosive destructive results. However, the occult processes unleashed by his following of the instructions of the Sacred Scroll start to transform him into a female version of himself. He finds himself in possession of a changed body which rapidly becomes more feminine looking, with softer skin and a voice that becomes higher during the course of the film. He is assailed by unfamiliar feelings too, such as a fascination with the handsome hero Ling, an interest in makeup and tapestry, and a heightened need to be loved, desired and supported. Asia’s story arc can be seen as his attempts to reconcile these feelings and this new physicality with his original and ongoing ambitions and ruthlessness. In becoming a transsexual he gets more than he bargained for and this eventually leads to his undoing.
One element of Invincible Asia’s character that fascinates me is the emergence of a new side to his personality during the movie. Feelings that would traditionally be seen as being softer or more feminine become mish mashed with Asia’s already present (‘male’) drive for political power and her / his willingness to use cruelty and violence to achieve it. A witty way of representing this in the movie is by using the visual device of tapestry. In a couple of scenes (including the climactic showdown) Asia is shown demurely embroidering as befits a high class lady. However, Asia also uses the tapestry needles as a particularly sadistic form of weaponry in these scenes, and this befits a power mad martial arts savvy villain.
Invincible Asia inserts what could be seen as typically female behaviours into his campaign for power. As he plots, tortures, murders, bribes and downright bullies his way to supremacy, he, or should I say she at this point, also flirts with Ling, experiments with makeup, does a spot of tapestry, and whimpers that no one loves him / her. “I’ve sacrificed myself to the world. But how many people will remember Asia the Invincible? Everyone in the world is heartless!” Asia murmurs to Asia’s concubine Cici at one point. In a later scene, when Cici discovers and recoils from Asia’s feminine transformation, Asia is deeply hurt and tearfully says “You are just the same as the common people. You are heartless.” This right after s/he has briskly murdered 8 or so camp followers. Asia seems to be wanting to ask “why doesn’t anybody love me” but her history as a ruthless psychotic bastard means that she doesn’t understand how her violent behaviour means that nobody can.
The climactic fight scene follows this pattern. As the film’s prime villain Invincible Asia takes on the film’s good guys, but does so in a feminine style. Asia’s dress, manner and body language is arch and even coquettish as s/he refutes accusations of villainy and defies the heroes. The aforementioned tapestry thread and needles come into play as her weapons of choice. When she is stabbed at the end by Ling, her erstwhile beau, she responds in hurt and bewilderment and accuses him of being a ‘heartless’ guy. She seems unaware that her past regimen of torture and murder might justify such treatment. Her final threat – to kill Ling’s 2 female comrades in front of him – and her subsequent attempt to do so come across as an expression of pure cattiness rather than the behaviour of a rugged warlord.
As a mortally wounded Asia plummets to her death down a cliff side she finds herself in Ling’s arms. She uses her supernatural strength to push him out of her downward trajectory and back to the safety of a cliff ledge, thereby saving his life. This is the only selfless, and most loving, gesture we have seen from Asia in the whole film. The last shots of her falling away show her face in a softened, misty light and Brigitte Lin assumes a softened expression. This is the most feminine Asia has appeared during the whole film.
As quoted above, Invincible Asia has some revealing lines of dialogue but it is also interesting to consider the use of visuals in this film, and the way they define and inform us about Invincible Asia. Unfortunately, I find the choreography of this film to be disappointing. It is overly dominated by wire fu and lacking in detailed movement. The way it is edited renders it incoherent, and it submerges the narrative logic of the plot. The choreography, therefore, cannot help us much in understanding Asia or, indeed, any of the other characters (as it can do in so many other martial arts movies). But this film’s mise en scene does help the viewer. Where choreographer / director Ching Siu Tung does excel is the way he defines and consolidates character development and story arcs by the use of visuals. The shot mentioned in the paragraph above is a case in point. Ching draws on his choreographic sensibilities in his artful way of blocking and posing his actors. Props and costumes are also useful and important indicators – I have already mentioned the use of tapestry as an example of this. During Asia’s early scenes with Ling she doesn’t speak, as Asia wants to hide her peculiar ‘male’ voice from Ling. This means that Lin is mute during these scenes and must communicate with facial expressions and gesture. Asia’s trans-sexuality is so extreme and odd, and opens up so many taboo areas, that Asia’s dialogue alone cannot encapsulate all the audience needs to know about this character. Ching’s use of visual clues and his well defined characterisation of Asia (in collaboration with actor Brigitte Lin) allows Invincible Asia’s strange and complex psycho-sexual identity to emerge from beneath and behind the normal trappings of a kung fu movie villain. The melodramatic aesthetic of kung fu movies, with their emphasis on using non-textual, visual and kinetic elements, gives Ching a forum to do this.
My next blog on Swordsman 2 will concentrate on Brigitte Lin’s performance of this character. I will also soon be posting a review of The Magic Blade as a guest reviewer for the jpfmovies blog.
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