Extraordinary Fidelity

Movie Time!

The CIA, yes the CIA, has released a documentary called "Extraordinary Fidelity". It tells the story of John T. Downey and Richard Fecteau, who were two CIA agents shot down over Manchuria during the Korean War. Their mission was to extract a Chinese agent who was organizing a guerilla rebellion to take down Mao's government. The two were captured and imprisoned for 20 years.

The film wasn't originally intended for the general public, but as a video for new recruits to help them learn about the agency's history. But now its coming to a YouTube link near you! (or embedded here)

Film

Dear Chinese guy.

One of my fave films is Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, but the ending is so ambiguous does Jen die? Earlier on in the film she can fly across the roof tops so surely she survives right?

Erme

Dear Erme.


Um I've not seen this film in ages, TCG talks a bit like Chow Yun Fat tbh, i.e. a mishmash of Mandarin mixed with borrowed words (mandarin speakers thought WTF when they saw the film). Anyway I do remember Jen jumping off the bridge and falling into the clouds as so:



The thing is though Jen can't actually fly, it's an exaggerated form of something called the light way where people are extremely nimble on their feet and can control their weight and balance almost perfectly. With the martial arts uber masters they can 'fly' even higher. I just watched the earlier bit in the film and the rooftop chase bit clearly shows Jen kicking off the walls and having to land and jump every now and again.

You know sort of like you can run up some stairs jump the last one and land without much of of an impact compared to your body weight. Ballet dancers can do this where they pirouette and land on pointe shoes. And over time for dramatic effect it is exaggerated. Much like in Braveheart whereby they feel William Wallace shoult be ten foot tall and don't believe Mel Gibson is Wallace.

In the video she does however glide, but that's wire works and CGI for you. I bloody wish I could fly at a ratio of more than 2:1 (I currently fly or rather drop at a ratio of 1:1 horizontal and vertical movement).

Anyway to spoil it for you yes Jen lives since Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon is part 4 of 5 books which were adopted to this film. My dad told me about this when we first went to see it, also that Li Mubai was picked from an earlier novel. Thus there is not exact continuity... the Jen Charactor appears in book 5 and thus lives. Though then again there have been some absolutely ridiculous things appearing in Chinese media. For example in the 1988 film A Better Tomorrow, you clearly see (for once) Chow Yun Fat eating an entire MP5 clip in super slow motion. There are a ton of squibs firing all over him. Yet he returns in the sequel which is handwaved that it is his twin brother...... riiiight...

I've not personally read these books as I prefer gritty horrible books like American Psycho

Tbh I don't think about it too hard and thinks she just puts her life into the hands of fate, or that it was a Gainax ending

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

Fuck you MGM

How an invading Army changes from Chinese to North Korean

Ever since last year I was pumped for the remake of Red Dawn when I heard that China was playing the enemy. But then, as I was about to log off facebook and go to bed, the news came up. Due to pressure from China, as well as the hype for the video game Homefront, the asshats at MGM decided to to edit the movie to make it a North Korean invasion instead. I am at a loss for words...

EDIT: Video related:

Horror films

Dear Chinese guy

Why are there no good horror films from China or Hong Kong? I can only find zombie films or comedy horror films which aren't scary at all. How come Koreans can make scary films but Chinese people can't?


George K


Dear George.



A bit of background.... a big reason as to why China doesn't make horror as we see it is simply because the censors don't like it. You know the kind of thing. We don't want people to see things which may upset social harmony. Stabby stabby psycho films such as erm..... American Psycho (a master piece the book anyway).

Scream 1 and 2 (less so 3) Saw I,II,III etc or I know what you did last summer, hell even The Fog (the 1980s version not the crappy 2005 remake). People can be very impressionable for example A better tomorrow. When A better tomorrow came out (not a horror film) loads of people copied Chow Yun Fat's character dress minus the guns of course.

China being China didn't give much credit to the people. You know the kind whereby newspapers and headless Chicken types blame movies for making people violent. Thus China's censors tended to not allow such things and or films of the super natural. It was something like 1979 when Deng Xiao Ping talked about removing the shackles from writers and artists. It was just talk though for many years. With the law about if we make a film to be shown in China then you really shouldn't make a different version sort of rule, unless we want to censor it get around double standard.

Thus when the government in China tells you NO, you simply don't do it. Unless we say so..... such is the will of a one party state....

Today writers skirt the issue by going all Dallas.



Oh it was just the imagination or it was just a dream or he took drugs (remember Winners don't take drugs!)



Which again promotes the ideology of drugs are bad m'kay....

..... while a western film would have the psycho lunge from a hidden corner when waking from such a dream just to scare people a bit more, they go all Dallas.

19 Levels of Hell for instance did a Dallas, it was all just a dream. Those that died didn't really die. Thus you get comical films about Zombies, Like Mr Vampire and Spooky encounters. Or modern day ones like erm The Phantom Lover which is sort of tense sometimes Romeo and Juliette remake. But not in your face lunging killer arrrgh make you jump kind of fear. Anecdotal I remember some might have been hell raiser or something. Which wasn't scary at all the scariest bit was when something fell out of a cupboard. Or Painted Skin, which is a knock off of Silence of the lambs. Where the protagonist goes around wearing other peoples skin.

Secondly the horror that is out there IS scary to older Chinese people. Like the dead coming back to life. While western influenced people like me see Zombies as a great opportunity to grab thy shotgun pump it like this.


One Handed Shotgun Pump

Shawn | Myspace Video

And go a Zombie huntin' ker chak! (Shotguns of the pump type are legal in the UK 3 shots maximum though)

Chinese have a general dislike of death and the undead, you know no number 4. Which goes far beyond the western fear of death maybe its the way three or four generations living under one roof is still common and Chinese people get to see their elders deteriorate. Maybe its the way many Chinese still venerate their ancestors or the way the recent dead tended (in the near past) to be buried nearby. (My grandad is in my uncles house in a jar). Such stuff about walking dead and or corpses being reanimated or ghosts is scary to many older Chinese people I know. A ridiculous movie I almost demanded my money back and the seconds of life I wasted watching had three seconds of CGI where his wife who turned out to be a ghost morphed a CGI monster mouth.... now if it were a morphed CGI dentata that would scare the hell out of me.


While I'll scoff at such films because I am a jaded city slicker. Who has met far too many weirdos to be phased much by anything.

It's like this back in 1984 audiences were awed at what was going on. While people born today see a big latex looking head.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNpb8KQ-OQ0

But with the censorship and skirting around like Dallas the true horror genre probably won't take off in China for a while. Now Koreans and Japanese people on the other hand. They make pretty decent horror movies.

Long lists of Korean films and Japanese films

Decent enough for Hollywood to copy remake such films and quietly pretend they thought of the idea themselves. Ok so they aren't as gory as western horror films but pretty decent regardless.




Except this one



Where they appeared to steal the plot from the Simpsons

One of my faves happens to be Candyman 1 probably because I really like the score to the film

Chinese in Foreigners’ Eyes

Below is a short film produced by Jacky Weng, a marketing student living in the UK. It is a look into how Westerners (and a Korean) perceive the Chinese. The opinions are mostly positive (probably because there was a Chinese person filming them).

China Promotional Ads

As I reported back in January shortly before Hu Jintao went to Washington, the Chinese government was going to be starting an ad campaign to boost its image in America. Well, they produced a short documentary (18 min) on China's rise to introduce themselves more clearly to the west.
Thoughtful insight? or Propaganda film? You decide.

Part 1


Part 2

The Joy Luck Club

This is one of my favorite books of all time. Anyone who loves things China needs to read this book. Written by Chinese American author Amy Tan, it is the story of four women who emigrated from China to give their daughters a better life. Each month the four women get together to talk and play Mahjong. They describe in detail each of their lives and hardships they faced as they grew up in China and eventually make their way to the US. It then tells the story of each of their daughter’s lives and the much different struggles they endure. The first one of the women was sold to a family as a bride at the age of fifteen, the second was forced to see her mother suffer and kill herself, dying before her eyes, the third was terribly abused by a man she thought she loved. She killed their infant son because it was the only thing she could take from him and cause him pain. She kept this horrible secret to herself. The fourth mother was forced to abandon her twin babies, unable to endure the burden of carrying them all the way south to safety as she fled the escalating violence of the Sino-Japanese war. The daughters had different issues. The first one wanted to please her husband, but lost her self in doing so. The second daughter’s family did not like her fiancé. The third daughter had the opposite problem; her fiancé’s family did not accept her. And finally, the fourth daughter who is the half-sister of the two babies abandoned by their mother must go to China to inform her sisters of their mother’s death. The hard lives of the mothers influenced how they raised their daughters. They all shared a common wish to give their daughters more opportunity and a better life in America. The relationships between the mothers and daughters are complicated, often strained; old ways verses new. The daughters struggling to balance their American lives while respecting the culture of old so desperately being kept alive by their mothers.

The book was also made into a film in 1993 and honestly, it is the only film that has ever brought tears to my eyes.

I can think of no better film to describe the life and hardships of Chinese American Immigrants in the early 20^th century. It is a film that I believe every Chinese American should see. Generations old and new. This is one of very few films that has touched my heart, and I hope it touches yours as well.

It has been... A Red Dawn

Many have heard of the infamous 1984 movie “Red Dawn”, were the Soviet Union and Allies in Latin America launch a full scale invasion of the United States and (presumably) start World War III. While a group of students from a small town in Washington form a guerilla army resistance group called the “Wolverines” and fight back. Well, Hollywood is at it again. And its not the Soviets this time.

For those of you who are unfamiliar, that symbol is made of the Chinese characters for 8 (八) and 1 (一). It is the seal of the People’s Liberation Army. The numbers 8 and 1 signify the month and day the Chinese communist militia was organized; August 1^st, 1927.

This remake of Red Dawn replaces the Soviets with Communist China. There is a huge amount of irony in this because in the original Red Dawn, the Chinese were on our side because the Soviets were invading them as well.

The Film is set to hit theaters November 24. There have been rumors that the film may be delayed due MGM’s short of funds, however it is still officially set for a November release.

There is no official trailer yet, but there is an unofficial news and information site for the movie here.

I do not know what to say about this film. On one hand I feel it will be downright epic, on the other hand I feel that this may just be capitalizing off of the average Westerners ignorance and uncertainty of China’s growing military and economic power.

China is obviously butthurt over this movie. Many of its state run newspapers have bashed the movie saying it portrays China negatively. There is no doubt it will be banned there.

But this film raises a much larger question; Would the US and China ever go to war?

In the near future? Highly unlikely.

Way down the road? Unless the regime collapses some other way, I see it as inevitable.

China and the US have major unresolved disputes that are not frequently discussed. Such as the manipulation of currency, human rights, Taiwan, Tibet, secret military spending, exploitation of third world countries, cyber terrorism, North Korea, the list is huge. But as in any situation were those on top (The US) become threatened by a rising underdog (China), there is eventually going to be conflict.

Its just like Lieutenant Tanner said;

“The two toughest kids on the block, I guess...Sooner or later they gonna fight.”

Now before you go start investing in that bomb shelter, Id like to reiterate that a war of that scale is incredibly unlikely during our lifetime. If the war happened tomorrow, the US would certainly win, especially with back up from NATO and our 10,000 nuclear warheads FUCK YEAH!

Even if China wanted to invade, they wouldn’t even be able to get here, as they have no blue water navy. However, they do have over 300 Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles and nuclear warheads capable of destroying any city in the western world, as per this map.

The relationship between the United States and China will decide the course of the 21^st century. Just as our relationship with the Soviet Union defined the 20^th century. There will be no war in the near future. But if China continues its aggressive expansion on the global stage and continues to build up its military, there is a chance that our grandchildren’s neighborhood may look something like this.

This weekend I have mostly been

Watching a few old films

If you like saving private Ryan you may like this, it is surprisingly apolitical and focuses mostly on the infantry on the ground. I finally got my DVD back bar stewards who borrow them pass it around 100 friends and I finally got this back yesterday.




Also

Hard Boiled




Note HARD BOILED IS FICTION, I've had more than a few questions asking me if Hong Kong is normally like what is depicted in Chow Yun Fat Movies, i.e. regular gunfu shoot outs all over the place. And no it is NOT like that in HK even Manchester isn't like that and you get murders all the time here.

But then again these are the same people who thought Braveheart was set in modern day Scotland