Yijiang chunshui xiangdong liu (Spring River Flows East)
Cai Chusheng, Zheng Junli, CN 1947; Screenplay: Cai Chusheng, Zheng Junli; Cinematography: Zhu Jinming, Wu Weiyun, Shen Xilin, Wu Tingfang; Editing: Wu Tingfang; Music: Zhang Zengfan; Cast: Tao Jin, Shangguan Yunzhu, Bai Yang. DCP (from 35mm), bw, 192 min. Mandarin with English subtitlesThis epic two-part political melodrama was made at the progressive Kunlun Film Studio in 1947, under prominent left-wing directors Cai Chusheng and Zheng Junli, in the middle of the Chinese Civil War. Released in two parts, the film was an enormous popular success, due both to its mobilization of full-throated melodrama and its political engagement. Its brutal critique of KMT corruption somehow evaded substantial censorship. When Japan invades China in 1931, idealistic schoolteacher Zhongliang leaves behind his mother, wife Sufen (played by popular and sympathetic early PRC star Bai Yang), and son in Shanghai to join the national struggle. They become poor refugees, struggling to survive. He escapes capture, ends up in the KMT capital of Chongqing, and finds his feet (and vocation) womanizing and thriving as a parasitic capitalist. On his return to Shanghai, his inevitable meeting with his abandoned and destitute family exposes the moral choices facing a Chinese family and society in crisis. (S.K.)