Monday, July 26, 2010

Hero by Zhang Yimou

Following the popularity of Chinese martial arts in what is known as the wuxia genre of cinema, the film Hero was released in 2002. This film was directed by acclaimed 5th generation filmmaker Zhang Yimou. One of his first projects was as a cinematographer for Yellow Earth, directed by Chiang Kaige. It was only later with the movie Red Sorghum that he debuted as a director and became known worldwide.

After the success of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Yimou decided to explore this new genre which was increasing in popularity. His film Hero narrates the meeting between a nameless warrior, played by Jet Li, and the Qin Emperor, played by Chen Daoming. Nameless is able to meet the emperor because he defeated three of the deadliest bandits in that time: Sky (Donnie Yen), Flying Snow (Maggie Cheung), and Broken Sword (Tony Leung.) The movie develops the story behind the encounter between Nameless and the bandits. The director uncovers the truth through different narratives in which different colors are predominantly used to differentiate one story from another and express the characters’ feelings in each situation, and causing the audience to feel the same.

Although it is not very obvious in the first scenes of the film, the audience can quickly catch on that a specific color dominates each anecdote, with the details slightly changed each time. The movie particularly focuses on the scene surrounding Nameless, Flying Snow and Broken Sword since it carries most the emotions of the story. The first color accentuated and often applied in their encounter is red. By itself, this color represents determination, strength, power, desire and love. This color is perfectly used in this first narrative scene to reveal the passionate relationship between the characters. Their attitude and words hurt each other. It was easy to notice that they loved one another; however, their pride did not allow them to be honest about it, and misunderstanding caused them to doubt their feelings. At one point, Broken Sword slept with his assistant Moon (Zhang Ziyi) in order to make Flying Snow jealous and feel bad about her betrayal. She responds by stabbing him and eventually goes to meet Nameless for a fight. The characters followed their feelings above rational thinking, and acted under the influence of their emotions of love and hate. In the end, their inability to control their emotions became their own enemy, causing them to be defeated.

This story is immediately found false by the Emperor. He rejects the story and instead he gives his own take on it. In here, blue is the color that is most seen. His perception of the encounter is very different from what Nameless told him. It is interesting to see the more humanistic approach of the emperor. He provides a plot in which its characters are less impulsive in their reaction. Therefore, blue was a suitable color since it represents calmness. The characters depicted peace in mind, in actions and in their decisions. Because of their true love for each other, the theme of sacrifice is portrayed a lot. The audience is touched when watching Flying Snow injure Broken Sword because she does not want him to die when fighting Nameless. Later on, after Flying Snow is defeated, Broken Sword and Nameless have a mental fight. The scenery is surrounded by the blue color of the river where they fight on, the trees in the background and even the air. This effect conveys the feeling of sadness, which is provoked in the audience after realizing that Flying Snow and Broken Sword could not be together forever. When a drop of water hits Flying Snow’s cheek, Broken Sword diverges his direction from the fight to her. In this part of the movie, the audience joins Broken Sword in the mourning of Flying Snow’s death.

Although the Emperor was right at guessing that Nameless’ story was a lie, the true anecdote reveals a completely different story. After being uncovered, Nameless decides to tell the truth. This time, the color that was highlighted was white. We usually relate white with the truth because it represents purity and light. Just like the idea of enlightenment, Broken Sword, the Emperor and Nameless understood that the highest of all knowledge is not fighting at all. This perspective was related to the Daoist idea of “wuwei,” or non-doing. Doing nothing to change the natural orders is the perfect state. Broken Sword understood it through prolonged meditation, and therefore he does not kill the Emperor when he had the opportunity to. Flying Snow, the girl he loves, ends up being resentful towards him because of this decision. Even Nameless, who planned to kill the Emperor, understood it after being in front of him and does not continue with his scheme. We find that death is also an important theme in this section. For Chinese culture, white is the color that represents death. In the end, with disappointment, Flying Snow kills Broken Sword, blaming him for the second failure of the Emperor’s homicide. Nonetheless, she realized that she was blinded by her desire for revenge and forgot her ultimate goal, which was to live with Broken Sword happily forever. In the end, she realized her mistake and kills herself while holding her lovers body, giving the audience a tragic ending.

In this story surrounded by the truth and death, the director adds a flashback that has green as its primary color. This flashback explains how the couple met and how they once tried to kill the Emperor but did not succeed. It was also meant to represent the harmony in life they had when they had a mutual goal, which was to kill the Emperor. After gaining an understanding of the meaning of life and the order of nature, that flashback became a dream and illusion for both of them.

In conclusion, the director’s artistic creation utilizes colors like red, blue, white and green to express emotions of the characters and the story. Through these colors, the audience is able to understand the feelings they had and allows them to be part of the plot. It was also used as a means to divide the different stories developed throughout the film. It helped in the organization of the audience’s understanding and kept them attentive. Eventually, the film Hero became a new land of experiment for the internationally known filmmaker, Zhang Yimou.

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