#邱毅已在厦门接种新冠疫苗 #
I think that anyone who knows a little bit about Taiwanese movies will not have seen this movie, at the very least, will not have heard of this movie. Similarly, anyone who knows a little about Taiwanese politics will not be unaware of the "228 Uprising." Indeed, the "228 Uprising" was a major event that had to be mentioned in Taiwan's political history, and the impact on the ruling Kuomintang at that time was also very large, and the "228 Uprising" is still an "original sin" of the KMT's rule in Taiwan. It is true that the "228 Uprising" played a very great influence on the subsequent democratization of Taiwan, but from the perspective of facts, the "228 Uprising" was not a simple event about democratic demands, but more of a protest against those in power at that time and outsiders.
Or first talk about the film itself, "City of Sorrows" is a Hou Xiaoxian film, released in 1989, because the Taiwan region had just "lifted the strict" at that time, the degree of openness of society and the degree of freedom of public opinion were far less than today, so at that time, making such a film can be said to directly challenge Taiwan's taboo topic. However, this film has not been deleted, let alone banned, a big reason is that this film won the Golden Lion Award in Venice, becoming the first Taiwanese film to win awards at the world's three major film festivals, this international honor gave the Kuomintang authorities relatively great pressure, so that this film passed the review, met with the audience, and triggered a big discussion in Taiwan about the "228 Uprising". But it is also for this reason that this film did not win the Golden Horse Award for Best Picture that year. In addition, this movie has also led to the travel fever in the Jiufen and Jinguashi areas, and many tourists go to Jiufen to play, in addition to shopping in the old street, they also have to look for the original location of the filming of the sad city.
To interject, the movie "Dosan" is also based on the story background and shooting location of Jiufen and Jinguashi, Jiufen and Jinguashi prospered by producing gold mines, and after the excavation of the mineral deposits was exhausted, the time of its prosperity and decline roughly coincided with the time of Taiwan in the Japanese occupation era, so the films set in this place were roughly related to the Japanese occupation era. Now when it comes to the most well-known connection between Jiufen and Japan, I am afraid that it will be the animation master Hayao Miyazaki's "Spirited Away", the town in this animated movie is based on Jiufen Old Street, if any reader wants to travel to Taiwan, Jiufen is a place I strongly recommend, of course, before going to see "Sad City", it is better.
If you think about it, I watched this film about three times. The first time I watched it in college, I just felt that Hou Xiaoxian's lens was very long, the whole film was very stable, and there was no deep impression on the content of the whole movie. The second time was when Xiamen University listened to Qiu Yi's speech and mentioned this movie, I went back to see it again and looked up some things about the "228 Uprising". The third time was before writing this article, combined with what I had recently read, I saw some details in the film, which can be said to portray the situation in Taiwan at that time very well, and also reflected the skills of the screenwriter and director. Oh, yes, one of the screenwriters of this movie is the director of the movie "Dosan" mentioned earlier, Wu Nianzhen.
The film begins with the Japanese Emperor's imperial voice and the painful groans of the woman who gave birth to a child, and Lin Wenxiong, the boss of the Lin family played by Chen Songyong, gets a son at the beginning of the film, named Lin Guangming. Japan's defeat, the birth of a new life, the name Guangming, everyone knows what this means. Here is a detail, that is, the person who gave birth to Lin Wenxiong is Lin Wenxiong's concubine, and he speaks Cantonese, on the one hand, it can be said that in Taiwan in 1945, the tradition of emphasizing men over women and marrying concubines was retained, on the one hand, it can be said that the economic exchanges with the mainland are still relatively close, and the economy is relatively good, and there will be Cantonese-speaking Nanyang women willing to marry over as concubines.
In addition to the dominant Hokkien language in this film, you can also hear Japanese, Shanghainese, Shandong dialect, Cantonese, and Shaoxing dialect, which is almost impossible to call ordinary language. From these complex languages, we can hear the complexity of Taiwanese society at that time: the defeated Japanese, the Nanyang people who did business, the Ashan (Tangshan people, that is, mainlanders) who followed the Kuomintang to Taiwan, the Shanghainese who engaged in business in Taiwan and even illegal smuggling, and chen Yi, a Zhejiang native who took over Taiwan as the chief executive. These people with different backgrounds, different ideas, different interests, and different degrees of civilization jointly intertwined the background of Taiwan at that time.
The background of the Lin family has outlined the living conditions of Taiwanese people at that time from the history and space. Lin Alu, played by the Lin family's father, Li Tianlu, a famous Taiwanese cloth bag opera master (Hou Xiaoxian's other film "Drama Dream Life" is filmed with him as the main actor and story prototype), was repeatedly bullied by the Japanese because he was regarded as a hooligan by the Japanese because of his protection of the interests of the village; Lin Wenxiong, the boss of the Lin family, played by Chen Songyong, went all out to maintain his family business and was finally shot to death by mainlanders; Lin Wensen, the second eldest of the Lin family who did not appear in the movie, went to Luzon with the Japanese army to join the army as a military doctor because of his medical skills Gao Jie played the Lin family old third Lin Wenliang in Shanghai as an interpreter for the Japanese army, contracted the disease crazy, after being cured, he was punished for the crime of traitor for refusing to do smuggling business with mainlanders, and the old disease recurred and became a madman; Liang Chaowei played by The old fourth Lin Wenqing of the Lin family was deaf since childhood, opened a photo studio for a living, liked to read leftist books, befriended literati, and finally was imprisoned for the "228 Uprising" purge.
In addition, the life trajectory and other details of the "228 Uprising" are also shown in the movie: the friendship between Japanese and Taiwanese after Japan's defeat in the war, the retreat of Japanese nationals, the life of mainland journalists in Taiwan, the outflow of Taiwanese rice candy, etc., can be seen in the movie. Through the depiction of these details, Hou Xiaoxian reflects the grand historical background of Taiwan at that time from the individual level. So, what exactly happened to the "228 Uprising", why it happened, how it happened, and how much impact it has left on the present, I think, this still has to start from 1945.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="20" > the 228 Uprising</h1>
It took place on February 28, 1947, as a mass movement of the people of Taiwan Province to oppose autocracy, dictatorship and democracy. On February 27, 1947, Kuomintang police officers beat up tobacco dealer Lin Jiang mai and bled him while inspecting smuggled cigarettes on the streets of the "Taipei Tianma Tea Factory". After that, the people began to watch, and the police officers wanted to pull out their guns to expel the onlookers, but they shot and injured the local people Chen Wenxi (who died the next day after being sent to the hospital). On February 28, 1947, Taipei citizens went on strike, marched and petitioned for the surrender of criminals, and were suppressed by the Kuomintang authorities, which aroused the anger of the people and broke out into a large-scale armed riot. Within days, the rioters took control of much of Taiwan Province. Chen Yi, the chief executive of Taiwan Province, urgently sent a telegram to Nanjing for help, and the Nationalist government dispatched the 21st Army stationed in Shanghai to land in Keelung and garrison Taipei to suppress the masses on a large scale, and the movement ultimately failed. (Taken from Baidu Encyclopedia)
Author: Ma Jun
Note: Published on the WeChat public platform of "Cross-Strait Youth"