Press Release for Barrie Pattison's History of the Chinese Kung Fu Film

CROUCHING FILM FREAK - SLEEPING CRITIC.

For a while there, Chinese language(s) cinema was the number two film industry on the planet. Jackie Chan was the most popular actor in history and it was easier to see him in down town Toronto, Melbourne or Sydney than it was to see Clint Eastwood or Mel Gibson. This is only the visible tip of activity, which has continued over a century and tells us alot about China, the movies and even ourselves.

Beginning in the silent period, we find the wu zia pian swashbucklers with their roots in Chinese Opera. As the material develops from mainland small screen black and white to the 'scope, colour and stereo Hong Kong spectaculars, they take on the shades of Hollywood epics, Japanese Samurai movies and Italian westerns. Some elements remain constant and others are added in. The acrobat heroes of the opera schools replace actors going through the motions and action stars learn from the martial artists. The sun hangs low in the purple studio sky, where the fields are sewn with paper flowers. Blood and sweat shine on perfect bodies, unaffected by gravity. The frame fills with saffron robed Shaolin monks, hermaphrodite cannibals, villains with fifty foot legs, heroes who balance sword points on lily pads and master martial artists whose skill derives from drinking the blood of venomous serpents.

This was all a bit much for critics who thought in terms of Pearl Buck, Chairman Mao and Charlie Chan and they never did catch up. However Kung fu movies were made around the world in imitation. Hollywood went on to assimilate Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, John Woo, Jet & Gong Lee. When one of his routines turned up in a Steven Seagal movie, action star Sammo Hung commented ruefully, "We steal from them. They steal from us." Now, since the end of the colonial period, the central government has made it their business to reclaim the martial arts spectacular. The success of Crouching Tiger... sits badly with them. What luck have they had?


Film maker and writer Barrie Pattison has done programs for the London NFT and the Paris Cinematheque. He studied the Chinese film phenomenon over decades, met many of the key figures of the classic period and has put together a program drawing on often rare material from official and private sources.

The screenings at Paddington Town Hall'sChauvel Cinema on Saturday October 20th at 1:00 pm and Monday 22 at 7:00 pm are unique opportunities to assess this material and decide what weight to give it's admirers.

Captions:

Love on a Foggy Liver - NY Chinatown - photo BrettRixon.

Jackie Chan gives stick - Liu Chia-liang's 1994 Drunken Master II.

Fifties martial arts action.

Hey that hurt! Raymond Liu's 1982 The Crane Fighter.

Fun in a Chinese movie - Chu Yuan's 1972 Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan.

Enquiries phone 02 9211 6514,

email:mozjoukine@yahoo.com.au