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Visionaries
of My Love
The
Bitter Tea of General Yen
viewed
June 24, 2000 on VHS 
Full
Details
Broken
Blossoms
viewed
June 24, 2000 on VHS Full
Details
80 years ago my relationship with my girlfriend would
have been a crime. The anti-miscegeny laws of that
time prohibited marriage between races. Even now,
long after the laws have been repealed, mixed marriages are still having a terrible time gaining
acceptance.
With this history in mind, I took a special delight in finding VHS
copies of two very bold films of the silent and
post-silent era that explore the theme of interracial
romance, specifically between Chinese men and white
women, from two of America's most recognized
filmmakers. In making these films each of them
took a dramatic diversion from their signature style;
and yet for their uniqueness and sensitivity these films
rank among the best of their respective canons.
Broken Blossoms was made in 1919 by, quite
unexpectedly, D.W. Griffith, the progenitor of the
Hollywood epic. This time, he had fallen upon a
melodramatic novel about a Chinese Buddhist priest who
goes on a mission to England only to become a humble
shopkeeper. One day his life becomes inextricably
entangled with that of a girl beaten half to death by
her abusive father. Griffith no doubt believed
that the exploitive events and lure of exotic sex would
pack in curious audiences.
Somehow, he still couldn't help but infuse the
subject matter with exciting filmmaking. It was
the same high-powered drama as in Birth of a Nation
and Intolerance; however, this time the charge
came not from tightly edited sequences, but from dreamy
visuals presented in a stunningly languid manner, mostly
through a dense, opiate-like fog that pervades not only
through the set but the mood of the film. This
film surpasses other Griffith films in texture: it
establishes a mood and the mood holds the audience in
its grip. It is also superbly nuanced, drawing out
the promise of sensuality though grappling with the
limitations to what it can portray, and therefore
exploring the limits to love of its time.
The virginal Lilian Gish, already the veteran of
dozens of films at the age of 19, is both the emotional
and erotic centerpiece of the film. She always
makes her character's suffering tangible and
interesting. There is nothing more memorable than
the way she pushes her fingers up the sides of her mouth
to force a smile for her father. When her father
is about to beat her, the terror on her face is
heartbreaking. And yet her character is capable of
remarkable moments of sexual awakening and
self-discovery, when she wakes with dreamy eyes to find
herself in the Yellow Man's bed, wearing opulent
Oriental silk and staring into the Yellow Man's
captivated face.
Richard Barthlemess does a capable job as the Yellow
Man, acting humbly but evoking longing for things
forbidden when the girl comes into his ken. In the
end, he commits two acts that would have been
inconceivable to link to the quite, spiritual man
introduced to us at the story's beginning, and then do
we reflect on how much the man has been changed, by his
Western surroundings, and by tragic love.
Frank Capra, who single-handedly crafted the corny
wholesomeness that defined the movie's vision of
American life, apparently was a much more exciting
filmmaker in this early days. The Bitter Tea of
General Yen was made two years before It Happened
One Night solidified his status as a comic
director. There is no sign of what has come to be
known as the Capra touch; instead there is something far
more exciting and interesting. This is a film with
unexpected bursts of violence, intelligent exchanges of
sexually charged dialogue and gamesmanship between a
Chinese general and the beautiful Western missionary
woman he holds captive.
The film begins in pseudo-action mode as a
missionary's wife (a very young and fresh-looking
Barbara Stanwyck) is about to enjoy her honeymoon when
her husband is called on to save an orphanage in a town
under the General's siege. During the dramatic and
violent rescue the wife is knocked cold and is then
rescued by the General. He then holds her in
forced custody, playing subtle games of seduction while
simultaneously contending with rival warlords and
traitors. The General's lustful designs backfire
against him when the wife unwittingly divulges
information to his enemies, leading to his
downfall. Alone, they confront each other with the
consequences in a the final scenes, where the only sound, the ringing of a
small bell, accentuates the climax. This film
provides entertainment in various levels and forms: both
profound and exciting, violent and sensual, it seems to
be a promise of the kind of filmmaking that Frank Capra
failed to deliver for the rest of his career, much in
the same way that the young, urbane and sexually charged
Gary Cooper was Capra-cized into an aw-shucks small town
hero.
Aside from the masterful directing, most impressive
is Nils Asther as the General. For what it's
worth, the Swedish-born actor plays the part very well,
mostly by conveying a dignified menace to his face.
Stanwyck shows signs of the sexuality that would excite
audiences throughout the rest of her career.
It is interesting to note how in both films the
female leads are somewhat oppressed by the demands of their
men; one being brutually beaten by her father, the other
neglected by her husband. Likewise, the Chinese
male leads are sensitive and intensely drawn to their
objects of affection; though whether there is any real
understanding of each other's hearts is a question
largely left unanswered by both films. Both
Chinese are very self-controlled with their desires, and
sadly accepting of their unhappy fates. If
anything, their non-abusive disposition mixed with a
shroud of mystery presents a special brand of
masculinity for women: a man who is noble but enigmatic,
a man to be pursued as much as he pursues.
Despite these similarities, and the fact that they
are both hopelessly exoticized, the two characters offer
several contrasts between them, and, surprisingly, offer
the possibility of diversity in depictions of the
Oriental from a white perspective (which sadly was never
quite realized). The General is godless, virile
and dignified; the shopkeeper spiritual, passive and
humble. Each character has a richness that put
today's Hollywood depiction of Asians (with Asian actors
no less) to shame. This does not mean that White
actors do a better job of portraying Asians; it means
that in spite of the progress we supposedly have made in
furthering cultural understanding in our society,
Hollywood has only taken steps towards being more
generic and superficial. A remake of either of
these movies would be a better use of resources than
another action movie with Asian gangsters, or even
another Jackie Chan feature.
But it is pointless to remake films that are already
perfect. The real challenge is to find out how the
themes of interracial love and cultural understanding
have evolved, if at all, from the time these beautiful
and provocative films were made. New stories that
suit the state of these themes in our time need to be
written and produced. I don't expect this to come
from Hollywood, but it does have to come from somewhere.
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