A Narrow Lane Celebrity

A brilliant, black-comedy script and the subtle comic genius of star Zhu Xu mark Cong Lianwen’s film as one of the best tragicomedies of post-liberation Chinese cinema.
Zhu Xu plays Sima Shouxian, an apparently diffident, pedantic oddball craftsman who makes funeral wreaths. But underneath Sima’s shy exterior is a razor-sharp intellect and he takes every opportunity to use his traditionally florid linguistic virtuosity to skewer the petty and pompous Red Guards lording it over his neighbourhood. Sima insists on using meaningful language, something which protects him from fearing the ideological fundamentalism metastasizing around him. When Sima and his two neighbours – the persecuted widow Zhuo Chunjian and rough-and-tumble dog butcher Han Niusan – are forced into a political reeducation programme, he contrives to get them out with some clever strategies. After Niusan becomes the protector of Chunjian and her daughter Ding Xiang, the latter’s desire to become a stage singer sets her up for a more terrible fate at the hands of local corrupt officials.
By 1985, the daring stylistic experiments and political expressionism of just five years earlier was no longer encouraged. Cong’s brilliant response is to turn the story inward, self-reflexively, and to use subtle, quietly subversive satire as an even sharper weapon against repression and falsehood. (SK)