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CAST & CREW
Featuring Chen Daoming
Gong Li & Zhang Huiwen
Directed by Zhang Yimou
In Mandarin with English Subtitles
Rated PG-13 109 Mins.
Featuring Chen Daoming
Gong Li & Zhang Huiwen
Directed by Zhang Yimou
In Mandarin with English Subtitles
Rated PG-13 109 Mins.
Reviewed by A.O. Scott - New York Times
Zhang Yimou and Gong Li constitute one of the great director-actress pairings in movie history. In the 1980s and ’90s they worked together on a remarkable run of movies — including “Red Sorghum,” “Raise the Red Lantern,” “Shanghai Triad” and “To Live” — that were central to the resurgence of Chinese cinema and made international stars of both of them. Ms. Gong, noble, fragile and indomitable, was for Mr. Zhang a muse, an alter ego and an emblem of China’s suffering and resilience at important moments in the nation’s history.
“Coming Home,” only their second collaboration in the past 20 years, reunites them in an intimate, politically resonant story set in the final years and the immediate aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. Ms. Gong plays Feng Wanyu, a teacher in a provincial city whose husband, Lu Yanshi (Chen Daoming), a professor, has been sent to a labor camp in a purge of “rightists.” Feng Wanyu lives with their teenage daughter, Dan Dan (Zhang Huiwen), a dancer who dreams of playing the lead in the ballet “The Red Detachment of Women.” Her father’s pariah status threatens her ambition, and she is eager to denounce him when local officials demand it.
Early in the film, Lu Yanshi has escaped and made his way home in a doomed and desperate effort to see his family again. He receives a mixed welcome. Feng Wanyu is both terrified and eager to be with him, while Dan Dan, who barely remembers her father, is worried about the disruptive effect his presence will have on her life. Her selfishness and shortsightedness, and her inability to sympathize with her parents or put aside her own needs are all perfectly normal. She’s an adolescent, after all. But in a time of political extremity, ordinary feelings and actions can have terrible consequences. Innocent people do not only suffer under a ruthless system; they become agents of its cruelty.
The first section of “Coming Home” culminates in a harrowing sequence that demonstrates Mr. Zhang’s unmatched skill as a choreographer of swift and complex action. The tension and suspense surrounding Lu’s return suddenly dissolves, giving way to a mood of gentle, contemplative melancholy. The Cultural Revolution ends. Surviving prisoners are sent home and rehabilitated. And the psychological conflict in Lu Yanshi’s family gives way to a muted drama of regret and reconciliation.
Which is not to say that relations among the three of them are any simpler, only that they become characters in a fable spun around a core of almost unbearable emotion. It’s especially poignant to see Ms. Gong, whose earlier characters were so stubborn and passionate, play a woman who (in ways I’m reluctant to reveal) is estranged from her own experience, past and present. The shadow of that earlier intensity is part of what makes this performance so moving.
And “Coming Home” itself is graceful and modestly scaled, forgoing the historical sweep and the operatic fervor of some of Mr. Zhang’s previous work. Its quiet, sentimental denouement is a bit deceptive: There is terrible pain here, and the main interest of the film is in how the characters respond to it and what their response says about China’s understanding of its recent history. Peace, this movie suggests, comes at the price of memory. Recovering from catastrophe and forgetting about it may amount to the same thing.
Zhang Yimou and Gong Li constitute one of the great director-actress pairings in movie history. In the 1980s and ’90s they worked together on a remarkable run of movies — including “Red Sorghum,” “Raise the Red Lantern,” “Shanghai Triad” and “To Live” — that were central to the resurgence of Chinese cinema and made international stars of both of them. Ms. Gong, noble, fragile and indomitable, was for Mr. Zhang a muse, an alter ego and an emblem of China’s suffering and resilience at important moments in the nation’s history.
“Coming Home,” only their second collaboration in the past 20 years, reunites them in an intimate, politically resonant story set in the final years and the immediate aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. Ms. Gong plays Feng Wanyu, a teacher in a provincial city whose husband, Lu Yanshi (Chen Daoming), a professor, has been sent to a labor camp in a purge of “rightists.” Feng Wanyu lives with their teenage daughter, Dan Dan (Zhang Huiwen), a dancer who dreams of playing the lead in the ballet “The Red Detachment of Women.” Her father’s pariah status threatens her ambition, and she is eager to denounce him when local officials demand it.
Early in the film, Lu Yanshi has escaped and made his way home in a doomed and desperate effort to see his family again. He receives a mixed welcome. Feng Wanyu is both terrified and eager to be with him, while Dan Dan, who barely remembers her father, is worried about the disruptive effect his presence will have on her life. Her selfishness and shortsightedness, and her inability to sympathize with her parents or put aside her own needs are all perfectly normal. She’s an adolescent, after all. But in a time of political extremity, ordinary feelings and actions can have terrible consequences. Innocent people do not only suffer under a ruthless system; they become agents of its cruelty.
The first section of “Coming Home” culminates in a harrowing sequence that demonstrates Mr. Zhang’s unmatched skill as a choreographer of swift and complex action. The tension and suspense surrounding Lu’s return suddenly dissolves, giving way to a mood of gentle, contemplative melancholy. The Cultural Revolution ends. Surviving prisoners are sent home and rehabilitated. And the psychological conflict in Lu Yanshi’s family gives way to a muted drama of regret and reconciliation.
Which is not to say that relations among the three of them are any simpler, only that they become characters in a fable spun around a core of almost unbearable emotion. It’s especially poignant to see Ms. Gong, whose earlier characters were so stubborn and passionate, play a woman who (in ways I’m reluctant to reveal) is estranged from her own experience, past and present. The shadow of that earlier intensity is part of what makes this performance so moving.
And “Coming Home” itself is graceful and modestly scaled, forgoing the historical sweep and the operatic fervor of some of Mr. Zhang’s previous work. Its quiet, sentimental denouement is a bit deceptive: There is terrible pain here, and the main interest of the film is in how the characters respond to it and what their response says about China’s understanding of its recent history. Peace, this movie suggests, comes at the price of memory. Recovering from catastrophe and forgetting about it may amount to the same thing.
