Zhang ‘comes home’ to his artistic origins
Print Edition
IT was no surprise when Zhang Yimou’s latest film, “Coming Home,” raked in 82.4 million yuan (US$13.2 million) at the box office on its opening weekend.
The highly anticipated drama pulled in 30 million yuan on May 16, an opening-day record for a Zhang movie, said production company Le Vision Pictures.
Critics predict the film will earn between 200 million and 300 million yuan, which would be a record for an art film in China.
Zhang has seldom had to worry about box office takings, especially for films like “Hero,” one of China’s highest grossing films ever, which took 250 million yuan.
But this time he abandoned commercial appeal to return to one of his favorite themes: a love story with twists and turns.
“Coming Home” is a return to Zhang’s artistic roots, according to critics.
Based on the last 30 pages of the novel “The Criminal Lu Yanshi” by Yan Geling, the movie, starring Gong Li and Chen Daoming, tells how a former professor tries but fails to make up with his wife when he is transferred from one labor camp to another in the early 1970s. He returns home after three years only to find his wife has amnesia.
The romance has three main characters and its plot and settings are simple, similar to Zhang’s other love stories like “Red Sorghum” and “Ju Dou.”
“In this film, Zhang Yimou doesn’t use magnificent scenery to impress audiences, rather he tries to evoke their emotions in an aesthetic way,” said Professor Yin Hong at Tsinghua School of Journalism and Communication.
The pinnacle of Zhang’s career as a director came in the late 1980s and early 90s, during which he focused on the gritty realities of life. In 2002, he began to direct commercial blockbusters with his epic “Hero.”
During the following years, he directed expensive martial arts films with epic scenes, including “House of Flying Daggers,” “Curse of the Golden Flower” and “A Simple Noodle Story.” They received mixed reviews from critics and audiences.
Zhang has the artistic capacity to depict emotion and sex to their extremes, said Zhang Yiwu, a professor at Peking University.
The focus on the suffering emotions between Lu Yanshi and Feng Wanyu in “Coming Home” is an attempt at a return to his gritty style, he said.
“Coming Home” is the first collaboration between Gong Li and Zhang since “Curse of the Golden Flower” in 2006.
Working with Gong was another sign of Zhang returning to his artistic roots, said Zhang Yiwu.
“But one film like ‘Coming Home’ doesn’t mean Zhang will simply return exclusively to art films,” he said.
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