- English name：Peking Opera Blues
- Broadcast time：September 6, 1986
- Starring：钟楚红（Cherie Chung）、叶倩文（Sally Yeh）、林青霞（Brigitte Lin）、谷峰、郑浩南（Mark Cheng）
- director：徐克（Hark Tsui）
Introduction
Today let’s take a brief introduction of a famous Chinese movie named “Peking Opera Blues”.“Daomadan” is one of the “Dan” roles in Peking opera, and “dan” refers to the female characters of different ages and identities. Daomadan plays the female warrior role that is highly skilled in military drill, usually riding a horse with a sword held in hand. They are mostly marshals or generals; hence often present an imposing manner, such as Mu Guiying, Fan Lihua, etc. In terms of stage performance, Daomadan attaches equal importance to chang (singing), nian (dialogue), and zuo (acting). She is also required to have combat skill, but the combat scene is far less fierce than that of “Wudan”, and stress is laid on figure posture, highlighting the mighty and dignified temperament of the role. Compared with other terminological names of Peking opera roles, Daomadan has got widespread fame for the namesake movie directed by Hark Tsui in 1986 (the film is entitled ‘刀马旦’ in Chinese, which writes ‘Daomadan’ in pinyin, but the English title is ‘Peking Opera Blues’).
Peking Opera Blues (or Daomadan in Chinese) was one of the most influential Hong Kong movies of that age. It was acclaimed by the film critics as “a remarkable work of Hark Tsui which brilliantly combines art with entertainment,” and even the director Hark Tsui himself deemed it his representative work in the 1980s.
Plot
Set in the early Republic of China when the country was in a state of political turbulence and people lived on the edge of starvation, the film tells a story of a Peking opera troupe embroiled in a political conspiracy, and three female protagonists managed to reveal to the public the evidence of a warlord betraying the country. The three acknowledged beauties, Brigitte Lin, Cherie Chung, Sally Yeh, are the protagonists of the movie. They are no longer eye candies, nor the foils to the heroes, nor little helpless weeping women, or princesses waiting for the rescue of the prince, they have their own independent personality, their own dreams, and also have the guts to pursue their dreams. Even though they come from different social status and have different cultural backgrounds, their common ground cannot be denied. Director Hark Tsui not only displays in the movie the dazzling martial arts skills, but also endows it with nostalgic patriotic sentiment. Through the eyes of three women from completely different social status, classes and cultural backgrounds, the film reflects the key point of the concept of Greater China, and depicts the historical vicissitude with humanistic emotion.
Professional evaluation
1.
Director Tsui Hark not only made this film have wonderful action performances, but also gave it a sense of family and country. Through the perspectives of three women with completely different identities, classes, and cultural backgrounds, he reflected the focus of the concept of Greater China, and wrote a tragic historical tragedy with literary and artistic feelings. When the film was launched, three patriotic women were the main characters, which seemed to be a competition with the pure male individualism in “A Better Tomorrow”.
2.
The film not only has a very ingenious story conception, but also the main and supporting roles are well performed. The Peking Opera scenes in the film are also closely and wonderfully connected with the plot. In “Dama Dan”, Bai Niu, who loves Peking Opera, cannot appear on stage due to her female body. She goes on stage for the first time to help Hua Jinxiu escape. She and Xiang Hong are favored by the governor and officially go on stage again. Finally, in order to escape, they sing a serious performance of “Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea” on stage with their brothers and sisters. All these scenes are advancing with the plot. On the one hand, the story of everyone working together to steal the documents is unfolded without leaving any traces, and on the other hand, it also fully demonstrates the bravery and strength of the three women like “Dama Dan”.
3.
Tsui Hark dramatizes the magnificence and dynamism of Peking Opera, condensing the theater into the intersection of politics and personal destiny. The sophisticated Tsui Hark uses strong dramatic conflicts to vividly depict the contradictions among various social classes during the warlords’ melee. Director Tsui Hark reflects the focus of the concept of Greater China through the perspectives of three women with completely different identities, classes, and cultural backgrounds, and writes a series of tragic historical tragedies with literary and artistic feelings.
Key words
京剧Jīngjù: form of traditional Chinese theatre which combines music, vocal performance, mime, dance, and acrobatics.
穆桂英Mù Guìyīng:a legendary heroine from ancient China’s Northern Song Dynasty and a prominent figure in the Generals of the Yang Family legends.
徐克Xú Kè: a Vietnamese-Hong Kong based New Wave film director, producer and screenwriter.
