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XIU
XIU NOMINATED FOR HUMAN RIGHTS AWARD
The Cultural Revolution (1967-1976) was perhaps the cruelest
period of modern Chinese history. Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down
Girl, the latest portrayal of the ruthlessness of
the People’s Republic of China in trampling on the individual
during the Cultural Revolution, is based on Yan Geling’s novella
Heavenly Bath (Tian Yu), which in turn is adapted for the
screen and directed by China-born actress Joan Chen. The film
focuses on fifteen-year-old Wen Xiu (played by Lu Lu), nicknamed
Xiu Xiu, who is from an educated working class family in the
city of Chengdu. All 7.5 million educated teenagers, according
to the Communist Party, must be sent down to the provinces
to become "educated" by hard labor alongside the poorest of
the poor about the wisdom of the Communist utopia. Whereas
her boyfriend (played by Luoyong Wang) has political connections
and avoids being sent to the provinces, she boards a bus for
an unknown destination, believing that she will return home
after the usual year of service. After successful months in
one of the provinces, Wen Xui is transferred to learn horse
and yak herding for a few months, and she is promised that
her new knowledge will enable her to be later transferred
to a prestigious cavalry unit for educated girls. When she
arrives on the Tibetan steppes, in a desolate location far
from Chinese culture, she is quite unhappy as the tent-mate
of laconic, uneducated Tibetan Lao Jin (played by Lop Sang).
Castrated for opposing Chinese domination of his motherland,
middle-aged Lao Jin has respectfully entertained other sent-down
girls before, and tries to be as gentle as possible, but acid-tongued
Wen Xiu does not show Lao Jin respect, a well-known character
fault of the arrogant educated class that the Communist Party
was obviously trying to correct.
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The
summer comes and goes, but Wen Xiu is not transferred as promised.
An itinerant peddler informs her that the cavalry unit has
been disbanded due to a riot among the educated girls. The
Party, in short, did not devise an alternative plan for Wen
Xiu, who is thus left in limbo. Although Lao Jin offers to
take Wen Xiu to a bus station so that she can return to Chengdu,
Wen Xiu replies that without proper approval, such action
would result in her death. When the merchant returns, he perfidiously
offers to assist Wen Xiu in securing approval for her to go
home in exchange for sexual favors, and she loses her virginity.
Thereafter, a series of visitors rape her, at first unwillingly
and then willingly, as her desperation turns into hopelessness.
Inevitably, she bears a child, goes to the village hospital,
is branded as a whore, and has an abortion. Perhaps the most
extraordinary aspect of the film is what is not spoken—the
eyes of Lao Jin, who would like to help and protect immature
Wen Xiu but who expresses in deeds but not in words his compassion
for her. In the end, she dies in the snow, Lao Jin returns
to his horses and yaks alone, and we can safely speculate
that her family well knows the human costs of the misnamed
"Cultural Revolution." Similar to the suppressed but upbeat
Farewell My Concubine (1993) and To Live
(1990), which also portray aspects of the Cultural Revolution,
Xiu Xiu has achieved a special notoriety—it is banned in China.
Joan Chen, moreover, is prohibited from making any more films
in the territory of the People’s Republic. In so doing, the
government in Beijing has thus given approval to the excesses
of the Cultural Revolution and thereby has indicted itself
of an arrogant, mindless, and undemocratic perception of the
masses as expendable ciphers, whereas the film is an eloquent
statement about the need for greater respect by the government
of the rights of children, families, peasants, and indeed
for cultural rights. Accordingly, the Political Film Society
has nominated Xiu Xiu for an award in the category
among nominees for best film on human rights in 1999. MH
NOMINEES
FOR 1999
EXPOSÉ:
Bastards, Three
Seasons
HUMAN RIGHTS:
Hard, Xiu
Xiu
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