Film: Spring In A Small Town
Director: Fei Mu
Country: China
Released: 1948
Runtime: 93 minutes
Genre: Drama
Studio: Wenhua
Influenced: Chen Kaige, Zhang Yimou, Wong Kar-Wai, Jia Zhangke
Budgetary constraints are part of the reason why this film feels like a modern Chinese fable. Financial issues at the production company Wenhua meant that director Fei Mu only had a cast of five people for Spring In A Small Town – the husband (Dai Liyan), the wife (Zhou Yuwen), the husband's younger sister (Dai Xiu), the guest (Zhang Zhichen) and the servant (Lao Huang). Set in the immediate aftermath of the Sino-Japanese War (1937-45), the film portrays an anonymous small Chinese town in ruins, an invalid husband consumed by regret and nostalgia, a wife stuck in a passionless marriage, a loyal servant and a younger sister full of joy and positivity despite the challenging circumstances.
Into this small world appears a doctor from Shanghai, Zhang, the husband's childhood friend and the wife's former lover, immediately creating a love triangle between the three characters that forms the crux of the drama. The minimalist setting and the limited cast give the film a timeless, allegorical feel. Does the wife (representing the people of China) face a choice between her husband, symbol of ancient China and its deep sense of history and tradition, and the guest from Shanghai, symbol of the vibrant modern city and capitalism? Alternatively, Spring In A Small Town is just a simple romantic drama.
From the start of the film we see the wife walking along the city wall, escaping her troubles and feeling as if she's floating like a cloud. It's perhaps a strange cinematic choice for her to continue the voiceover narration when the guest arrives, given a lot of the action she is describing is self-evident from the images, but this lends the film a literary approach. There are also occasional innovations in terms of editing and camerawork, while like earlier Chinese classic film Street Angels, there’s a scene of someone singing a Chinese folk song, in this case by the sister about Ivan Doudard. Later on in the film, there's also a lovely scene on the river when the sister sings another song, while at the back of the boat the wife and the guest exchange desiring glances.
By the third morning, the former lovers are conspiring to lie so they can go for secret walks together by the city wall. The guest chides her for being selfless and never having an opinion, but the chemistry and longing between the two is palpable. Meanwhile, the husband is full of shame that he cannot make his wife happy and says to the guest that he should have married her instead. The wife can’t see a way out of the situation, unless her husband dies, but she then recoils at the idea of thinking such a thing.
In a cruel twist, the husband suggests to the wife that she play matchmaker for his little sister (who is 16 and soon ready to marry) and the guest. The adults all get drunk and then the truth of the wife’s love for the guest dawns on the husband (and the sister too). At this point, there's a lovely moonlit exterior shot reminiscent of ancient Chinese landscape painting and full of symbolism. The movie closes with the wife looking out longingly from the city wall, accompanied by her husband who has now recovered his lust for life. Perhaps the film’s message is not to ditch the old China in favour of modernity? Or maybe it's just a simple morality tale? Either way, it's universally regarded as one of the greatest Chinese films ever made.
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