The Spring River Flows East
Encyclopedia
The Spring River Flows East is a 1947
Chinese film
directed by Cai Chusheng
and Zheng Junli
and is generally considered one of the great Chinese films of the period. The Hong Kong Film Awards
ranked it in its list of greatest Chinese language films ever made at number 27. Produced by Kunlun Film Company, the film is over three hours long and consists of two parts, Eight War-Torn Years (八年離亂) and The Dawn (天亮前后), released one after the other the same year.
The film details the trials and tribulations of a family around the Second Sino-Japanese War
, in pre-war, wartime and post-war China. The first part of the film, Eight War-Torn Years details the early life and marriage of a young working-class couple, Sufen (Bai Yang), and Zhang Zhongliang (Tao Jin) and the strain produced when the husband is forced to flee to Chongqing
while leaving his family in Shanghai
during the war.
The second part of the film details Zhang Zhongliang's return to Shanghai, now married into a wealthy bourgeois family for whom Sufen is forced to work for as a maid.
The film was remade in 2005 as a television adaptation starring Hu Jun
, Anita Yuen
, Carina Lau
, and Chen Daoming
, though this newer version is referred to by the English translation, The River Flows Eastwards instead of The Spring River Flows East
dynasty, Li Yu
(936/7 - 978). The poem, To the tune of ‘the Beauty Yu’ ("Beauty Yu" is the metaphoric name for Papaver rhoeas) was written shortly after the loss of his kingdom to the Song Dynasty
:
The film is set in Shanghai
and begins shortly after the Mukden Incident of 1931. Sufen (Bai Yang) and Zhang Zhongliang (Tao Jin
) are fellow workers in a textile factory. During a National Day
(October 10) celebration at the factory, Zhang successfully urges his fellow workers to donate to the Northeastern Volunteer Army who are fighting the Japanese invaders in Dongbei (Northeastern China). He is reprimanded by his boss, Manager Wen, for going against the Japanese, and potentially endangering the factory's workings.
Sufen and Zhongliang get married and before long, they have an infant son, whom they named Kangsheng ("to resist and to live on"). The Japanese invasion now reaches Shanghai. Manager Wen sends his cousin-in-law, Wang Lizhen (Shu Xiuwen), to Hankou
, Inner China to avoid the war. Meanwhile, Zhongliang joins the Resistance in the inner lands as a medic
and parts with his mother, Sufen and their baby, who stay on in Shanghai. In 1938, Sufen goes down to the provinces with her mother to join up with Zhongliang's father and younger brother Zhongmin. Because the Japanese are arresting the intelligentsia
, Zhongmin, a village schoolteacher, runs off to join the guerrillas in the mountains with three of his friends.
The people live a life of suffering under the Japanese. Zhongliang is captured as a coolie
but escapes. Zhongliang's father is hanged by the Japanese for trying to work a compromise concerning their grain levy. The guerrillas successfully exterminate the Japanese soldiers in the village, and bring the villagers to the mountains where their base is. However, Sufen and her mother-in-law are sent back to Shanghai.
Zhongliang escapes to Chongqing
, which is outside the sphere of influence of the Japanese, where he cannot find a job. Destitute, he looks for old acquaintance Wang Lizhen. Lizhen gives him a place to stay at her house and finds him a job at her godfather's company. However, he soon discovers that, like almost everyone else in his office, he has practically nothing to do. He degenerates into a loafer, and feels oppressed by the carefree, bourgeois attitudes around him. He finally succumbs to the charms of the liberal-minded Wang Lizhen.
At Shanghai, Sufen now works in a war refugee camp
, while taking care of her son and mother-in-law. The film ends amidst scenes of a torrential thunderstorm
hitting their shanty lodging.
The film continues the story of Zhang Zhongliang in Chongqing. After his liaison with Wang Lizhen, he is promoted to be private secretary of Wang's godfather Pang Haogong, and becomes a shrewd entrepreneur. Sufen, on the other hand, continues working in the refugee camp. Their son has grown up to be a young boy. The Japanese decides to dismantle the refugee camp for military purposes, and order an evacuation of all refugees, and the people live through hard times on rice rationing
. The homeless refugees are forced to stay in a freezing stream as punishment for a few escapees.
Zhongliang and Wang Lizhen get married. The Japanese finally surrenders in August 1945. Zhongliang flies back with Pang to Shanghai while Lizhen stays relunctantly in Chongqing. In Shanghai, the Nationalists
round up people associated with the Japanese, including Manager Wen, and lock them in jail. He Wenyan (Shangguan Yunzhu), Manager Wen's wife, plays host to Zhongliang. Wenyan transfers Wen's money to her name, and ends up as Zhongliang's secret mistress.
Postwar conditions are tough. Sufen cannot afford to stay at her rented shack, and she cannot contact her husband. She offers her services as a servant under He Wenyan. Meanwhile, Wang Lizhen arrives in Shanghai. Kangsheng, Zhongliang's son, becomes a newspaper boy.
He Wenyan throws a cocktail party on National Day. While carrying in a tray with drinks for the guests in the hall, Sufen chances on Zhongliang, who is about to dance a tango
with his new wife. She overturns the tray in shock, drawing attention from all the guests, and under pressure from Wang Lizhen, confesses to everyone that Zhongliang is her husband. There is an uproar, and Sufen runs off, while Lizhen faints in her room upstairs. Once awake, Lizhen roars for revenge while Wenyan privately gloats over her misfortune.
Suzhen goes back after a night in the streets due to the midnight curfew
, and reads a letter from Zhongmin, who has now married his sweetheart and is teaching in the countryside. Suzhen confides in her mother-in-law that Zhongliang is back and has married another woman. They go to confront Zhongliang at Wenyan's mansion.
Lizhen starts a ruckus and insists that Zhongliang divorce
Sufen. Shamed and totally disillusioned, Sufen runs out of the house with her son and goes to a quay, where she asks her son to buy her something to eat. When he comes back, she has drowned herself.
1947 in film
The year 1947 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*May 22 - Great Expectations is premiered in New York.*November 24 : The United States House of Representatives of the 80th Congress voted 346 to 17 to approve citations for contempt of Congress against the "Hollywood Ten".*November 25...
Chinese film
Cinema of China
The Chinese-language cinema has three distinct historical threads: Cinema of Hong Kong, Cinema of China, and Cinema of Taiwan. Since 1949 the cinema of mainland China has operated under restrictions imposed by the Communist Party of China's State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television and...
directed by Cai Chusheng
Cai Chusheng
Resting Place= Babaoshan Revoluntionary CemeteryCai Chusheng was a Chinese film director of the pre-Communist era. Known best for his progressive output in the 1930s, Cai Chusheng later became a victim to the persecutions of the Cultural Revolution.- Early career :Born in Shanghai to Cantonese...
and Zheng Junli
Zheng Junli
Zheng Junli was a Chinese actor and director born in Shanghai and who rose to prominence in the golden age of Chinese Cinema.-Early years:...
and is generally considered one of the great Chinese films of the period. The Hong Kong Film Awards
Hong Kong Film Awards
The Hong Kong Film Awards , founded in 1982, are the most prestigious film awards in Hong Kong and among the most respected in mainland China and Taiwan. Award ceremonies are held annually, typically in April. The Awards recognize achievement in all aspects of filmmaking, such as directing,...
ranked it in its list of greatest Chinese language films ever made at number 27. Produced by Kunlun Film Company, the film is over three hours long and consists of two parts, Eight War-Torn Years (八年離亂) and The Dawn (天亮前后), released one after the other the same year.
The film details the trials and tribulations of a family around the Second Sino-Japanese War
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...
, in pre-war, wartime and post-war China. The first part of the film, Eight War-Torn Years details the early life and marriage of a young working-class couple, Sufen (Bai Yang), and Zhang Zhongliang (Tao Jin) and the strain produced when the husband is forced to flee to Chongqing
Chongqing
Chongqing is a major city in Southwest China and one of the five national central cities of China. Administratively, it is one of the PRC's four direct-controlled municipalities , and the only such municipality in inland China.The municipality was created on 14 March 1997, succeeding the...
while leaving his family in Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
during the war.
The second part of the film details Zhang Zhongliang's return to Shanghai, now married into a wealthy bourgeois family for whom Sufen is forced to work for as a maid.
The film was remade in 2005 as a television adaptation starring Hu Jun
Hu Jun
Hu Jun is a Chinese actor of Manchu ethnicity. He is known for his dramatic roles in various films and television series.-Filmography:-External links:***** - Official recognition fan site...
, Anita Yuen
Anita Yuen
Anita Yuen Wing-yi is a Hong Kong film and television actress. She was the winner of the 1990 Miss Hong Kong Pageant.-Pageant career:At the age of 18, Yuen entered the Miss Hong Kong 1990 pageant. She was a heavy favorite to win the crown from the semifinal to final. During the semifinals on August...
, Carina Lau
Carina Lau
Carina Lau Kar-ling is a Hong Kong actress. She was especially notable in the 1980s for her girl-next-door type roles in films....
, and Chen Daoming
Chen Daoming
Chen Daoming is a famous Chinese actor known for his flexibility and longevity. He has been branded the Emperor of Chinese drama, having starred in all types of dramas and films....
, though this newer version is referred to by the English translation, The River Flows Eastwards instead of The Spring River Flows East
Title
The title derives from a poem composed by the last ruler of the Southern TangSouthern Tang
Southern Tang was one of the Ten Kingdoms in south-central China created following the Tang Dynasty from 937-975. Southern Tang replaced the Wu Kingdom when Li Bian deposed the emperor Yang Pu....
dynasty, Li Yu
Li Houzhu
Li Houzhu , also known as Houzhu of Southern Tang , personal name Li Yu , né Li Congjia , courtesy name Chongguang , posthumously known as Prince of Wu , was the last ruler of the Southern Tang Kingdom from 961 to 975 during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms...
(936/7 - 978). The poem, To the tune of ‘the Beauty Yu’ ("Beauty Yu" is the metaphoric name for Papaver rhoeas) was written shortly after the loss of his kingdom to the Song Dynasty
Song Dynasty
The Song Dynasty was a ruling dynasty in China between 960 and 1279; it succeeded the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period, and was followed by the Yuan Dynasty. It was the first government in world history to issue banknotes or paper money, and the first Chinese government to establish a...
:
Part One: The Eight War-Torn Years
Part One is about 100 minutes in length.The film is set in Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
and begins shortly after the Mukden Incident of 1931. Sufen (Bai Yang) and Zhang Zhongliang (Tao Jin
Tao Jin
Tao Jin is a Chinese football player who currently plays for Shanghai Shenhua as a defender in the Chinese Super League.- Club career :...
) are fellow workers in a textile factory. During a National Day
Double Ten Day
Double Ten Day is the national day of the Republic of China and celebrates the start of the Wuchang Uprising of October 10, 1911, which led to the collapse of the Qing Dynasty in China and establishment of the Republic of China on January 1, 1912...
(October 10) celebration at the factory, Zhang successfully urges his fellow workers to donate to the Northeastern Volunteer Army who are fighting the Japanese invaders in Dongbei (Northeastern China). He is reprimanded by his boss, Manager Wen, for going against the Japanese, and potentially endangering the factory's workings.
Sufen and Zhongliang get married and before long, they have an infant son, whom they named Kangsheng ("to resist and to live on"). The Japanese invasion now reaches Shanghai. Manager Wen sends his cousin-in-law, Wang Lizhen (Shu Xiuwen), to Hankou
Hankou
Hankou was one of the three cities whose merging formed modern-day Wuhan, the capital of the Hubei province, China. It stands north of the Han and Yangtze Rivers where the Han falls into the Yangtze...
, Inner China to avoid the war. Meanwhile, Zhongliang joins the Resistance in the inner lands as a medic
Medic
Medic is a general term for a person involved in medicine, especially emergency or first-response medicine, such as an emergency medical technician, paramedic, or a military member trained in battlefield medicine. Also the term is used toward a Nurse in pre-hospital care and/or emergency...
and parts with his mother, Sufen and their baby, who stay on in Shanghai. In 1938, Sufen goes down to the provinces with her mother to join up with Zhongliang's father and younger brother Zhongmin. Because the Japanese are arresting the intelligentsia
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
, Zhongmin, a village schoolteacher, runs off to join the guerrillas in the mountains with three of his friends.
The people live a life of suffering under the Japanese. Zhongliang is captured as a coolie
Coolie
Historically, a coolie was a manual labourer or slave from Asia, particularly China, India, and the Phillipines during the 19th century and early 20th century...
but escapes. Zhongliang's father is hanged by the Japanese for trying to work a compromise concerning their grain levy. The guerrillas successfully exterminate the Japanese soldiers in the village, and bring the villagers to the mountains where their base is. However, Sufen and her mother-in-law are sent back to Shanghai.
Zhongliang escapes to Chongqing
Chongqing
Chongqing is a major city in Southwest China and one of the five national central cities of China. Administratively, it is one of the PRC's four direct-controlled municipalities , and the only such municipality in inland China.The municipality was created on 14 March 1997, succeeding the...
, which is outside the sphere of influence of the Japanese, where he cannot find a job. Destitute, he looks for old acquaintance Wang Lizhen. Lizhen gives him a place to stay at her house and finds him a job at her godfather's company. However, he soon discovers that, like almost everyone else in his office, he has practically nothing to do. He degenerates into a loafer, and feels oppressed by the carefree, bourgeois attitudes around him. He finally succumbs to the charms of the liberal-minded Wang Lizhen.
At Shanghai, Sufen now works in a war refugee camp
Refugee camp
A refugee camp is a temporary settlement built to receive refugees. Hundreds of thousands of people may live in any one single camp. Usually they are built and run by a government, the United Nations, or international organizations, or NGOs.Refugee camps are generally set up in an impromptu...
, while taking care of her son and mother-in-law. The film ends amidst scenes of a torrential thunderstorm
Thunderstorm
A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm, a lightning storm, thundershower or simply a storm is a form of weather characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere known as thunder. The meteorologically assigned cloud type associated with the...
hitting their shanty lodging.
Part Two: The Dawn
Part Two is about 92 minutes in length.The film continues the story of Zhang Zhongliang in Chongqing. After his liaison with Wang Lizhen, he is promoted to be private secretary of Wang's godfather Pang Haogong, and becomes a shrewd entrepreneur. Sufen, on the other hand, continues working in the refugee camp. Their son has grown up to be a young boy. The Japanese decides to dismantle the refugee camp for military purposes, and order an evacuation of all refugees, and the people live through hard times on rice rationing
Rationing
Rationing is the controlled distribution of scarce resources, goods, or services. Rationing controls the size of the ration, one's allotted portion of the resources being distributed on a particular day or at a particular time.- In economics :...
. The homeless refugees are forced to stay in a freezing stream as punishment for a few escapees.
Zhongliang and Wang Lizhen get married. The Japanese finally surrenders in August 1945. Zhongliang flies back with Pang to Shanghai while Lizhen stays relunctantly in Chongqing. In Shanghai, the Nationalists
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang of China , sometimes romanized as Guomindang via the Pinyin transcription system or GMD for short, and translated as the Chinese Nationalist Party is a founding and ruling political party of the Republic of China . Its guiding ideology is the Three Principles of the People, espoused...
round up people associated with the Japanese, including Manager Wen, and lock them in jail. He Wenyan (Shangguan Yunzhu), Manager Wen's wife, plays host to Zhongliang. Wenyan transfers Wen's money to her name, and ends up as Zhongliang's secret mistress.
Postwar conditions are tough. Sufen cannot afford to stay at her rented shack, and she cannot contact her husband. She offers her services as a servant under He Wenyan. Meanwhile, Wang Lizhen arrives in Shanghai. Kangsheng, Zhongliang's son, becomes a newspaper boy.
He Wenyan throws a cocktail party on National Day. While carrying in a tray with drinks for the guests in the hall, Sufen chances on Zhongliang, who is about to dance a tango
Tango (dance)
Tango dance originated in the area of the Rio de la Plata , and spread to the rest of the world soon after....
with his new wife. She overturns the tray in shock, drawing attention from all the guests, and under pressure from Wang Lizhen, confesses to everyone that Zhongliang is her husband. There is an uproar, and Sufen runs off, while Lizhen faints in her room upstairs. Once awake, Lizhen roars for revenge while Wenyan privately gloats over her misfortune.
Suzhen goes back after a night in the streets due to the midnight curfew
Curfew
A curfew is an order specifying a time after which certain regulations apply. Examples:# An order by a government for certain persons to return home daily before a certain time...
, and reads a letter from Zhongmin, who has now married his sweetheart and is teaching in the countryside. Suzhen confides in her mother-in-law that Zhongliang is back and has married another woman. They go to confront Zhongliang at Wenyan's mansion.
Lizhen starts a ruckus and insists that Zhongliang divorce
Divorce
Divorce is the final termination of a marital union, canceling the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage and dissolving the bonds of matrimony between the parties...
Sufen. Shamed and totally disillusioned, Sufen runs out of the house with her son and goes to a quay, where she asks her son to buy her something to eat. When he comes back, she has drowned herself.
Cast
- Bai Yang - Sufen
- Tao Jin - Zhang Zhongliang
- Shu Xiuwen - Wang Lizheng
- Shangguan Yunzhu - He Wenyuan
External links
- Spring River Flows East, Part I at the Chinese Movie Database
- Spring River Flows East, Part II at the Chinese Movie Database
- Critical analysis from the La Trobe UniversityLa Trobe UniversityLa Trobe University is a multi-campus university in Victoria, Australia. It was established in 1964 by an Act of Parliament to become the third oldest university in the state of Victoria. The main campus of La Trobe is located in the Melbourne suburb of Bundoora; two other major campuses are...
- Essay from China.org.cn
- Essay from ChinaCulture.org
- Profile and discussion questions from Ohio State UniversityOhio State UniversityThe Ohio State University, commonly referred to as Ohio State, is a public research university located in Columbus, Ohio. It was originally founded in 1870 as a land-grant university and is currently the third largest university campus in the United States...