Gleanings
The tale of a disabled stoic woman
K. S. Sivakumaran
I was amazed and astonished seeing some Chinese films at the
International Film Festival, and Kerala Film Festival held towards the
end of last year in both Goa and Kerala. One such film was Cherries (in
Chinese Ying Tao).
The astonishment is due to the fact that the modern China has moved
away fast from the regimented society it had once been and is now more
and more Western oriented and modernised as Japan and other South East
Asian countries have come to be.
I shall brief in my appreciation of the film and it would be
basically informative than a thorough clinical analysis.
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Cherries (Ying Tao) |
Zhang Jiabes is the director of the film and it is produced by the
Shanghai Film Group Corporation in Beijing.
The film is based on a real happening said to have occurred in the
early 1980s in the Southern parts of China.
If Cherrie is one of the protagonists, the other is her husband Ge
Wang. It is a beautiful and awe inspiring depiction of human endurance
that both undergo.
The woman is young with an undeveloped mental temperament. She is
also slim and crippled. She cannot walk straight and cannot find a job
with her handicaps. The man cannot leave his kind and affectionate wife
for fear of mishaps. He alone has to work to maintain the family. It is
tough finding means for both of them.
Despite her shortcomings mentally, Cherrie is a fountain of love,
showering kindness particularly to children. Both avoided physical
relationship. Since they did not have children of their own, they liked
other children.
One day Cherrie finds an abandoned baby girl lying next to her. The
couple names her Hong Hong. However the man sells the baby to some
strangers after sometime. It is the anxiety and her chase after the
strangers in a red car limping and running a long distance captured
graphically by the cameras that make you uneasy and feel a natural
sympathy towards the brave woman.
The story takes a turn after many years while Hong Hong grows up as a
teenager and visits her adopters. The girl hates her mother. The more
the mother loves the more the adopted daughter hates her. It is this
ironical relationship between the two - love and hate - that hinges the
characters.
Cherrie picks and plucks cherries on a rainy day for Hong Hong and is
washed away in a stream falling from the mountainous region. The tragedy
is Grecian-like and the film ends in belated realisation of Cherrie’s
deep love for her family.
The main roles are played by MiaoPu, Tuo Guoquan and Long Li.
For most part the cinematography Maruike Osa Me is breath taking.
Though sentimental at times, I liked the film very much.
The South Asian and South East Asian Cinema have come of age and even
beats at times the Cinema in other parts of the world (Iranian films are
an exception) in representing the human love in a context of Eastern
traditions and values.
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