Actually, The Founding of a Party Is Pretty Good

This is an old post being re-uploaded. Originally written 2011/06/25

After The Founding of a Republic, the people making these films seem to have gotten a taste for the all-star cast gimmick, so this year being the 90th anniversary of the Communist Party of China, The Founding of a Party was born. A lot of angry young men fixate on that word “great” and go: “Sure, founding a country is a great undertaking, but now founding a party is a great cause?” Personally I’m willing to be lenient about it. Everyone knows last year’s coldest joke: “Have you seen Uncle Jian hand-job?” I figure the director definitely didn’t want to see the upgraded 2011 version, “Have you seen Uncle Jian hand-job yet?” Right?

For such a magnificent domestic epic, I didn’t go to the cinema… because your humble narrator is genuinely broke right now. What I watched came from the almighty internet, the file’s source was the evil Baidu, the download route went through the shameless leech that is Xunlei, and the player was the classless Windows Media Player. I did not uphold the film’s copyright. I watched a pirated copy. First of all I owe myself a deep self-criticism for this vulgar behavior that seriously damages domestic cinema.

Anyway, I finished the two-hour movie, and I watched it carefully. Honestly I went in looking for things to nitpick. I’d already heard the pretentious crowd on Douban gave it 2 points, and I know the angry guys on Youku didn’t rate it above passing either. You could say I went in with the mindset of “let’s see how stupid this actually is,” same as with The Founding of a Republic. Back when I watched that one, I spent the whole time busy spotting celebrities, going oh I know this one, don’t know that one, then Chef Fan dies, then the two sides go to war, then that idiot Liu Ye who yells “Bad people all need education” comes out to review the troops, and then the country is founded, just like that… completely baffling.

But after finishing this one, I felt like complaining yet didn’t know how, or rather didn’t know what to complain about. All I could say was: “Once you accept the premise, it’s actually pretty damn good.”

First off, the plot of The Founding of a Party wasn’t what I expected. I figured it would run all the way to Yan’an, but it ends right at the Party’s First National Congress. Most of it is about the winding road from the Xinhai Revolution to the birth of the Party. Not bad, actually — it sticks fairly close to the title. A lot of people say this film is pure ass-kissing, but apart from the bit where everyone stands up to sing The Internationale and the rather fake Mao–Kaihui romance, there isn’t really much flattery, and I like to think I even caught a few hints of something subtler.

First, the Xinhai Revolution ends, compromise is made with the Qing, Yuan Shikai steals the fruits, and the revolutionaries get persecuted one after another. The various “gentlemen” who studied abroad start plotting revolution. You have to feel for Dr. Sun Yat-sen — noble title, noble integrity, but no noble army under his command. As Song Qingling (played by Dong Jie, who looks wrong no matter how you slice it) puts it: “What is our revolution missing?” The answer is “a reliable army.”

First, that creep Feng Yuanzheng plays Chen Duxiu going full retard, trying to turn Peking University students into troops. Unfortunately the kids are only good for studying; their combat power is clearly lacking. Even if you exploit the May Fourth Movement, in the end it’s still arrests and roundups, a bunch of idiots holding meetings every day discussing which country’s revolutionary model to rip off. So the “Tencent spirit” has ancient roots after all — everyone loves copying foreign stuff, nobody finds their own way. Copying Japan, America, Europe all fail in turn, and finally someone remembers the homeland of the bullet-magnet Stalin… and discovers that the masses of workers are dumb but numerous. So creepy Feng Yuanzheng immediately defects to the worker camp, becomes one with the toiling workers, swears to live and die with them, and instantly dumps his revolutionary student bros from school. Everyone’s studied the history, so you know how it ends: the Celestial Empire’s huge peasant-worker population base delivers terrifying combat power, the revolution succeeds, and that’s how we got today’s happy life.

So-called revolution is just a bunch of people trying to seize power while the getting’s good. Overthrow the current system, build your own system where you get the final say — it’s all just satisfying your own desire to rule. Revolutionary slogans — for freedom, for China, for humanity — are just slogans. This reminds me of Stephen Chow’s Royal Tramp, where Chen Jinnan explains the Heaven and Earth Society to Wei Xiaobao: anti-Qing, restore-Ming is just a high-sounding slogan; the real goal is money and women… Revolution is the same. The revolutionary mentality is always with us; people always long for that beautiful state where “what I say goes.” Which is exactly why we now see plenty of people unhappy with the current government and longing for revolution. Of course, people today have way less fighting strength than back then. Take the jasmine thing — everyone’s yelling on the internet, but actually get them on the street and all you’ve got left is bystanders. So the internet is a good thing: a bunch of people can only run their mouths online, while in real life they’re still the Party’s good children.

I’ve said too much about what the film made me think about. Let’s talk about the film itself. First the plot: as someone who studied a bit of history and barely passed middle school, I can say watching this wasn’t too taxing. But if you haven’t studied even that little bit of history, the plot will feel extremely jumpy. Also the whole film runs on a timeline, speeding up and slowing down at random. If this were a documentary I’d say fine, but… what genre is this supposed to be, anyway? I genuinely don’t know. Maybe The Founding of a Party will pioneer a new genre: “historical recap”? And what really got me was the battle scenes. Warlords fight for ages, and the only actual battle scene goes to Zhu De, and it’s our side getting suppressed. Then Old Zhu picks up a rifle, aims with the naked eye, headshots four machine gunners, and just like that breaks the enemy’s impregnable defense line… well, everyone’s used to that by now. Then there’s the ridiculous Mao–Kaihui romance… Director, were you worried people would call this a gay film if you didn’t toss in some women? That love story has nothing to do with the main plot. If it weren’t about great men, would you have added a sex scene? Would you? Would you? If you really wanted to boost the box office, just have Andy Lau or Leehom and Tang Wei do it for the revolution — guaranteed packed houses.

The last thing I have to complain about: Chow Yun-fat is a real tragedy. He plays Yuan Shikai looking all imposing, but his underlings are Zhao Benshan, Fan Wei, Feng Gong, Liu Yiwei. Since President Yuan is about to ascend the throne, why not bring in Xiao Shenyang as a eunuch messenger too and complete the set.

Anyway, compared to The Founding of a Republic this film’s ass-kissing is less obvious, and it’s watchable. It’s a decent educational film — delete the stupid romance and you could show it to middle schoolers to learn history, and it even has some implicitly thought-provoking content. As for a score… given how stupid domestic films are right now — stuff like Just Another Pandora’s Box, The Treasure Hunter, Laughing in the Wind, Orphan of the Accident can’t even tell a story properly — The Founding of a Party managing to tell a complete story is no small feat. Out of 10, I’ll give it a passing 6.

Last year was The Founding of a Republic, this year The Founding of a Party. So next year — Army Day, director Han Sanping, how about another one?