A few days ago, an entry called "Chinese-style horror" quietly appeared on the hot search list.
In the live performance "See Pingyao Again", there is a clip called "Choosing a Wife" that has aroused a lot of controversy.
This section elaborates on how to use feudal criteria to determine whether a woman is worthy of marriage, such as whether she has a three-inch nasturtium, fingers like green onions, constant palm lines, and plump buttocks.
The story takes place in the late Qing Dynasty, so some have tried to defend it, arguing that it is just a true reflection of history.
Thus, a complex question arises: is this a continuation of feudalism or a critique of feudalism?
In my opinion, the discomfort felt by many netizens during the performance is ultimately the most real experience.
See Pingyao Again is indeed worth our in-depth **, but it's not just because of the controversy and criticism it carries. And the story behind it, and its author. More crucially, we must get to the bottom of the roots of this "Chinese fear".
"See Pingyao Again" is an experiential drama with a situation as the background, and it has gradually gained a certain popularity because of its deep sense of experience.
The story describes the late Qing Dynasty, when Zhao Yishuo, the owner of a ticket number in Pingyao, did not hesitate to send his property and people to Tsarist Russia in order to save people. Before going out, the residents of the city learned of this good deed, and they sent wives to Zhao Yishuo, who was not yet married, some to his sister, and some to his daughter, just to ensure that the Zhao family could also have offspring.
The purpose of this performance is to show the traditional moral concept of loyalty and filial piety, and it adopts a very traditional tragic narrative.
So, is the work "See Pingyao Again" intentionally designed for male condensation?
I don't dare to describe death in one word.
First of all, the paternal flavor in the plot can be regarded as a "reflection of history", just like all costume dramas cannot get rid of the cultural background of the Three Outlines and Five Constants, and all criticism must be based on the premise of display.
Secondly, although there are many male characters in "See Pingyao Again", it seems that female characters are not scarce.
In the work "See Pingyao Again", the storyline of the dart master bathing.
However, I have always held the view that "what you see is what you get".
Even if the consciousness of the work is very avant-garde, what is the point of such expression if the viewer only understands the old way of expression?
Although "See Pingyao Again" shows some traditional temperament, these temperaments are more displayed through the sacrifice of women;Despite the plight of the vulnerable, the plight is portrayed as frivolous and does not make much of an impression.
Describe in detail the "wife selection" sessions that provoked controversy.
Compare whose three-inch golden lotus can be placed in a porcelain basin, whose fingers are so slender as snow, whose palm pattern does not have a broken palm (broken palm kefu), whose back is so smooth and fair, whose face is so beautiful, and whose buttocks will be bigger in the end.
In it, all the actresses wore belly pockets to show off their backs and show the audience their mesmerizing hip writhing movements.
It is completely impossible to see that this is a decent family and the yellow flower girl in the city is getting married, but it is more like visiting the kiln.
When we talk about "critique", whatever form it takes, it should have a painful overtone that is widely perceived by the general public.
Just as Lu Xun described the joy and happiness of the New Year at the beginning and end of "Blessing", few people really understand what kind of happy moment this is "making dumplings together".
In "See Pingyao Again", I'm sure that only female characters can experience this chilling feeling.
Immediately after that, we finally selected an extremely "precious" woman who her husband's family considered to have very good qualities. She was dressed in red and seeded for Zhao Yishuo that night.
In order to show the integrity of the male protagonist, he thanked the woman, but the woman responded:
Young proprietors.
You chose me.
This is the blessing I deserve.
I don't know anything about it.
Am I a woman to be proud of.
I'm going to give you a boy.
I do.
If it can't be done, then the husband will become the norm for the wife.
I can't accept your courtesy.
This sentence definitely does not fit the lines of "Mother's Road"?
What's even more shocking is that Zhao Yishuo left home the next day to do an "important thing", and his wife died of dystocia in order to keep him planting all night.
The value of the heroine is like a container of life, and her noble qualities are not manifested in personality, but in the womb.
In order to show the heroic figures of the Zhao family's time, our ancestors all sat upright and behaved dignifiedly, while the newly selected women still wore belly pockets and exuded charming charm.
Only the ladies who had been chosen to die for their husbands were dressed appropriately and sat up straight.
In the face of her own passing, she is full of pride and deep awareness of her evaluation:
has already been born.
Since you are dead, let's die.
The Zhao family has gone through so many generations.
Only I, the woman, were allowed to enter the ancestral tablet.
Okay, when the word "ancestral hall" is used for sacrifice, the nature of this episode can basically be determined.
Even more ironically, she wore only one simple outfit from beginning to end, and that was the wedding dress.
Among them, there is another heart-wrenching secret wedding.
In that bathing scene, each dart master has a good-looking woman by his side to scrub his body.
The master hugged the girls tightly and forced them to attack him, but because of the pain, he pushed the girl down and knelt down and cried bitterly.
It is mentioned in the line that even if you lose your life during the journey, you can find the last comfort.
No matter how subtle, adults don't always carry an indescribable sense of comfort, and this is the only role that women can play before they achieve "brilliant achievements".
Compared to his wife, this time the body donation was almost unknown, and it was just a pure sacrificial act.
This passage explains the meaning of Chinese horror: in ancient times, the wedding feast was seen as a joyous event for men, and for women, it was a kind of funeral ceremony for their future lives.
Although the times have advanced to this day, why does this kind of "funeral celebration" activity still exist in the name of righteousness?
The word "marry" is composed of two parts, "take" and "woman", and its original meaning is the ancient Xi of snatching relatives in order to compete for wives.
This explanation is in the dictionary.
From this it can be seen that in feudal times, the joy of marriage was often based on exploitation.
In the work "See Pingyao Again", each character is skillfully integrated into the grand narrative, the female body is revealed, they speak of pride in making sacrifices for men, completely like a tool without perception, and all emotions are completely eliminated.
Do they focus too much on the big picture and ignore the expression of the individual?This is not the case.
In the performances, they show many unique expressions, such as after the sacrifice, some of the ghosts of the masters express that they want to go home to eat a bowl of noodles, while others express that they miss their partners.
Although humanity has passed, the warmth of humanity remains.
However, the roles played by women are very different.
When women's emotional experience is completely erased, it represents the oppression and cruelty of feudal weddings to women, and the creators choose tolerance and forgiveness for women.
This is the main source of what is known as "terror".
I was reminded of some performances that, although the themes were similar, were more contemporary and distinctive.
"Three Worships on Red Dust and Cool" was co-created by Zhang Bichen and Meng Jia.
When the duo debuted, they took off their red veils and kicked off in a charming, expressive way.
They have always maintained a subtle melancholy tone, showing the tragic fate they face to contemporary audiences from the perspective of ancient women:
Listening to the deafening sound of gongs and drums, someone's eyes were full of tears.
In this world, it's a ridiculous marriage.
Even though we never had the opportunity to meet face-to-face, our red lines are still tightly connected.
Salute to the sky, the earth, the sun and the moon.
After two bows, I forgot about my whole life.
After singing the wedding feast, the joy, sorrow, and joy of the rest of the days will not have any effect, and I will pour the wine on the ground like a walking corpse:
Even though people are still alive, they have begun to commemorate themselves, and it's amazing.
When the ** ended, the audience mistakenly thought that the performance had come to an end, and at that moment, the key stroke lit up.
A cheerful suona suddenly sounded from the side of the stage, and a welcoming team walked to the ** of the stage and put on the headscarves they had just taken off for the two "brides".
At this moment, they were robbed of their right to speak, obediently trapped in a thin red veil, and turned back into a kind doll.
What's so special about this just a few minutes of stage?
Luckily, it shows the audience the unique emotions of women.
In contrast, in order to better highlight a particular subject, the difference between first removing a woman's speech and then replacing her in a blank dialog box and forcibly adding expressions of submission and flattery can be said to be superior.
In the final analysis, netizens jokingly called "See Pingyao Again" a "Chinese-style horror", which just reveals its hypocritical nature:
Although it is nominally to promote traditions, in reality it is still about clan culture, feudal morality, patriarchal system, and the Three Principles and Five Constants.
Although it reveals the experiences of women in ancient times to a certain extent, it succeeds in masking its inherent compulsive nature through its festive and fragrant display.
It's not too much to describe harm as something beautiful and describe it as "horrible."
Interestingly, there are horror movies with "Chinese horror" at their core, focusing more on what women go through.
A Chinese Ghost Story is a series of works that mainly describe the gap between humans and ghosts in a chaotic social background.
In the first work, although Nie Xiaoqian is a ghost, she still can't escape the fate of being manipulated as a sexual resource. Her life is full of ups and downs, but she has never stopped pursuing love. First, he was used by the dryad grandmother to seduce men, and then he was married to an old black mountain demon who needed to be pleased.
When Xiao Qian was dressed in red, her beauty reached its peak.
However, in the process of marrying, darkness envelops Hongyan, and she is punished by a slap and eaten by the heads of the thousands of men who make up the old demon of Montenegro.
Neither during her lifetime nor after her death, she never enjoyed the freedom and right to choose.
In the second work, Fu Qingfeng and Ning Caichen love each other deeply, but are eventually married to someone else.
The wedding dress look at the time of marriage is still a classic to this day, but beauty does not mean happiness, and her tears of grief still tell the pain of women.
When we discussed "Liang Zhu" n times again, Zhu Yingtai burst into tears, no one cared, she was dressed in bright red clothes and wore a phoenix crown on her head, as if she was bound by chains.
No matter how gorgeous the red dress and the wedding were, there was no direct correlation with the happiness of the woman herself.
They have been on their knees, and fate has determined that they will be trapped in a grand "wedding feast" for the rest of their lives".
The first half is "Liang Zhu", and the second half is "A Chinese Ghost Story".
On the contrary, it is only when they abandon the "beautiful" phoenix crown from the male perspective that they can regain their freedom.
The first half is "Liang Zhu", and the second half is "A Chinese Ghost Story".
These works do not represent the advanced concept of excellence, but show sufficient integrity.
His honesty is so high that he does not ignore the dark side of history, nor does he decorate his greatness with the tears of the weak.
In the final analysis, the controversy in "See Pingyao Again" is not about the material, but about the way it is expressed.
It's acceptable to show outdated ideologies, but the key is from what perspective you apply them.
For example, Mo Yan created the book "Breast Fat Buttocks":
Although she was the blacksmith's spouse, she was actually far superior to her husband in striking iron. Whenever she saw iron and fire, her blood boiled. Her hot blood would pound the veins. Her muscles would become unusually prominent, each one like a freshly unsheathed bullwhip, black iron striking red iron, flowers splashing, sweating, and finally forming a stream in the milk gully, and the whole environment was filled with iron and blood. ”
In fact, his depictions and fantasies of the female body are also quite bold and open-ended.
However, the beauty of the breasts and buttocks here is not materialized or just staring, on the contrary, it is more like a strong and shocking sign of motherhood. Plump breasts and fat buttocks are the pride of a man, but also the pride of a woman. The female body not only has the power to give birth to the entire universe, but also has the power to shake the world.
For example, in the work "Lust and Caution", women also need to devote themselves to the realization of great things with a passive attitude.
However, in Ang Lee's interpretation, Wang Jiazhi shows a strong cohesion. In a male-dominated society, women are just an object of repression and forgetfulness. She does not exist, but as a female shell, easily breaking the patriarchal system.
We don't expect modern literary and artistic creation to reach a similar depth of thinking, but at least, we can't ignore the existence of reality.
The dark qualities of traditional weddings are still present today.
For example, there is a wedding Xi called "throwing chopsticks."
When the bride enters the palace of marriage, she throws chopsticks back, symbolizing that she no longer enjoys the "maiden meal" and disowns her family of origin. In addition, there is also an opinion that this means that she will not take away her mother's property.
As a result, many brides feel reluctant and tearful during the process of throwing chopsticks, but in the end they are enforced.
In fact, this has the same logic as the so-called "splashing" ritual.
For example, "Show your personality."
The bride was arranged to sit in a dustpan and then carried home, and she stood alone in front of her ancestors in the ancestral hall, in order to weaken her spirit, to make her gentler when she entered the door, and to give her filial piety to her in-laws.
It also includes foods known as "divorced meat".
Before officially getting married, the man needs to prepare a few catties of pork for the woman, and attach pork legs in some places, this meat is called "divorced meat".
What's going on?Floating in one of the versions, the hairs stand on end:
There was a daughter-in-law who treated her mother-in-law very badly, first being transformed into a pig by a fairy, and then being killed by her husband. Her son was also a pig, but unfortunately died in a **. When the husband learned the truth of the matter, he still thought that she should be punished, so he cut off a pig's leg and took it to his father-in-law's house.
On some occasions, the bride's mother will cut a piece of pork at the wedding, which represents a special relationship with her daughter.
These wedding Xi customs, which still exist today, are based on a similar logic:
Marriage is a ritual of marriage handover, and the bride is seen as fish that can be disposed of at will.
As Ning Caichen lamented in "A Chinese Ghost Story", whether it is a human or a ghost, she cannot escape the shackles of fate.
The 1987 show still sheds light on the problems faced by some women today.
On the contrary, there are still many such occasions where they play suona without permission
While the male actors show their strength and greatness, the female actors kneel next to them and bow their heads.
While the male actors show the deep cultural heritage and strong sense of power of the noodle culture, the female actors show off their bodies by facing the audience with their bare backs and twisting their hips.
Piao Chang describes the predicament faced by women as a structured web.
While it may not seem like a big thing to pick it alone, if the creators who control the discourse replace us with this fatherly perspective, then the grid will become denser and more cohesive.
In the work "Liang Zhu", Zhu Yingtai can only restore her innocence and human rights by experiencing death.
However, the female characters in "See Pingyao Again", from birth to death, play a role in continuing emotions in the play, and become a means to show emotions outside the play.
Even at the end of life, it is impossible to break free from bondage.
Chinese-style horror, that's all.
Chinese fear is not a ghost, but a disregard for human nature.
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