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| Director Wei Shujun |
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| Author Yu Hua |
ONLY THE RIVER FLOWS (He bian de cuo wu) B+ China (101 mi) 2023 d: Wei Shujun
There’s no understanding fate; therefore I choose to play the part of fate. I wear the foolish, unintelligible, face of a professional god. —Albert Camus, opening film quote from his play Caligula, 1944, part of his Cycle of the Absurd
Premiering in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival before becoming an arthouse box office hit in China, this heavily stylish, neo-noir murder mystery was shot on 16mm in the Zhejiang and Jiangxi Provinces, apparently the first mainland Chinese movie to be shot on film in years, where the film stock had to be scanned and printed in Taiwan, given a beautifully dark and murky look with desaturated colors by cinematographer Chengma Zhiyuan. Reminiscent of Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s neo-noir horror film CURE (1997), and the psychological crime thrillers of Bong Joon-ho’s Memories of Murder (Salinui chueok) (2003) and Diao Yinan’s Black Coal, Thin Ice (Bai ri yan huo) (2014), this was adapted by Wei and Kang Chunlei, who also has a prominent role as a suspected murderer in the film, from Yu Hua’s morally ambiguous short story in his 1988 compilation Mistakes by the River. A rapper turned filmmaker, having majored in sound recording from the Communication University of China in Beijing, Wei is the only post-90’s Chinese director to have been selected three times for the Cannes Film Festival, working with different combinations of screenwriters on every project, but his earlier film Striding Into the Wind (Ye Ma Fen Zong) (2020), ironically about a sound recordist, left something to be desired, an aimless and empty slacker comedy that was admittedly offbeat and quirky, not something you typically see from China. Yet here what immediately grabs one’s attention is Emil Gilels coolly playing Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata, Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-Sharp Minor, Op. 27 No ... YouTube (6:10), the same pensive piece used in Edward Yang’s Yi Yi: A One and a Two... (2000), while the everpresent flashlight was also prominently featured in Yang’s A Brighter Summer Day (Gu ling jie shao nian sha ren shi jian) (1991). Opening in December 1995, the film takes place in a small rural town with only 50 homes, where a murder has been committed along the shoreline of a nearby river, with a woman known locally as Granny No. 4 (Yang Cao) emerging as the victim. By setting the film in this time period, occurring between the events of Tiananmen Square and the more recent economic boom, it evokes a period just before technology brought changes to forensic science, evidenced by boxed desktop computers, cassette tapes, transistor radios, Polaroid photographs, and incessant indoor smoking, a time when citizens led a repressed and silent life, when adherence to social norms was the most important thing, often pushing people to shame and secrecy, yet it was also a time when everyone did everything together, like eat, work, play, where socialization was done face to face, as opposed to now when everybody is isolated on their phones. The police chief (Hou Tianlai) has given his squad a vast new headquarters in a broken down movie theater that has fallen into disuse (audience attendance in China was at an all-time low in the mid 90’s, so the government decided to allow screenings of Hollywood films), providing an office in what was the projection booth, surrounded by broken projectors and abandoned reels, symbolic, perhaps, that what we’re watching is not always reality, urging his lead detective, Ma Zhe (Zhu Yilong) to wrap things up quickly, as all eyes of the Party bosses are on this case, determined to prevent another serial killer like Andrei Chikatilo, who sexually assaulted, murdered, and mutilated at least fifty-two women and children between 1978 and 1990. More concerned with appearances and the incarceration of the presumed murderer than any motives that may have driven the crime, the Party assumes the role of the protector of society. What really stands out, however, is the self-reflective quality of the film, a poignant character study of a man who’s finding it increasingly difficult to ascertain truth and justice, as the conventions of a detective movie start breaking down, placing us directly into the mindset of Ma Zhe, perhaps as much to do with existential angst as the solving of a murder, with offbeat flashes of wry humor and no traces of any graphic violence, while the investigation team is busily stabbing pig carcasses to see which blade may be the most similar to the murder weapon. The camera revisits the scene of the crime from multiple perspectives, actually assuming the position of the murderer, with the victim showing no fear or apprehension by his presence.
Opening with a sequence in which a young boy dressed as a policeman and carrying a toy gun chases his friends around an upper floor through a maze of corridors of an abandoned building, opening and closing doors without finding anyone, until he reaches a door which dangerously opens into the emptiness of free-falling space, where there is a precipitous drop down to the rubble of a construction site below, with the child seen staring out into the abyss, a premonition, perhaps, of the detective coming up blank in his search for answers, yet otherwise having no relation to the story, and the boy is never seen again, with the unfinished construction reflective of a time when the rapid development across small villages had come to a sudden halt. All the director’s titles invoke spatial metaphors, not really the point in making the film, but somehow the people in the story connect to that physical space, becoming a thematic point of emphasis that viewers are drawn into. Essentially a police procedural movie, like a puzzle piece, with Ma Zhe examining the murder site, interrogating witnesses, always accompanied by his more excitable second in command, Xie (Tong Linkai), while meticulously exploring the clues, with the film playing out as a work in progress. Of peculiar interest is the overly descriptive name of one of the potential suspects, known only as the “madman” (Kang Chunlei), who has suddenly disappeared, someone the victim adopted after becoming a widow, something of the village idiot, instantly becoming a person of interest, but it’s rare for a name to connote such an ominous nature. When he’s found, Ma Zhe’s interrogation techniques are not what we suspect, as the “madman” never utters a word, described by others as harmless, so the detective attempts a non-threatening approach, silently hanging around, observing from a distance, gathering what information he can, while still pursuing the evidence. His arrest somewhere around the midway point seems to suggest the case has been solved, with Ma Zhe’s seemingly satisfied superior pondering “Why haven’t you wrapped up your report yet?” Indicating he still needs to sort things out, this opens the eyes of viewers, who suspect more is lurking in the darkness. A woman’s purse is discovered near the crime scene, containing cassettes of familiar pop songs, but at some point a woman’s voice breaks in, where she is clearly speaking to a secret lover, as the town’s buried secrets emerge, exposing a couple in a secret relationship and a gay hairdresser who tries to hide his identity, yet seemingly wants to be arrested, already having a criminal record for public indecency, described here as “violations of morality.” Running down these leads proves to be difficult, and may not have anything to do with the case, but they are part of the process of moving from suspect to suspect, where the stress takes its toll on Ma Zhe’s professional and private life, as his wife Bai, Chloe Maayan from Lou Ye’s SUMMER PALACE (2006), Bi Gan’s 2019 Top Ten List #6 Long Day's Journey Into Night (Di qiu zui hou de ye wan) (2018), and Diao Yinan’s The Wild Goose Lake (Nan Fang Che Zhan De Ju Hui) (2019), is a primary school teacher who is expecting a baby, with the ultra sound informing them that this child may be suffering from an incurable congenital defect and might have cognitive development problems. Coming against the background of a mentally challenged suspect and possible murderer, also strained by the effects of China’s one-child policy, Ma Zhe suggests she have an abortion, but his wife thinks otherwise, turning into a debate about the value of life, becoming an aggravating source of tension between them, as he’s completely invested in the murder case, but she is seen calmly attempting to put together a gigantic jigsaw puzzle of a mother and child, yet in a fit of rage, he flushes a few of the remaining pieces down the toilet. Moments later, however, we see the entire puzzle framed on the wall with no pieces missing, completely at odds with reality. In more mundane moments of domestic tranquility, watching them slurp noodles with chopsticks is a thing to behold, taking us back to filmmakers Wong Kar-wai and Hou Hsiao-hsien, where it was a signature trademark with both.
Essentially a crime drama, what’s unique is the
contemplative, existential aspect of the protagonist, where the root of his
discomfort is never established, but is apparent throughout. While his
trustworthy dedication and loyalty to the job are never questioned, it’s his
intelligence and adherence to rational thought that stands out, as Ma Zhe has a
moral outlook that rises above his coworkers, as he is capable of seeing things
they don’t, with lingering questions that dig deep into his soul, creating a
personal conflict, yet the film is completely invested in his character, with
all the moral ambiguities, taking us on a journey that continually feels overly
understated and discreet, delving into unexplored territory, as facts and
evidence become interlinked with subjective memory, pure conjecture, and even
guesswork. After the prisoner escapes and more murders occur, including a
student poet and a young boy, the “madman” again becomes the focal point, but
something interesting happens, as the psychological mindset of the criminal and
the lead detective somehow merge, with Ma Zhe so obsessed with the case that he
begins seeing the suspect everywhere, contaminating his mind, burrowing deep
into his subconscious, undermining his police instincts, creating an
impressionistic, off-kilter montage that seemingly takes place entirely in his
imagination. A turning point occurs when he falls asleep in an empty
movie theater and experiences a surrealistic, David Lynch Twin Peaks style dream sequence, with each of the murder victims
speaking to him, concocting an entirely different conclusion to the case,
driven by a projector that bursts into flames, becoming a metaphor for the
fallibility of truth. This unexpected aspect of the film is quite
surprising, taking us where few films are willing to go, essentially five
minutes of an homage to cinema like few contemporary directors still dare to
do, with a lead protagonist unraveling into a descent of madness, obsession,
and personal isolation, as it defies all rationality and deductive reasoning
typically associated with police work, instead creating a muddled netherworld
that feels more symbolic than real, yet all the evidence is re-evaluated in
this new light, filtered through an altered mindset, where it’s hard to distinguish
between what’s real and what’s imagined. This only heightens the mystery,
drawing viewers into a mystifying unknown, yet the film inscrutably builds Ma
Zhe’s character throughout, rarely seen without a cigarette, becoming familiar
to us, where we appreciate what we know about him, as his integrity and ardent
professionalism continually stand out, becoming the driving force of the film,
dominating all that we see, yet there’s something else happening here, an
undercurrent of doubt, with no cut and dry answers, which elevates this into
unexplored territory, expressing a disarming honesty, becoming an unfinished
and incomplete portrait of moral authority, which is rare in a police
procedural. This plays into Yu Hua’s literary vision, an author known for
his abstract writing style, whose stories portray disturbing personal realities
of modern China, accentuating the interplay of diverse meanings, particularly
between imagination and reality, innocence and guilt, blurring the
lines between postmodernism and tradition, often venturing into the absurd,
examining the dark side of human psychology and society in a non-traditional
way, with subjective storylines that investigate and illustrate the challenges
of cultural disintegration and identity loss. Defiantly ambiguous, this
absorbing yet completely atmospheric crime drama is heavily punctuated by
images of abandoned and neglected houses, narrow streets, and torrents of rain,
apparently washing the sins away, generating a suffocating atmosphere that blurs
the lines between good and evil, but the film’s exploration of complex social
and moral themes, such as fetishes, identity, and the intricacies of human
emotions, play a significant role in allowing viewers to draw their own
conclusions. This is a uniquely innovative film built upon a classical
film noir structure, which looks to the past as a way of trying to understand
the present, becoming an impressionistic mosaic on the ephemeral nature of
truth, which is one of the more dangerously perplexing problems of
modernity.
