Confucius
Director: Hu Mei
Year: 2010
Rating: 5.0
Chow Yun-fat is Confucius.
But don't go in expecting a bullet or sword ballet. In the first phase of
his Hong Kong career, Chow never played characters in historical ancient
period films. That is kind of amazing when you think about it because nearly
every other Hong Kong actor did at some point. But Chow was a modern man
whether in comedies or action. The idea of him wielding a sword or being
in period costume seemed incongruous. Give the man a gun and step back. Then
he went off to Hollywood, made two contemporary action films before he entered
the world of wushu with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon in 2000. And he created
a wonderful character. After returning to Hong Kong, he has appeared in three
epic period films - Curse of the Golden Flower, The Assassins and this film.
Of course, he fits fine into those films because he is Chow Yun-fat and can
do anything. Even playing a villain as he did in The Assassins and Curse
of the Golden Flower.
Confucius of course is no villain. He lived
nearly three thousand years ago and, in some ways, his moral philosophy is
as relevant today as ever. To some degree this film though is a trudge.
It feels as if the Mainland govt was likely keeping a close eye on this and
wanted a portrayal that was positive but also embraced a strong central government
so that chaos would not ensue. It has zero personality with Chow doing his
best to look firm, dignified and honorable throughout. If you ever watch
those historical recreations they make for the History Channel, you get a
sense of this film - but with a much larger budget. It is an epic film with
thousands of extras, huge and small sets, stunning landscapes and all the
décor that goes along with a film like this. But at the center of
it is Confucius - a simple man of moderate means. He was a commoner who through
hard work and original thinking in the government bureaucracy worked his
way up and came to the attention of the Emperor of Lu.
This was an era of many small kingdoms and
constant conflict within and without. Every family and every kingdom wanted
a leg up and that led to constant war. Confucius saw this chaos as destructive
to everything an Emperor tried to do for his people. His solution that he
tried to preach to the King as the Minister of Law was that of what became
Confucius thought - be humane, be righteous, be filial, be respectful of
authority and your people will support you. He also was a military strategist
and advised the King. One thing that he saw as essential was that the Big
Three Families that held power within the empire had to be diminished.
This led to his downfall and he was driven into exile.
The first hour of the film is the rise,
the second hour is the exile. He and a group of his followers leave Lu looking
for a home, for refuge. They travel for years being ejected from kingdom
after kingdom. Poverty follows him. Everywhere he goes he stops to teach
his code of morality. It is hard not to think of Jesus doing the same. The
years pass. He gets old and gray. He begins to collect his teachings by writing
them down on these bamboo slips. After his death his teachings and sayings
became part of the Chinese education system and he made it on to Fortune
Cookies! This is rather lifeless honestly but at the same time fascinating
to learn about his life. It would have been easy and tempting to plop in
some action scenes but female director Hu Mei refuses to do that.
