Re: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

>>>>> "dave" == Dave Rolsky <[email protected]> writes:

  dave> Is that review a joke or something?  

Hmm, I certainly didn't introduce it as a joke, on the contrary. Are
your comments meant to be a joke or just clumsy and uncharitable?

	If not, its pretty
  dave> ridiculous.  It always amazes me how people can read so much
  dave> into works of art/entertainment.  Certainly, there are plenty
  dave> of works with lots of rich political content, but I really
  dave> don't think this film is one of them.  

"Having rich political content" and "being amenable to a richly
political reading" aren't the same thing; do you deny the distinction
in general or just here?

	That's not to say that
  dave> there's nothing political about it because every work reflects
  dave> its creator(s) viewpoints, but that's a far cry from an
  dave> explicitly political work.

And *only* an "explicitly political work" or one of "rich political
content" should be read politically? Are those two different criteria
or just one?

You don't give a single reason for anyone to think that political
interpretation of film is inappropriate. Too bad; such an ambitious
argument might have started an interesting conversation.

  dave> This part is quite rich:

  >> (The Michelle Yeoh & Chow Yun Fat characters are basically
  >> mercenaries for the ruling class, who reclaim Jen from an evil
  >> lesbian feminist Jade Fox.)

  dave> Hmm, feminist, maybe.  Though her motivations hardly seem to
  dave> be feminist.  Lesbian?  That just comes out of nowhere.  The
  dave> only sex Jade Fox is mentioned as having is with a man.
  dave> Doesn't mean she's not a lesbian but there's very little to
  dave> indicate that she is, unless you insist on seeing things that
  dave> aren't there.

I thought *during* the film that there were lesbian overtones both to
Jade Fox and to her relationship with her student (who was also her
master in *two* senses, thus giving a nicely dialectical dimension to
their relationship).

  dave> I _am_ looking forward to the prequel, which will hopefully
  dave> cover the events related to Jade Fox & Li Mu Bai's master.
  dave> I'm hoping that it _does_ address the issue of sexism.

Unlike the present film which doesn't? Gee, I thought the main plot
was almost entirely *about* gender roles. I guess I too "saw stuff
that wasn't really there". The love interest beteween the Yeo and Yun
Fat characters was thoroughly shot through with considerations of
gender and sexism.

  dave> As for them being mercenaries for the ruling class.  That's
  dave> not so clear either.  Their motivation in 'reclaiming' her
  dave> (which they aren't even trying to do!) is not really motivated
  dave> by money.

Bah! They are *clearly* mercenaries for the ruling class! Why else are
they so motivated to aid the father -- who is a rich and powerful
gov't official, iirc -- except because they are retainers, either to
him specifically or to his class generally.

  dave> Another good part:

  >> _Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon_ has an intriguing _but
  >> underdeveloped_ lesbian-feminist class-struggle subtext

  dave> Hmm, maybe its under-developed because it doesn't really
  dave> exist.

Or maybe it's just underdeveloped?

  dave> And later:

  >> With her dying breaths, she reproaches Jen for denying her
  >> literacy (earlier, Jade fox stole the Book that contained the
  >> secret teachings of Wu Tan, which she, illiterate, couldn't read;
  >> Jen read it & surpassed her female mentor, without sharing her
  >> learning with her).

  dave> Huh?  Illiterate?  Its never implied that she can't read (in
  dave> fact, we see her reading the posters outside the Yu residence
  dave> earlier in the film).  The problem is that she doesn't have
  dave> the talent to _understand_ the book.  But that wouldn't fit
  dave> the writer's theory, so its ignored.

Well, s/denying her literacy/denying her greater understanding/ -- an
alternate reading *clearly* withing the bounds of the principle of
interpretive charity -- and your objection is mooted.

She reproaches with her dying breath Jen's greater understanding of
the Book, and thus the secrets of the Wu Tan -- whether that's a
function of literacy or a broader notion of understanding, the point
remains, namely, Jen has been educated in ways that Jade Fox wasn't,
these differences in education are variables of class, and thus Jade
Fox reproaches her.

  dave> Ok, maybe the review was a joke and I'm just a troll-biter.

I can think of other possibilities which I'm too courteous to voice.

I don't care so much if you disagree with this (rather abbreviated,
summary) reading of the film. That is, after all, one way to initiate
interesting conversation, though not generally by showing the
interpretive miserliness you've shown here.

I find your denial of the legitimacy of political readings of 'texts'
that aren't *overtly* or *explicitly* political to be absurd and prima
facie wrong. And it flies in the face of about 150 years of the theory
of interpretation, going back at least to, as Paul Ricoeur called the,
the three 'masters of suspicion': Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud.

Are you going to give *any* grounds for such a broad claim?

Kendall
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