Discussing Zhang Yimou’s use of colour in ‘Hero’ in a historical and cultural context, and assessing the domestic and international response to his work.
As a student and admirer of all different sorts of filmmaking, I have developed particular interest in certain aspects of the craft, with one particular being an inventive use of colour within films. When a filmmaker pushes past the idea of colour simply just ‘being there’ and actually makes use of it in a particular way I always find it elevates my emotional response to the piece. However, when I began to research for this essay I found a surprising lack of material on the different uses of colour in film. Whilst explaining this mystery, Dalle Vacche and Price (2006) wrote ‘unlike the major areas of investigation within film studies – genre, auteurism, national cinema – to name but a few, colour remains an area of inquiry significantly less well heeled’. Therefore I wanted to use this essay to investigate one of my favourite directors, Zhang Yimou, and pull apart all the reasons why he pushed colour to its limit in his signature film Hero (2002). I will be looking at the different readings of his expressive use of colour in this film, as well as the critical and commercial response to it around the world, and also explaining how the use of colour has been an artistic choice throughout film history.
When taking a broader look at the use of colour throughout film history, one point immediately becomes apparent: colour wasn’t always an option for the filmmaking community. However, even when you look at the very first films ever made, it’s obvious that the different tones between black and white vary because of the technicolour of the original subjects, and moving into the advent of actual colour in films, expressionist interpretations quickly appeared, including Black Narcissus (1947) and The Red Shoes (1948), both films directed by virtuoso pairing Powell & Pressburger. Edgar, Marland and Rawle (2015) discussed the latter film, ‘watch the central ballet sequence …its expressive use of colour, setting, costume… one of the most important visual sequences ever produced for the screen.’ Powell & Pressburger’s experimentations with colour pushed the industry forwards, allowing future generations to experiment with their usage of colour to a greater extent.
Moving forward three decades, Edgar, Marland and Rawle (2015) looked at Don’t Look Now (1973) to see how the usage of colour in film had become more expressionistic. ‘Throughout Don’t Look Now, the bright red coat becomes a repetitive motif in the mise-en-scène, symbolising John’s guilt around the death of his daughter, as well as playing a role in the ghostly story of past and future.’ This particular usage of colour within film, with one colour boldly standing out from a more muted palette, had been wildly popular in the film industry for decades for its assistance in pushing forwards particular points and creating references for the audience to be able to easily follow a narrative. A more recent film which also used this technique is Schindler’s List (1993), with the repeated use of a highlighted red coat allowing the audience to follow the location of the little girl and bring about a stronger emotional response as a result.
Natalie M. Kalmus, credited as the “colour supervisor” of almost every single Technicolor film produced between 1934 and 1949, had as big a hand to play in the development and usage of colour as any director or cinematographer of the time. Describing her view of how colour should be used, Kalmus (1935) explained, ‘A super-abundance of colour is unnatural, and has a most unpleasant effect not only upon the eye itself, but upon the mind as well.’ Looking back at the examples of the usage in colour in film I’ve already gone through, the usage of colour is still quite subtle and very
Page | 1 effective, something Kalmus doubtlessly inspired and would have enjoyed. However my focus film for this essay completely throws her rules away. Directed by celebrated Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou, Hero (2002) is an overload of colour, combining the delicacy of the arthouse style with the overload of the modern blockbuster to create an unforgettable visual experience. The film has a non-linear structure, with the same story being repeated multiple times depending on which character’s perspective we’re viewing it from, and although the structure is very complex Zhang has a surprising technique to easily separate these timelines: colour.
The revolutionary usage of colour in Hero (2002) was the result of a partnership between Zhang and his cinematographer on the film, Chris Doyle, who was already well known for using a vibrant colour scheme that affects the viewer due to his work on movies such as In the Mood for Love (2000). Together they decided to use colour to separate the different timelines, and overloaded each shot with its respective colour in order to both create an overwhelming visual experience and also create a more logical plot structure. As Edgar, Marland and Rawle (2015) explain, ‘Zhang and Doyle give us a code in the mise en scene to understand where we are, and each unit has a dominant colour: (1) Black; (2) Grey; (3) Red; (4) Blue; (5) White; and (6) Green.’ Using colour in this way benefits the film in two ways. Firstly, it makes a potentially unwieldy film structure work a lot better and the storyline becomes easier to process, meaning that the messages Zhang wanted to get across are a lot more accessible. Kalmus (1935) found this in her own research, ‘colours alone speak with more eloquence than could be described by words.’ However it also works in the way of simply making the film look very good; there are numerous scenes in the film that stick in the mind for their beauty and composure, and the overload of colour within every frame helps to create both a unique identity for the film within the modern filmmaking landscape and also create emotional responses within the viewer.
Zhang’s use of colour within his films is perfectly programmed to create emotional reactions from the audience, just as any other aspect of filmmaking should be. It is widely known in many different forms of media that different colours create varying emotions, with an example being given by Edgar, Marland and Rawle (2015) while discussing Hero (2002), ‘The red, blue, white, and green sections could be interpreted as representing common emotional symbols. Since the red sequence is about a romantic spat, we might see the colour representing anger, or the green might represent envy.’ This instant emotional response to colour that most of the audience will have seems relatively simple, however ask a sample of strangers what emotions a colour triggers within them and you’ll likely hear lots of different answers. Dalle Vacche and Price (2006) agree, ‘How do we know what a particular use of red means if, in our culture, red can indicate multiple and often contradictory things: love and anger; revolution and madness.’ This varying reaction to colour should work against someone trying to use it as a storytelling tool, however it works in Zhang’s favour, underlining the idea that the narrative suggests; life is coloured by the viewpoint of the individual. As Edgar, Marland and Rawle (2015) state, ‘…we need to remember what the narrative is saying to us overall: the truth is relative. Each colour then takes on a different shade or nuance of memory depending who is telling the story.’ Therefore the angry red of one character could be the lustful red of another, or a scenario could be coloured green for one envious character and purple for another more powerful character, giving Zhang’s fictional world and characters more emotional depth.
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Looking at specific frames from Hero (2002), I wanted to pick out specific moments which highlight Zhang’s creative use of colour, and explain why exactly the shot works so well in this colourful context.
In the two shots above, the character ‘Flying Snow’ (played by Maggie Cheung) is reflective after having just killed another character in battle. As her back is turned to the camera, the colour of the leaves turn to red, falling down around her and making her blend in with her surroundings. My immediate reaction to this scene is that the character is pondering the life she has just taken, and therefore the leaves change colour to match the blood she has just spilled. As red is normally viewed as an aggressive colour that would certainly seem to match my point. However when watching the film this shot doesn’t seem to signal anger or danger as you’d expect, instead a kind of sadness or resignation, something which I believe is due to the figure being swallowed up by the colour around her. As Hillenbrand (2013) states, ‘…the way the camera soaks the screen in redness functions counterintuitively, since this notional uniformity in hue only works to destabilize the very concept of solid colour.’ If you mix this concept with the stereotypical suggestion that red is a dangerous colour, it seems to signal that Flying Snow has resigned herself to the fatal consequences of her actions, for which she will eventually suffer consequences.
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In contrast to the other shot I highlighted, the frame above is notable for its lack of colour. The ‘white’ segment of this film is meant to signify the truth of the storyline, but due to the tragic consequences the characters suffer throughout this section it could just as easily point to other ideas. In Chinese culture white is the colour people wear when they’re in mourning, so I suggest that by dressing the truth in a supposedly sad colour Zhang is telling the audience that these characters suffer due to their actions and the world in which they live, and they mourn the loss of their countries independence and eachothers lives. Edgar, Marland and Rawle (2015) agree with this reading of the film, ‘…colours establish patterns or motifs that deepen the storytelling, heighten the cinematic spectacle and make us think about the nature of truth. Since Sword writes the characters for “Our Land” in the sand, the link between the environment and colour makes thematic sense.’
A key point of Hero (2002), one which proved highly controversial, was the idea of “tianxia”. This Chinese word, approximately translated into English as “all under heaven” or “our land”, caused uproar because it was interpreted as many (especially in Western civilisations) to suggest he supported authoritarianism. However, when viewed through the perspective of colour and what Zhang did with it to change perspectives, another reading appears which is more complimentary. Hillenbrand (2013) suggests ‘colour in this film, abetted all the way by Kurosawa, becomes a powerfully synaesthetic experience, and its cross-sensory character gives birth to a different kind of tianxia, a cinematic ‘all under heaven’ which is more about the humanizing power of the filmic medium than any hymn to authoritarianism.’ This is obviously a very thematic reading of Zhang’s filmmaking decisions, but that doesn’t make it any less true, and I personally agree with Hillenbrand about this. If you view Hero (2002) in this light, the symbolism & visual ideas Zhang creates ties in nicely with the narrative of the film, suggesting that colour shapes our perspective of the world and acts as a link between every individual and their differing emotions.
While looking through different research articles and essays on Hero (2002), a surprising name repeatedly appeared as a reference point and inspiration: Akira Kurosawa. Surprising for me because all I knew of his work had him using black-and-white film, seemingly more interested in the power of narrative and editing. However, the theory that Kurosawa shaped Zhang’s work on this film is compelling. Firstly Zhang himself wrote about Kurosawa’s influence on him for Time Magazine, stating ‘Just a few weeks ago, I was having a discussion with my crew on an action film we are making. We conceived a scene in which several people told their stories from different perspectives,
Page | 4 and we realized, “hey, that's Rashōmon.” I counsel my colleagues to resist the temptation to imitate Kurosawa blindly; it is impossible to surpass him.’ (Zhang, 1999). Despite his seemingly strong ambition to avoid taking inspiration from the Japanese director, comparisons to Rashōmon (1950) are very easy to make, with the multiple timelines and non-linear storytelling in Hero (2002) almost identical to the earlier film. Mackey (2004) recounts Chris Doyle saying about his own work in the film, ‘‘obviously, it's our Rashōmon.’ However as the earlier film was shot with black and white film, colour isn’t such a key comparison between Zhang and Kurosawa.
A better comparison between the two directors would be in Kurosawa’s later filmography as he started embracing colour film, specifically Ran (1985) and Dreams (1990), both of which use colour in symbolic ways to suggest ideas that the script cannot. In her study of a particular scene (above) from Ran (1985), Hillenbrand (2013) explained ‘…what really animates the composition is its colour. Kurosawa's palette picks out those who matter more, and those who count for less, through its considered juxtaposition of white tones, primary colours and muted shades.’ It is quite easy to assess from this simple frame which characters matter and the standard of their relationships, due to the vertical and horizontal positioning that reflects the levels of power, but the colour also plays an equal role in this wordless explanation of setting. The older figure in white is clearly ranked above the other characters as the white robe conveys a feeling of knowledge, and the four brightly coloured figures next to him have these colour schemes to separate their emotions and storylines from eachother. This comparison works very well with Zhang’s work on Hero because he used the exact same technique to separate timelines and emotions in his work. Hillenbrand (2013) brings this point to a good conclusion when she states ‘Hero presents a melded reworking of Ran, Dreams and Rashômon, in which the Japanese films are not just heavily referenced in their separate cinematic status, but drawn into a kind of free-standing creative fusion.’
When Hero (2002) was released Zhang had already made 11 films, and his use of several cinematographic techniques hen become apparent, including his use of colour. A key example of this is the film Raise the Red Lantern (1991), and as you could guess by the name, the colour red is highlighted throughout the film for several different reasons. Critical evaluations of this technique
Page | 5 vary, with most Western reviews being highly positive (Berardinelli (1996) stated "the appeal to the eye only heightens the movie's emotional power") but Chinese reviews being a little more critical (Dai (1993) writes "this kind of film is really shot for the casual pleasures of foreigners"). However Hero (2002) was a major step into the blockbuster world for Zhang, which in turn affected the way he used colour in the film. Zheng’s study (2010) agrees, ‘This good-to-be-looked-at-ness has long been considered a Zhang Yimou hallmark, but in this case it became the mainstay of the film's aesthetic and affective investment.’ Reviews of the film therefore raised in accordance with the raise in Zhang’s style, with mainly Western critics raving about his visual style and the way he brought a contemporary arthouse style to a mainstream genre like the martial-arts movies, and pan-Asian critics complaining about the supposed ‘Hollywood sheen’ given to Zhang’s work, but in both markets the film found massive commercial success, becoming the highest grossing film of all time in China at the time.
The overwhelming success of the film in both domestic and international markets can be put down to Zhang’s reputation as a filmmaker, and his use of colour to create aesthetically pleasing but mentally challenging images is a massive aspect of that view. In fact the film has been seen as not only promoting Zhang’s style, but suggesting that it is emblematic of a wider ‘Chinese’ style of filmmaking. An article in Metro: Media & Education Magazine (2003, p. 249-251) states ‘Visually rich, beautiful and dramatic, Zhang's films have helped bring a Chinese aesthetic to the West. The key to conveying this strong aesthetic is a powerful use of colour, relied upon to portray strong visual symbolism and also allowing the film's message to cross cultures.’ As a form of language, colour is ideal for a filmmaker like Zhang to have wide success, as translation isn’t needed across borders and continents when you’re talking with colour. Various film analysts have tied his use of colour together with his international success, suggesting that his work with colour is just as much tied in Western influences like Alfred Hitchcock and Stan Brakhage as it is in his own Asian culture. Looking at these suggestions, Hillenbrand (2013) suggests ‘a key theme throughout is the idea of the ‘colour of money’: the notion that the film's chromatic styling is designed, above all, for box-office gold, both in China and abroad.’ Although there is enough evidence in the thematic reasoning of Zhang’s work with colour to suggest he filmed in stunning sections of colour purely for the sake of his narrative, it’s interesting to consider that in his aim to create a film that would be a success outside of his homeland, he may have tapped into a very lucrative style of filmmaking. This success hasn’t gone unnoticed in his homeland either, with a massive explosion of educational articles about colour in film after the release of Hero (2002), with the majority being written in Mandarin. As Hillenbrand (2013) states, ‘“…the mounting interest in the topic within contemporary film studies, have been sparked, in part at least, by the chromatically bold and complex work of directors such as Zhang and Kurosawa.’
When applying both a historical and a cultural context to Zhang’s work on Hero (2002), his accomplishments are even more astonishing. By framing such varied uses of colour within such a commercially viable film, he did a lot for the positive discussion of colour as a more artistic choice rather than something that just simply ‘exists’, and his influence on the film industry cannot be overstated, increasing a more visually creative and astounding creative output from his homeland but also influencing the wider world of film. As Hillenbrand (2013) stated, ‘“…the film is not just about what colour can do for cinema, but also about what cinema can do for colour.’ Zhang has proved with his experimentation with colour that this relationship is a very beneficial one.
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References
Edgar, R., Marland, J. and Rawle, S. (2015). The language of film. 2nd ed. London: Fairchild Books AVA, pp.139- 153.
Kalmus, N. (1935). Color Consciousness. Available at: https://eastman.org/sites/default/files/technicolor/pdfs/ColorConsultants_ColorConsciousness.pdf (Accessed 12 December 2017)
Dalle Vecche, A. and Price, B. (2006). Color, The Film Reader. New York: Routledge, pp. 1-134.
Yimou, Z. (1999). Akira Kurosawa. Available at http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2054381,00.html (Accessed 29 November 2017)
Hillenbrand, M. (2013) ‘Hero, Kurosawa and a cinema of the senses’, Screen, 54(2), pp. 127–151.
Berardinelli, J. (1996) ‘Raise the Red Lantern’. Review of Raise the Red Lantern, directed by Zhang Yimou. Available at http://preview.reelviews.net/movies/r/raise.html (Accessed 12 December 2017)
Dai, Q. (1993) ‘Raised Eyebrows for Raise the Red Lantern’. Review of Raise the Red Lantern, directed by Zhang Yimou. Public Culture, pp. 333-337.
Zheng, Y. (2010) ‘What Makes a Genre Blockbuster Good to Look At: Zhang Yimou's Transformative Modus Operandi in Hero’, Film International, 8(1), pp. 47-62.
Anonymous (2003) ‘ATLAB'S DIGITAL CHEMISTRY COLOURS ZHANG YIMOU'S WUXIA FANTASY WORLD’, Metro: Media & Education Magazine, Issue 135, pp. 249-251.
Mackey, R. (2004) FILM; Cracking the Color Code of 'Hero'. Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/15/movies/film-cracking-the-color-code-of-hero.html (Accessed: 2 December 2017).
Film List
Raise the Red Lantern (1991). Directed by Zhang Yimou [Film].
Rashōmon (1950). Directed by Akira Kurosawa [Film].
Ran (1985). Directed by Akira Kurosawa [Film].
Dreams (1990). Directed by Akira Kurosawa [Film].
In the Mood for Love (2000). Directed by Wong Kar-wai [Film].
Don’t Look Now (1973). Directed by Nicolas Roeg [Film].
Schindler’s List (1993). Directed by Steve Spielberg [Film].
Hero (2002). Directed by Zhang Yimou [Film].
Black Narcissus (1947). Directed by Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger [Film].
The Red Shoes (1948). Directed by Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger [Film].
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