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The Last Emperor: the Journey of Finding Identity Chan Lam Kay

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The Last Emperor: The Journey of Finding Identity Chan Lam Kay The Last Emperor (1987), directed by Bernardo Bertolucci, was a classic epic movie which was the big winner of the 60th Academy Awards and the 45th Golden Globe Awards. Over the decades, the cinematography of the film has been thoroughly analyzed by critics. However, the identity of Puyi, the last emperor of the Qing Dynasty as well as the main character in the film, is more intriguing and fascinating to me. According to Stuart Hall (1990), cultural identity is “not an essence, but a positioning”. Meanwhile, the issue of searching for identities has been a focus and widely discussed in the recent decade in Hong Kong. In a sense, this film resonates with the floating identity of Hong Kong, especially the emotion and the destiny of Hong Kong people in such chaotic times throughout history, despite the fact that the whole story and production is not related to Hong Kong at all. Therefore, this article will mainly focus on the journey of searching for identity in Puyi as represented in the film, with reference to Hall’s and Jonathan Rutherford’s discussion on the politics of identity. When compared with the television version (218 minutes), the theatre version (163 minutes) is more precise and consistent and thus is chosen to be discussed in this article. While the story happened in China, the film itself was actually international production in terms of directing, screenwriting, casting and shooting. The original score was composed and arranged by Ryuichi Sakamoto (Japanese), David Byrne (British-American) and Cong Su (Chinese) who had one piece being selected in the soundtrack. What’s more debatable is the language being used. Even if most actors/actresses are Chinese, they speak English except for some ritual phrases and traditional expression occasionally in Putonghua. It sounds wired to Chinese audiences. Therefore, some critics critiqued this film from the perspective of Orientalism. Said (1995) described Orientalism as “a western style for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient”. The film production is a typical example of how Chinese history and Puyi’s biography have been represented and seen in the eyes of the West. Nevertheless, Puyi himself, no matter inside or outside the film, was exactly experiencing and perhaps struggling with the difference between “the Orient” and “the Occident” in that particular historical moment of regime change. Having said that, it is too complex and irrelevant to compare the “real” Puyi with the character in the film because it has been discussed in various articles. 1 The movie starts with the scene when Puyi (played by John Lone) is a middle-aged man followed by the flashbacks of his past life as a toddler. As the story is not in chronological order, a narrative model of “the three-act structure” in film (Syd Field, 1979), including Setup, Confrontation, and Resolution, is employed to explain the transformation process of Puyi’s identity for the purpose of better understanding. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LAST-EMPEROR-1987-Bernardo-Bertolucci-John-Lone-Peter- OToole-CZECH-POSTER-/361407427372 2 Act I: The power of emperor From “I can do whatever I want” to “I’m not allowed to say what I want to say” Before 1908 1908 1912 Historical (Not depicted in the Death of Empress Qing Dynasty Moment movie) Dowager Cixi and the ended Coronation of Puyi (Implicated in the movie) Social Toddler Emperor of Qing Dynasty Emperor exclusively Identity whose father Prince Chun in the Forbidden City was Guangxu Emperor’s brother https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Emperor In the Qing dynasty, China faced historical changes including internal disturbance and foreign aggression. Right after the death of the previous emperor and Empress Dowager Cixi, 3 it “so happened” that Puyi was appointed as the successor. “The constitution of a social identity is an act of power” (Hall, 1990). As an emperor, the coronation of Puyi is undoubtedly a symbol of power. Even though he was a toddler, all government officials and even his own father needed to kowtow to him at the ceremony of coronation. The awakening of power was very significant for Puyi’s identity. The scene of coronation showed the innocent and Puyi’s childish side. Soon after he grew up, he “realized” that he was the emperor and enjoyed playing around with his servants by using his power. As Hall (1990) suggested, there were two ways of understanding cultural identities, whilst the first was “oneness” with “shared culture, history and ancestry held in common”. Therefore, it was relatively stable and unchanging. It is easy to understand whenever we see something different from us, and we are more certain who we are. The other way was concerned with similarities and differences, which constituted “what we really are” and “what we have become”, and thus was always a constant transformation. In Puyi’s case, his identity was never stable because of regime change. The conflicts of dramaturgy happened frequently in the relationship between Puyi and other characters, which constituted the identity of Puyi. From the scene of Puyi’s conflicts with his younger brother Pujie, he requested Pujie to take off the yellow-sleeve robe and tried to emphasize his status as an emperor. Yellow was regarded as the imperial colour in China. When Pujie refused and claimed that he was not the emperor, the only way of Puyi to prove himself was to order his servant to drink the ink, which was ironic yet pathetic. After Qing dynasty's collapse, he became an emperor “exclusively” in the Forbidden City and “the only man who was not allowed to leave the front door in China” as referred by his foreign tutor Johnston (played by Peter O'Toole). It was once again an awakening of power but in a fading way. In the movie, Puyi was portrayed as ambitious and rebellious. He tried to reform the system and expelled the eunuchs from the Forbidden City which aroused criticism and backlash from the high consorts and officials. There were also scenes of cutting his queue, having sex with his wives Wanrong (played by Joan Chen) and Wenxiu, which fully represented his masculinity as dominant, self-confident and determined. However, when it came to marriage, he could not choose his favourite girl Wenxiu as the first consort but could choose Wanrong instead even though he was the emperor. 4 Act II: Emperor as a name 1924 1927 1934 Historical Beijing Coup Chiang Kai Shek Japan Moment taken Shanghai established Manchukuo Social An emperor expelled from “Playboy” Henry Puppet emperor of Identity the palace and exiled to in Tientsin Manchukuo Tientsin When Puyi was young, he tried hard to escape from the Forbidden City. He was no longer allowed to live with his family until the Beijing Coup. As he stated earlier in the film that “the emperor never leaves the palace”, it became a metaphor that he was no longer an emperor after he left the Forbidden City until this particular moment. He could finally leave as he always wished; however, he did not expect to leave under this circumstance. When he moved to Tienjing, he became playboy Henry who was still able to afford a luxurious lifestyle. His marriage was not subject to him in the first place. Wenxiu divorced him without his consent, which was undoubtedly a representation of his fading power in the role of an emperor as well as a husband, especially in the old days when women rarely had the right to pick her own partner. For some reasons, Puyi accepted the offer from Japan in the hope of re-establishing the Empire of Manchuria but soon became the puppet emperor of Manchukuo. The contrast between the coronation at Manchukuo and the previous one in the Forbidden City was well presented in the scenes, in terms of the scale of ceremony and the symbolic meaning. If the coronation is a symbol of empowerment, the desolate and “empty” land in Manchuria, the presence of officials and guests reflected that Puyi as a puppet emperor just merely had the title but not the power. His dream was broken when all the officials left with an empty hall after he stated that Manchuria was not a colony. When the Japanese Military officer forced him to sign the orders and revealed that Wanrong had an affair with the driver, it was an insult to him that he lost his dignity as an emperor and a man. In fact, the decision of being the emperor in Manchukuo was contradictory and put him in a dilemma. Although he tried to 5 restore Manchuria by developing his own country, the collaboration with Japan could be interpreted as a betrayal to both Manchuria and the China, which made him political prisoner and traitor of the People’s Republic of China. From Act I to Act II, the confrontation in the film was all about the power struggle and resistance in Puyi’s identity. “Identities are about questions of using the resources of history, language, and culture in the process of becoming rather than being” (Hall, 1996) There was neither “rediscovery” nor “return” in identity (Hall, 1990), especially after the Qing dynasty collapsed. As the last emperor, Puyi’s identity has been shaped by regime change. As suggested by Rutherford (1990), “each individual is the synthesis not only of existing relations but of the history of these relations”. Identity is always a process instead of a definite and absolute answer. This is the history that determines how we have become. Whilst Abbas described Hong Kong’s culture space with “the strange dialectic between autonomy and dependency that we see in Hong Kong’s relation both to Britain and China”, Puyi’s identity from the emperor of the Qing Dynasty to “the last emperor” was highly shaped by the autonomy and dependency in the relation among him, Manchuria, warlord, Japan and the West.
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