In October 1930, in the mountains and forests of central Taiwan, an indigenous tribe was holding a wedding banquet, and then a Japanese policeman suddenly appeared to break the lively atmosphere.
Thirty-five years ago.
In 1895, the Qing government signed the Treaty of Maguan, ceding Taiwan and its affiliated islands to Japan. The Japanese army quickly took over the land of Taiwan and adopted military rule over the people of Taiwan.
The leader of the tribe, Mona Rudao, was from the Sideks, when he was a tall and mighty young man.
Under the rule of the Japanese army, Mona Rudao and his tribe were forced to abandon the traditional farming and hunting habits and became the tide in the development of civilization.
The national beliefs of the Sideks have thus become a victim.
Thirty-five years later, at a wedding banquet of the Mona Rudao tribe, a Japanese policeman came to make trouble, the groom invited him to drink, but was attacked by the police, so the police and the clan got into a serious conflict, and the officer was injured in the fight.
Mona Rudao, well aware of the disparity in strength between the two sides, endured humiliation and burdens, and led his people to the door to apologize, but the officer still reported the incident and wanted to put them to death.
On October 27, 1930, the Sideks, led by Mona Rudao, launched an uprising against the Japanese army, killing 134 Japanese. It was then encircled and suppressed by the Japanese army for fifty days.
History is called the "Fog Society Incident".
In 1997, Wei Desheng, a young director in Taiwan, accidentally turned to a comic book that told this story about faith and battle, and he was deeply touched and wanted to make this story into a movie.
In 2009, after twelve years of painstaking efforts, the largest epic film in taiwan's film history, "Sidekbare", was officially launched.
China has never lacked history and faith, and Chinese films have never lacked large-scale productions and narratives of history, but there is only one film that combines "history" and "faith" with such a magnificent film.
This epic film has many difficulties in raising funds, so Xu Ruoxuan and Wen Lan participated free of charge, Jay Chou, Yan Chengxu and other 200 stars generously donated, according to Taiwan media reports, Zhou Dong borrowed 40 million (NT$) from the director without interest, so that the film could be filmed smoothly.
In today's China, such films should perhaps be re-read. About the nation, about the faith, about human beings themselves.
The reason is just like what many people say about the movie: it can awaken the power of faith.
Before I talk about the movie, I want to tell the story about the movie first.
In 2012, "Sidekbar" was released in the mainland and was widely acclaimed in the industry, but it only got 15 million at the box office, and it is still a niche film in the mainland.
The director of this film, Wei Desheng, was born in Tainan City in 1968, and in 1993, the twenty-five-year-old Wei Desheng entered Yang Dechang Film Studio and officially stepped into the film and television industry.
In 2008, Wei Desheng, who is already well-known in the industry, made "Cape Seven", which became famous in one fell swoop, and this film is a landmark work of Taiwanese cinema, so that the Taiwanese film after "Cape Seven" is called the "post-Cape Era".
(Middle: Wei Desheng)
Many people think that this is Wei Desheng's favorite work, but Wei Desheng said that the filming of "Cape Seven" was to make "Sidekbar".
In September 2011, "Sidekbar" was released in Taiwan, and unlike the dismal release in the mainland, it earned NT$800 million at the box office in Taiwan, breaking the box office record maintained by "Cape Seven" for three years.
For "Sidekbarle", Wei Desheng devoted twelve years of hard work.
From learning about the "Fog Society Incident" in 1997, to completing the script in 2000, shooting the trailer at his own expense, and then re-investing and borrowing money after the success of "Cape Seven", Wei Desheng relied on the reverence for "faith".
In the words of Yao Ruolong, the author of the original comic, "Wei Desheng and Mona Rudao are actually the same kind of people, but their ways are different", and the "Mona Rudao" in the film is a simple person with faith.
Wei Desheng's filming of "Saidekbale" and the "Mona Rudao" in the movie leading the people to revolt are all things that are driven by faith and are bloody things.
And that's exactly what flashy modern people are gradually losing.
The Taiwanese version of "Sidekbare" is divided into upper and lower episodes, "Sidekbare: Sun Flag" and "Sidekbare: Rainbow Bridge", with a total length of four and a half hours. The mainland release version was cut by 130 minutes, but the story is still very clear and still full of power, and what is said here is subject to the mainland release version.
The story of the film is based on the real history of the last century, when the Taiwanese Sidek people launched the "Wushe Uprising" against the Japanese army.
The film begins with an account of the traditional way of life of the Sideks.
The young Mona Rudao participated in the tribal coming-of-age ceremony "out of the grass", cutting off the heads of enemies as a trophy, thus representing a real man, who could tattoo a man's motif on his face.
The Sideks live deep in the mountains and are a typical independent patriarchal society, fishing and hunting, men hunting and fighting, and women sewing men's clothes and waiting for the heroic men to return home.
Outside the male protagonist, inside the female protagonist, life is calm and steady.
In the high mountains of Taiwan, the Wushe area has many tribes, but the living environment is harsh, people rely on hunting for a living, and the competition for hunting grounds by various tribes has become a part of the men's lives.
Therefore, for the honor of the tribe and the competition for the hunting ground, different tribes often broke out into battles.
So in the inheritance of the ancestors of the Sideks, there is a legend:
After death, people walk across a rainbow bridge, and on the opposite side of the rainbow bridge are those who have passed away.
A boy who has only hunted the head of an enemy can be called a real man, and is entitled to walk across the Rainbow Bridge and be recognized by the ancestral spirits.
The people of the Saidek also pursue a lifelong pursuit of being able to die such a proud death.
This is also the faith of Mona Rudao throughout his life.
At the coming-of-age ceremony, Mona Rudao, who returned to the tribe with the head of the enemy, recalled the scene of his childhood: his father stroked his clean forehead and chin, telling him that only by cutting off the head of the enemy and becoming a real man would he be entitled to walk across the Rainbow Bridge and meet the sacred ancestral spirits after he died.
Mona Rudao did it, tattooed a totem symbolizing a man on his face, and let his reputation for bravery spread out.
For Mona Rudao, this was the most important moment of his life.
This is the spiritual belief of the Saidek tribe, and the pursuit of spirit is greater than the material need for survival.
In the words of the movie, it is: real people can lose their bodies, but they must win the soul.
The peaceful life that has been passed down from generation to generation has changed with the Japanese.
After the Sino-Japanese War, the Japanese took over Taiwan and suppressed most of the region by force.
The Fog Society, where the Saideks were located, was strategically located and rich in products, and soon faced Japanese occupation.
Before the arrival of the Japanese army, the various tribes of the Saidek tribe were constantly in strife over their hunting grounds and the honor of men.
After hearing that the Japanese army was coming, the tribes began to cooperate in an attempt to prevent the arrival of the Japanese army.
The Way the Sideks were sniping at the Japanese on the narrow mountain paths they were familiar with. Ambushing the top of the hill with guns and bows and arrows, the Japanese attacked as they passed down the hill, pushing rolling stones down the hill.
This move did catch the Japanese by surprise at first, but they were faced with an elite modern army after all, and the resistance of the tribe soon failed.
Instead, it was counter-attacked by the Japanese army.
During the counter-offensive, Mona Rudao's father was also killed in the battle, and before he died, his father told him: Don't let the Japanese enter our hunting ground.
The Japanese thus occupied the Kirisame, and Mona Rudo did not fulfill his father's last wish.
Before his father died, Mona Rudao had completed the "grass out" and became a real man.
He was strong, intelligent, and prestigious, a proud but sane man.
Mona Rudo became the leader of the tribe, but the first thing he faced was the death of his father and the inability to do anything in the face of the mighty Japanese army.
At the flick of a finger, the last twenty years.
With the arrival of the Japanese army, the Saidek people in the Wushe area completely lost the primitive tribal way of life that had been free and passed down for a long time, and the old order was completely destroyed.
The Japanese relied on military repression to bring the Saideks under rule.
According to the records of the Japanese army, the Japanese army's rule in the Wushe area of Taiwan was completely oppressed by force in the early stage. As some Japanese moved here, the Japanese army began to carry out modernization reforms in the Kirishe area.
The Japanese army, as well as the japanese who had migrated in, began to let the local Sideks build hospitals, schools, post offices, factories, railways and other infrastructure.
The aim was to bring modern civilization, domesticate the wild nature of the Sideks, and develop wood resources in the vast forested area of the Mist Society.
Along with modern civilization, there is the prohibition of traditional customs, such as the coming-of-age ceremony of cutting off the heads of enemies.
The Aborigines were forced to work and education, learning Japanese and Japanese history, and the Sideks were reduced to cheap labor.
The Japanese who came to the Kirisame Society acted recklessly, oppressed the Sidek men, raped the Sedek women, and the local tribesmen dared to be angry.
Mona Rudao's generation, who witnessed aggression, had to swallow insults and live in the shadow of the Japanese.
The new younger generation, either embracing the civilization brought about by Japan, or becoming workers, is not paid a salary, is discriminated against, and lives in the shadows.
Spiritual discrimination, the oppression of survival, and the discontinuation of national culture have made the entire Sidek tribe live in the depths of the water, but due to the strength of the Japanese army, they can only continue to live quietly.
Mona Rudao also went from youth to his father's age, and was an old man with high prestige in the tribe.
In the face of the situation of the tribe, he has always been grumpy, bear the burden of humiliation, and has been looking for an opportunity to fight.
The Japanese army deprived the tribe of the right to use firearms, and the reclusive Mona Rudao accumulated day by day to quietly accumulate gunpowder on matches in order to have a chance to resist.
Mona Rudao would sometimes go to his own hunting ground alone, and in the lonely hunting ground, he would sing the songs of his own people, remembering his long-dead father and the spiritual beliefs of the young people who were gradually being worn away.
After twenty years of enduring and witnessing all the changes, I felt pain in my heart, but I still couldn't do anything about it.
At that time, most of the tribesmen were living in a muddy life, and the young people did not have a totem representing men tattooed on their faces.
There are also some clans who recognize modern civilization, such as Ichiro Hanaoka in the police station.
Ichiro Hanaoka was a Sydek man, and after the Japanese army came, he learned the modern culture brought by the Japanese, changed a Japanese name, and became a local policeman.
Among the police, he has the highest academic qualifications, but the lowest salary.
Ichiro Hanaoka is like the first generation of people who came to the city from the countryside, accepting civilization, but not accepting civilization, but not willing to go back to the past.
He married a wife who was also "civilized", and both lived a Japanese life, wearing kimonos and speaking Japanese, but the Japanese looked down on them, and the proud Sideks looked down on them.
Against this background, the twist of the story, the Fog Society incident broke out.
At a wedding banquet of the tribe, the Japanese police came to make trouble and were injured by the tribesmen.
The officers held a grudge and were bent on killing the tribe. At that time, it was a big thing for the prisoners to beat the Japanese police, and the Japanese police had to report it anyway.
Mona Rudao led his people to apologize to no avail, and the long-simmering anger and hatred finally broke out completely.
Although the young Sideks were unable to complete the traditional coming-of-age ritual of "coming out of the grass", they had not yet broken the generation.
So the leader of the tribe, led by Mona Rudao, and the bloody young man of the tribe immediately hit it off, and wanted to use the Japanese head to complete the young man's coming-of-age ceremony and sacrifice the ancestral spirits in blood.
MonaRudo then began to contact the other tribes under the jurisdiction of the Kirisame, but only five tribes answered the call, because the leaders knew that it would be a suicidal revenge.
A reckless life, or a proud death.
"If you exchange life for a totem mark, what will you exchange for these young lives?"
"Real people can lose their bodies, but they must win their souls!"
Ichiro Hanaoka also came to persuade MonaRudo, who said to him, "If civilization requires us to bow down, then I will show you the pride of barbarism." ”
This sentence made Ichiro Hanaoka die, and he also changed his attitude and secretly helped the clan uprising.
On October 27, 1930, the Japanese army held a sports meeting at the Kirisha, and most of the local Japanese people were present. Mona Rudao connected the five tribes, laid out an action plan, and all began to wait for the dawn of the day, waiting for the moment of the awakening of the wild.
In the early hours of the same day, the tribes solved the scattered outposts according to the plan and began to gather at the Fog Society.
The operation was very successful, and the "Blood Sacrifice ancestral spirit" led by Mona Rudao killed 134 Japanese people, including many women and children, at the Games of the Kirisame, which was contrary to tribal traditions.
It also means that they are ready to die from the beginning. The operation was more like wild suicidal revenge.
Immediately after the outbreak of the Kirisho Incident, the Japanese army immediately sent troops to the Kirisho area to fight.
More than three hundred tribesmen led by Mona Rudao also began the last burning of their lives. Relying on the complex terrain, they repelled the Japanese army of more than 3,000 people.
At first, the commander of the army, who despised them, also began to become angry and demoralized, and applied to the military for the use of the internationally banned gas bomb.
Then, facing the Sidek men, there was an endless battle until death.
They shouted with their arms raised, willing to fight for the glory of the nation and for their souls, and more than three hundred warriors burned the strength of their lives and held out the battle for more than a month.
For them, faith is greater than life and death, and justice is greater than life and death.
Mona Rudao led the men in battle against the Japanese, allowing several teenage teenagers, with women and children, to escape to safety. But women chose a different path in order to reduce food consumption and cut off men's back roads.
In the jungle, which is as beautiful as a painting, the women bid farewell to these teenagers. The teenagers seemed to understand what they were going to do, crying and holding on, but the women all had a determination in their eyes.
They came to a beautiful wood, killed their young children with their own hands, and then made ropes out of their clothes and hung them on a tree. They sang ancient songs, one by one, hanging their heads on ropes and hanging themselves en masse.
The mother said to her son, "You're already a man, go fight, I'll be waiting for you at the other end of the Rainbow Bridge." ”
The shock of this scene is indescribable.
The men on the other side began a desperate battle, the purpose of the battle was not to live, but to be able to die proudly.
The Japanese used the hostile tribes of Mona Rudao to encircle the jungle unfamiliar to the army.
Thus the ethnic hatred and tribal hatred reached their peak, and more than three hundred tribesmen led by Mona Rudao fought a final decisive battle against the Japanese army and the tribes that defected to the Japanese army.
Teenage teenagers rushed into the enemy army with guns, and when there were no bullets, they fell off the cliff with the enemy in their arms; the body of the man with the totem tattooed on his face was stabbed more than a dozen times, but his eyes were still sharp; facing the Japanese troops across the bridge, the only remaining men rushed to the cannon with their swords...
When you reach the end, you will die with the enemy. Unable to kill the enemy, he committed suicide with pride.
At the end of the battle, Mona Rudao and the remaining tribesmen came to a wooden bridge.
Across the bridge was the Japanese army with machine guns and cannons, and the tribesmen held knives in their hands and looked into the sky as if they could see the call of their ancestors. They shouted with all their might, as if performing some kind of ritual.
Then, brandishing their knives in their hands, they rushed with all their might toward the enemy on the other side of the bridge.
A shell fell and the wooden bridge was blown to pieces. At this point, more than three hundred tribesmen were all dead.
That bridge is not a rainbow bridge, but in their eyes, the bridge that runs desperately at the last moment of life must be a rainbow.
Across the bridge is not the Japanese army with machine guns and cannons, but the ancestral spirits that smile and wave to them.
They died proudly in burning faith.
At the end of the film, yahiko Kamada, the commander of the Japanese army, looks at the brilliant cherry blossoms and sighs: "Three hundred soldiers resisted thousands of troops and committed suicide without dying."
Why would I see the samurai spirit that we have been lost for a hundred years in this remote mountainous region of Taiwan?
Are the cherry blossoms here blooming too brightly? ”
In real history, the "Wushe Uprising" is a glorious page in the history of the Chinese nation's anti-aggression, and when the mainland was in deep trouble, the people of Taiwan also launched a counterattack in their own way. Heroic, tragic, and shocking.
Later, the area around Wushe was rebuilt as "Datong Village", which is still one of the most important cultural and historical relics in Taiwan.
In the 1940s, the remains of Mona Rudao were found by the Japanese army and used for specimen experiments, and after the end of the War of Resistance Against Japan, people found the remains of Mona Rudao and built a cemetery for him, located in what is now Nantou County, Taiwan.
Director Wei Desheng said of "Sidekbare": "The focus is on what is the fight. ”
The historical Saideks were subjected to the brutal rule of the Japanese army, and their survival needs, national beliefs, and basic human rights were lost.
What makes them fight for is not one of them, but what they should have as a "human being", a reverence for life, a desire for justice, a belief in the world.
Later, the few remaining Sideks were forcibly relocated by the Japanese to Kawanaka Island, which is convenient for surveillance, and to this day, they have never returned to their former residence.
The national faith that has been passed down for thousands of years may have been assimilated by civilization, but the strength that faith has brought to this nation is incomparable. The word "faith" is also the most powerful word in this story.
The reason why "Sidekbarle" is so rare is precisely because it does it, it awakens the power of faith. A firm, right, and worth burning power for.
For the Sideks, when people live, they always have to fight for something; and what is important is to fight for what.