Text/Sun Haifan
Among the political, economic, and military factors that led to the communist victory in the country, the northeast land reform, which began in 1946, undoubtedly occupied an important position. Because of this, the theme of "Northeast Land Reform" has also been filmed into movies by northeast film studios many times, so after the two "land reform films" of "Glorious People" and "Wei Guo BaoJia" have been released from 1949 to 1950, a similar theme of "Liaoyuan Countryside" was released in the same year.
Poster of "The Distant Countryside"
Written by Yuan Wenshu, directed by Wu Yonggang, and starring Zhang Ping, Sophie, Chen Ge, Liang Yin, Ge Cunzhuang, etc., the story of the film is: In 1947, the Northeast People's Liberation Army continued to win military victories, and due to the needs of work, Wang Hanlong and his wife Zhang Juan were sent by the provincial chairman to work in the new area of Taohuachuan, which was remote and complicated. After a long journey, they arrived in Taoshan County, and in the office of the county party secretary, they met Qin Erhu, a militiaman in the East Village of Taohuachuan District, so they went to Taohuachuan with Qin Erhu. On the way, Wang Hanlong learned about the disunity of the villagers in the East Village and the West Village for the construction of the dam.
A dispute arose in the east village and the west village
As soon as he arrived in the district, Wang Hanlong and Liang Chengzhong, the assistant of the district, went to the village and saw that the fields dried up and the grass seedlings withered. They decided to meet the next day to study the solution. Dong Batian, the bully landlord in the village, and his daughter Sun Xiumei and Kuomintang agent Li Jiantou conspired to provoke the stubborn old man to come forward and make trouble, undermining the unity of the two villages in order to deal with Wang Hanlong, the mayor of the new district. Sure enough, the stubborn old man jumped out at the meeting in the East Village to discuss drought resistance and dam repair, and disrupted the venue. Wang Hanlong found the key to the problem and began to study the solution. When the people of Xicun came to repair the dam, the Kuomintang agents took the opportunity to provoke, and as a result, the chairman of Xicun was beaten to the head and bleeding, and Wang Hanlong arrived in time to calm down the storm. Wang Hanlong immediately convened a meeting of cadres and activists and asked everyone to carry out ideological work and promote the work of dam repair. He and his wife Zhang Juan went to their hometown separately to persuade the stubborn old man not to be used and warned Dong Batian to be honest. The dam repair work has finally been carried out smoothly and has achieved results. At night, Dong Batian and the secret agent Li Jiantou prepare to blow up the dam, but the highly vigilant militia makes their plot unsuccessful.
Dong Batian and the agents conspired to burn the grain
In the blink of an eye, autumn is a scene of harvest, and the farmers have harvested their own grain. The stubborn old man, who had changed, reviewed his mistake to Wang Hanlong and told him the secret that Dong Batian and Li Jiantou were going to set fire to the public grain. Wang Hanlong immediately organized a militia to wipe out the saboteurs. A year later, the provincial chairman inspected Taohuachuan, and at the meeting to celebrate the harvest, he praised the conscientious and responsible work spirit of district governor Wang Hanlong and the active labor of the villagers, and encouraged everyone to actively produce, support the front, struggle for the complete defeat of US imperialism and Kuomintang reactionaries, and work hard to build a new China.
The provincial chairman went to Taohua District to celebrate the harvest meeting
Looking at the three "land reform theme" films released in 1950, we can find that the "paradigm" or "routine" of such films has gradually taken shape, and there are the chiefs who arrange and inspect the work until the end of the film, there are the protagonists of the strong will and wisdom of superhuman, there are reactionary agents and bully landlords and other distinct opposites, there are the masses in the middle who do not have a high ideological understanding and some fear of our staff, and most of the later films have not jumped out of this pattern.
Wang Hanlong and Dongba Heavenly Father and Daughter
However, because the director of this film, Wu Yonggang, is an experienced filmmaker, even if the tone of the story and publicity cannot be changed, he is obviously more professional than some previous films in the film's picture shooting, especially the use of the environment to set off the atmosphere and the use of lenses, which is also "The Distant Countryside" has more film sense to some extent.
Wang Hanlong went deep into the field
The screenwriter of this film, Yuan Wenshu, is a native of Xingning, Guangdong, a native of Daping, Xingning County, Guangdong Province, and was a progressive cultural person before liberation. In 1937, Yuan Wenshu was appointed as the deputy captain of the third team of the Shanghai Rescue Drama Team. In 1940, he became the editor of Xinhua Daily. In October of the following year, he went to Yan'an and served as a teacher, class teacher and department head in the Drama Department of Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts and Literature. In 1947, he was appointed as the head of the Mudanjiang "Luyi" cultural and industrial troupe. In 1948, he was appointed as the director of the Education Department of the Northeast Lu Xun Institute of Literature and Art. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, he successively served as the director of the Shanghai Film Studio, the deputy secretary of the party group of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, and the vice chairman of the China Filmmakers Association. His major works include the one-act drama "National Enemy", the film literary script "The Distant Countryside", the essay collection "Film Quest Collection" and "Film Industry Record". Yuan Wenshu died in 1993 at the age of 83.
Yuan Wenshu
Director Wu Yonggang undoubtedly has an important position in the history of Chinese cinema, he joined the Shanghai Lily Film Company as an art trainee in 1925, and then transferred to the Great China Lily Film Company as an artist, and learned to do costumes, props, makeup, field notes and other work. In 1934, he wrote and directed his debut film "Goddess" starring Ruan Lingyu in Lianhua. In 1936, he wrote and directed the national defense film "Top Gun". After the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, he also edited and directed films such as "Rouge Tears", "Leaving Hate Heaven", "Chinese Snow White", "Red Tears of The Iron Window" and so on. From 1946 to 1949, he filmed films such as "YingChun Song" and "Licking Deep Love". After "The Distant Countryside", in 1952, he filmed China's first feature film that enabled ethnic actors and languages, "Hasen and Camilla". After 1962, he directed films such as "Autumn Ong Encounter Immortals", "Jasper Hairpin", "You Sanjie" and so on. In 1980, he became the general director of "Bashan Night Rain". Wu Yonggang died in 1982 at the age of 75.
Wu Yonggang
Chen Ge, who played the provincial chairman in the film, later left a name in Chinese film history for playing the division commander with a Sichuan accent in "Southern Expedition and Northern War" and Wang Baochang in "Catching Zhuangding". However, this red literary and artistic warrior in the Yan'an period, the subsequent situation was not smooth, after 1966, although he starred in the "Southern Expedition and Northern War" became a household name, but he himself was affected and suffered from illness, in 1981, the most characteristic "chief professional household" in the history of Chinese cinema Chen Ge died at the age of 65.
Chen
The film stars Zhang Ping and other actors Liang Yin, Du Defu, Ge Cunzhuang, etc. Introduced earlier in this series, I will not repeat it here, and the next issue introduces the feature film "The Victory of the Inner Mongolian People".