More Lake Gangjin.

Water Gate Bridge.

Though the official credits remain the same as those of  last year’s Zhang jin hu  / The Battle at Lake Changjin, the all time most expensive, most lucrative Chinese film ever, the current release Battle at Lake Chanjing II  : Water Gate Bridge  is alleged to be the footage left over from part one, largely shot by Tsui Hark, whose 2014 3D Zhi qu wei hu sha /Taking Tiger Mountain this one resembles. It offers the Chinese People's Volunteer Army's 7th Company arriving at the Water Gate Bridge in the Funchilin Pass with instructions to frustrate the retreat (“advance in another direction”) of the American 1st Marine Division - adding to the humiliation of the allied forces fresh from their triumphs in the WW2 Pacific. We are still waiting for the Poles, Turks and (pause) Australians to show up.

The action focuses on the fighting round a spectacular set of  mountain side six foot diameter pipes and their pumping station, glimpsed in the earlier film and featured in the promotion for this one.

Questions around the new film pretty much obliterate the one about whether Water Gate Bridge  is worth your fifteen bucks and two and a half hours of your time.  In the current charged atmosphere it looks like a warning shot, though this is largely repudiated by the fact that they have been working on it for five years. I still watch uneasily, considering the way these military spectaculars have come to dominate the current Chinese films we are being offered and their enormous attendance figures on their home turf.

As an example of the state of Chinese movie making art it is generally imposing with odd lapses - obvious model planes or the show piece truck crashing down the mountainside  interrupting impressive battle action material - the drone shots moving through arrested motion action with bullet tracks arching round them, characters crashing through levels of buildings, napalm victims running encircled by globes of flame. Hard not to worry about turning agonising death into a handsome piece of kinetic sculpture.

One top of this there’s the question of credibility. The imposing combat footage is again spaced by historical context material. We’ve lost that pensive Chairman Mao but James Filbird’s General Douglas MacArthur is back, looking ridiculous puffing on his corncob pipe at a formal reception. He’s clearly the villain, urging the use of the A Bomb to Ben Z Orenstein’s not very lookalike Harry Truman who is seen pondering next to his Napoleon portrait, like heavies in U.S movies - think Ricardo Cortez in Bad Company or Lionel Barrymore in It's a Wonderful Life. While the American troops are generally shown with some plausibility, they have to have a psychopath G.I. lurking in the shadows with a sharp screw driver to take out the upright Chinese soldiers.

   Jing Wu in action.

We pick up our guys - er - their guys (it’s an effort to remember who you are supposed to be rooting for) in the middle of the advance on the Chosin Resevoir, determined to impede the U.S. withdrawal despite their air supremacy and the support of the U.S. Carrier Strike Force. The Seventh have already taken away American artillery pieces only to have them bombed intro scrap metal. The response is to hand over the souvenir side arm and tell their commander to immediately go and capture some more from the invaders. Despite chipping their teeth on frozen beans and having their radio batteries ice up, the Chinese forces are inspired when the cloud clears to reveal the snow capped mountains “That’s our motherland” - more convincing in the last film and that was a special effect.

The action peaks on getting into the empty pipes by cutting a hole and shooting the pumphouse with a rocket along the cavity. Ha! The yanks didn’t expect that one! More spectacular action including placing explosive satchels under the enemy armor. Against orders, John F. Cruz’ General Smith pulls out. The blazing fires of the battle dissolve into chill morning ashes. This has not been without cost. Only nine party members survive. No one takes prisoners in this picture. We’ve had a flashback to Jing Wu’s home life to get the only woman into the movie and we end on a down beat note, repeating the opening of part one.

There is no doubt that the action staging can hold it’s own with Hollywood efforts like Saving Privare Ryan which is almost certainly an influence but the unrelenting assaults are numbing, dissipating a good part of the effect, and there is the old problem - one muddy guy in a uniform looks pretty much like another one, meaning it’s hard to differentiate characters and give the audience a chance to relate to them.

In many ways this is more accomplished than Part One but it’s impact is less because
we have already seen some of the makers’ tricks and because it pretty much abandons
the attempt to flesh out the would-be sympathetic characters.

 

I’d suggest diving on this one immediately, as it may move out of our grasp forever.
On the other hand it may become a permanent feature of our interface with Asia as
people draw positive and negative inferences.

Barrie Pattison 2022