Tian Zhuangzhuang’s film The Blue Kite, filmed in 1993, was a highly controversial film. The People’s Republic of China ultimately banned the film from being viewed in China, however sold the rights to a foreign producer in order to make some money off its production. The Blue Kite, although filmed in the early 1990s, covers the period between the Hundred Flowers Movement and the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, early 1950s to late 1960s. This film portrays the actual hardships faced by the people during these three periods of Communist China. As mentioned in Hanna Nielsen’s article on The Blue Kite, the focus of the current generation of film makers in China, labeled the fifth generation, is the troubled relationship between the Communist Party and the people.

Oddly enough, for a government labeled The PEOPLE’S Republic of China, there has been a lot of hardship suffered by the people on the behalf of top officials in the party. The struggles of the various characters in the film shadow the struggles the general population faced because of these different movements. This is seen beginning with the Hundred Flowers part of the movie. Spence describes the Hundred Flowers campaign as a movement permitting the population to openly criticize the faults of the Chinese Communist Party. Despite this open invitation, people were still very hesitant to reply, as seen by Shaolong’s distress at having his name mentioned along with a critique of the Party. In Spence, a professor describes how an “invisible pressure” made the people reluctant to speak. Starting in the Hundred Flower campaign and continuing through the Great Leap Forward, is the concept of the people being forced to do something that they feel is wrong and if they don’t do it they are punished. One example is seen through Zhu Ying (I believe this is her name, the Uncle’s girlfriend) being reprimanded as a counterrevolutionary for not “dancing” with Party officials. By “dancing” the film really meant have sex with the officials. Young woman being placed in this position was a common occurrence during this period of history. Many attacks against woman by officials went unreported because the Party could not be seen as anything less than the guiding force of China to the people. This is a particularly disturbing image when she reappears later in the film, basically broken. She looks aged and tired. Zhu Ying suffered several years in prison for speaking against something that people would condemn as wrong. By looking at these incidents in the film and in real life, it is plan to see that the Party did not always benefit the people.

The Blue Kite takes a radically different view of Maoist China compared to Breaking With Old Ideas. The film Breaking With Old Ideas was a propaganda filmed, targeted at increasing peoples support and view of the Party. Characters are portrayed as heroic for following the Party’s revolutionary principles. Compared to the film The Blue Kite, Breaking With Old Ideas doesn’t realistically look at the struggles of the peasants, but says if you believe in the Party everything will work out. However, in The Blue Kite, characters are portrayed as victimized by poor CCP policies. Rather than the PRC being considered the savior of China, the people almost view it as a change in slave masters. The “bourgeois” Nationalist masters have been replaced with Communist oppression. If the people don’t do what they suppose to, they are labeled as counterrevolutionaries or “Capitalist Roaders.” Instead of paying rent 60 years in advance, farmers and workers are forced into communes, where they starve because of unrealistic production goals. Innocent people are condemned as “rightist” in order fill quotas set down by the Party. All of this ask of the people why they should trust a government that made some many mistakes.