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SHADOW MAGIC Send This Review to a Friend
In this age when fancy special effects on screen are taken for granted it is hard to imagine the shock people had when they first experienced pictures that move. France and the United States are generally the focal points for exploring early film history. Now comes an exquisite, totally charming new film that dramatizes the first efforts to bring motion pictures to China in 1902. The applicable title "Shadow Magic" also describes the magical spell cast by this extraordinary work. Directed by Ann Hu, who grew up during the upheaval of China's Cultural Revolution and has since studied and worked in the United States, "Shadow Magic" was filmed in Beijing and the result is a magnificent ode to those stalwarts who pioneered cinema in what was then known as Peking.
The story, which Hu co-wrote with four others, is built upon the arrival of Raymond Wallace, a westerner, played with verve and determination by Jared Harris, who has been down on his luck and believes he can make money by introducing still-primitive movies to the people of Peking. He meets Liu Jinglun, a still photographer at a portrait studio, who has a passion for exploring the latest western products. Liu, portrayed with openness and the spark of a dreamer by Xai Yu, catches on quickly and the encounter leads to a partnership. The character of Liu is based on real-life motion picture pioneer Liu Zhong Lun, but Wallace is a fictional composite.
Hu dramatizes the clash of cultures that ensues, and the film is rich in atmosphere that captures the era and etches entertaining portraits of the local citizenry. Nancy Schreiber, the director of photography, has succeeded in giving us a film consistently beautiful to behold, and we come close to feeling that we have been transported into that period. Li Yusheng is fascinating to watch as Lord Tan, the revered performer whose traditional art is far removed from the new art form. The skepticism with which movies are greeted provides for humor as well as drama, as when people are startled by seeing a train coming straight at them and when they later are able to watch movies taken of themselves.
The film is made without condescension, and seeing the subject explored in China provides special interest since this is a territory virtually unexplored, at least in the west. Woven into the story is a romantic interest, the love Liu has for Lord Tan's beautiful daughter and the pressure by Liu's father to arrange an economically advantageous marriage between him and a less than appealing rich widow.
"Shadow Magic" is ideal for film buffs, but it also holds a broad appeal for virtually any audience anywhere, since the historical and cultural situation is blended so invitingly with the personal stories, as well as with the overall look and warmth of the film. It is also worth noting that Hu's film is the first official co-production of the People's Republic of China and Taiwan, with Hu and Sandra Schulberg as co-producers at the American end. A Sony Pictures Classics release.
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