Cinematic Settlers by Janne Lahti Rebecca Weaver-Hightower

Cinematic Settlers by Janne Lahti Rebecca Weaver-Hightower

Author:Janne Lahti, Rebecca Weaver-Hightower [Janne Lahti, Rebecca Weaver-Hightower]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781000094459
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 2020-07-26T00:00:00+00:00


“Descendants of the Dragon”: The Land of the Brave

In mid-December, 1978, President Jimmy Carter’s announcement of America’s recognition of the PRC as the sole legal government of China and the annulment of diplomatic relations with the ROC not only challenged the Nationalist government’s political legitimacy but also provoked social upheaval in Taiwan. Taiwanese musician Hou Dejian composed a song, “Descendants of the Dragon,” to express his personal grievance and galvanize a collective consciousness of patriotism and nationalism among the Taiwanese. The mythological imagery of the dragon is a symbol of imperial power and a cultural totem for the Han Chinese people. This song soon became extremely famous during the “campus folk song movement,” a grassroots music movement that emerged from Taiwan’s colleges during the late 1970s and became rapidly popular in the 1980s. In 1981, Taiwanese director Lee Hsing completed a film, The Land of the Brave, in which he appropriated Hou’s song as the original title and the theme song. With a star-studded lineup, including Chin Han, Joan Lin (Lin Feng-jiao), Kenny Bee (Chung Chun-to), and Sihung Lung (Lang Hsiung), Hsing attracted the audience and aroused Han settlers’ patriotic sentiment and national identity in the face of Taiwan’s international setbacks.

If Home Sweet Home articulates its settler colonial narrative in part through its satirical critique of the Taiwanese people’s American dream, then The Land of the Brave expresses a more explicit collective resentment against the US from its opening. The film begins with a pseudo-newsreel sequence of President Carter’s diplomatic recognition of the PRC and the Taiwanese people’s reaction to this shocking news. This sequence effectively sets the tone for the film by foregrounding the Taiwanese people’s vexation, anxiety, and indignation, together with the protests against the US government, synchronized with the stirring melody of “Descendants of the Dragon” performed by a symphony orchestra. The story revolves around two families’ (Fan and Zhang) members and other related characters. Fan Jintao (Kenny Bee), a young college student majoring in music, relinquishes his dream to study abroad in Italy after the termination of Taiwan-US diplomatic relations, and organizes a choral group with other cohorts. The group then embarks on a tour of Taiwan’s countryside to perform “campus folk songs.” Lin Chaoxing (Chin Han), a US-trained doctor specializing in agronomy, returns to Taiwan, where he works at a governmental agricultural research institute and serves as an adjunct professor at a university. He becomes acquainted with the department’s teaching assistant, Jintao’s older sister Fan Jinwen (Joan Lin), and falls in love with her. The narrative threads then focus on the romances between the main characters, the generational conflicts among the family members, and the ways these conflicts are resolved through a transcendent, collective level of settler national reconstruction. The film ends with a scene of the numerous attendees of a flag-raising ceremony—all of the main characters participate, standing in front of the Presidential Office Building on National Day in 1981 in celebration of the ROC’s seventieth anniversary, and waving the national flags, accompanied by the song “Descendants of the Dragon” in chorus.



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