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Singing Behind Screens
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Ermanno Olmi (The Tree of Wooden Clogs, 1978) lived to the ripe age of 86 in 2018, thus becoming one of the Grand Old Men of European cinema alongside Marco Bellocchio, Jerzy Skolimowski, Víctor Erice … The last decade of his working life was extraordinarily productive and creative – four features plus a segment in the anthology film Tickets (2005). His final film, the confronting war drama Greenery Will Bloom Again, appeared in 2014. A Chinese-Italian co-production, Singing Behind Screens is a beguiling fable about politics, war and empire. Beautifully staged and edited, it moves back and forth between a theatrical production (featuring a wonderful Bud Spencer as narrator and master of ceremonies) and a historical recreation. Both versions relate the story of Vedova Ching (Jun Ichikawa), an Admiral’s widow who boldly takes on the role of pirate leader. Olmi’s vision of social processes is big enough to encompass both the dirty dealings of government, and the possibility of peaceful co-existence and reform. With its plaintively poetic imagery and shameless appeals to old-style eroticism (an Italian visitor to the Chinese theatre “receives” the tale in a dreamy swirl of sex, naked women and opium), Singing Behind Screens will present barriers to some viewers’ engagement. But it rewards those who can give in to its charms. © Adrian Martin October 2005 / December 2019 |
