"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and Burke’s Dramatistic Pentad
Introduction:
The blockbuster mandarin movie “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” directed by Ang Lee was a mega-hit in the U.S. , grossing $128 million in a country not known for welcoming foreign language films, and became the darling of critics and moviegoers alike. It was nominated for many awards around the world, including the Category of Best Pictures at the Academy Awards, where it won four slots, including the one for the best Foreign Language Film.
But this film was not such a favorite in its homeland, China, where the very characteristics that endeared it to western audiences proved to be its shortcoming. The usual run of the Kung-fu films emphasize action and usually have flimsy plots, and an almost non-existent portrayal of deep human emotions, but Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is a beautiful, luscious, almost poetic adaptation from a wuxia novel by mainland Chinese writer Wang Du-lu.
This essay shall discuss the communication elements undertaken in the movie that made it a symbolic rhetoric that helped the western audience understand what went on in the movie’s plot, and why these things happened, in Kenneth Burke’s line of opinion.
Discussion:
To understand its appeal for the Western audiences, we define and analyze the movie in terms of Kenneth Burke's precepts of dramatism and the five terms that he believed is capable of defining all human action: “If action, then drama; if drama, then conflict; if conflict, then victimage.” This is also popularly known as the “dramatistic pentad.”
Kenneth Burke’s Dramatism:
We shall use five terms as generating principle of our investigation. They are: Act, Scene, Agent, Agency, and Purpose. In a rounded statement about motives, one must have some word that names the act (names what took place, in thought or deed), and another that names the scene (the background of the act, the situation in which it occurred); also, one must indicate what person or kind of person (agent) performed the act, what means or instruments he used (agency), and the purpose.... any complete statement about motives will offer some kind of answers to these five questions: what was done (act), when or where it was done (scene), who did it (agent), how he did it (agency), and why (purpose) (Burke, 1945), so much like the what, who, when, where, why and how in news reporting.
How does this Orient production bring in a Western sensibility?
In understanding the Burkeian school of thought, to mention a group would mean a “community” that has arrived into an identification after a process of learning and de-learning. In this instance where “Western sensibility” is found in an “Orient production” would only mean that the average western viewer or audience find in the movie values, lessons, identification of beliefs and actions that are culled within its identity. The only thing then that makes the movie or the act itself apart from the recipient of message is the actor.
With a power cast alone, lure of western ingrained culture among these eastern talents induces the drama of integrating east and west in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. But the movie is actually made by a team (the Agent) that is neither totally Eastern nor totally Western but truly global in its perspective by bringing together eastern characters or talents with western education or skills. And to say once again “global” would mean “western” as there exists a popular belief that colonists are global, and westerners are the “colonists.”
Each of the team members who formed the Agent, thus brought to the movie a sensibility not totally rooted in mainland China, and thus the Agent had a lot of impact on the Act of making the movie, and on the Purpose to which it was made. The movie became more stylized, choreographed by Yuen Wo Ping, who had previously created the jaw-dropping sequences for The Matrix. The fight sequences are steeped with an inherent lyricism, and a fluid postmodern grace which gives the motions of Kung fu a free dynamism that defies gravity, a sample of their qinggong (the skill of weightlessness). These are far removed from the “realistic” traditions of Hong Kong action flicks, and look more like fierce ballet than battle. The Agency in the form of Lee also makes sure that the action sequences are not bereft of facial expressions, because these actually take the story forward.
The Purpose
But the most important part that differentiates the movie from others of the Kung fu genre is of course the Purpose that Burke has talked about. The Purpose is to create a world of fantasy, a time and place where passions, morals and destinies can come together in one grand adventure. Lee succeeds in making the film a glorious cinematic experience long absent from the contemporary Hollywood screens thus fascinated western audience, it failed, as earlier mentioned to capture eastern acceptance. Thus the Purpose had a big hand in how the Act turned out visually; it has the appeal and fascination that the West has always had for the Orient. Drama in this instance is how it was portrayed or presented.
But the difference is not just visual, it is visceral, profound infusing a contemporary slant to the wuxia, removing it from its male-dominated characteristics and imbuing the females with the most importance. Here, the conflict, which is the purpose, enters as Burke would propose. Female role, already emphasized in the Disney animation hit “Mulan” stands out as “she” takes centerstage: “......that a hero's concerns are necessarily central on account of his being male…” The decisive reversal of this tradition made Lee’s movie appeal to western audience so used to seeing male doing kung fu and leading roles in Asian movies. In Wang's novel, the dragon and tiger of the title stand for the pair of young lovers, Yu Jen-long and Lo Xiao-hu (shortened to "Lo" and played by Chang Chen). In the film, however, Lo's role is so cut down in size that Jen alone is made to carry the cultural meanings of these mythical beasts--a transition that is potentially subversive given that Chinese women are traditionally likened to lilies and peonies (Leung, 2001).
While western audiences might find Jen convincing though flawed and admire her “gumption,” Asian audiences might see her as disrespectful and dislike her presumptuousness. Western audiences might consider it is an act of rebellion and liberation, while some Asian audiences might perceive it as a miscalculated and failed learning.( Kim, 2001)
The movie reaches beyond "positive female role models" to explore how they adapt in a world that does not overtly oppress them, but is nonetheless full of glass ceilings, sexual prejudices, and predefined images of masculinity and femininity (Levie, 2001). Nevertheless, these terms would mean something to a community or a group of people that identifies themselves with that theory or value, and may be perceived odd to another group.
Conclusion:
Given the above discussion basing the drama and impact of Crouching Tiger to its western audience, it can be concluded that the western audience, in their psyche, have been attuned to seeing movies that exemplify if not “glorify” that which is generally or what they themselves may perceive as “western.” The emergence of women liberation for instance, as signified in the lead female character’s travails. If only through a movie, done by Asians themselves portraying “values” or western ideals and in a “kung fu” movie at that, such as the Crouching Tiger, this has been achieved, then, let the audience appreciate as much as they want.
In fact, in another point of view, say “un-western” or not even oriental, the movie consciously and subconsciously, could have been actually made for “western” audience considering the education and culture the actors had, which are basically western. In this instance, the movie is, as Burke would say, a replication of real life, for, theater, or movie and real life are quite indistinguishable from the other.Works Cited
Burke, K. (1945) A Grammar of Motives. Publisher:New York: Prentice-Hall, xv.
Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (Asia Union Film & Entertainment, China Film, Columbia Pictures Film Production Asia, EDKO Film, Good Machine, Sony Pictures Classics, United China Visions, Zoom Hunt International Productions, Taiwan/Hong Kong/USA, China: 2000) directed by Ang Lee.
Kim, L.S, (2006)Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Making women warriors — a transnational reading of Asian female action heroes. Jump Cut, A Review of Contemporary Media, Volume. 48, winter , Retrieved
October 06, 2006 from Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Communication Essay
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