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Lam Nguyen Tai

" The Lover"

INTERCULTURE IN THE FILM "THE LOVER"

Tai Lam VVOB, Brussels- Belgium 1998 I. INTRODUCTION: There have been a lot of changes during the past 2 centuries. Now we are living in the present world that can be considered as a far more advanced and marvelous one than ever in science and technology. We can see advanced technology at work, at home, in the city and even in the country. There's no doubt that modern technology & science have brought us many useful things such as improved conditions etc. They have also brought us disadvantages that include not only environmental problems that do a lot of harms to every species of beings in the living world, but also the cultural ignorance. Nowadays we are living in a multicutural society and community where nows the time every people in the world has a desire and tendency to turn back to the past to learn or get to know more about their own original culture. That, more or less, help make intercutural communications more easy and effective. Of all the modern media today, movie is one of the most effective ways to lead and introduce us the other people's cultures. In general, movie has played a very important role to the intercultural understanding. After watching the movie adaptation of "The Lover", which has been the most popular western novel set in the Mekong Delta, directed by Gerard Brach with the actors Jane March and Tony Leung. I would like to introduce and present briefly how I found the culture aspects were presented in the film and which intercultural elements played a part in it.

II. FILM SUMMARY:

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Lam Nguyen Tai

" The Lover"

That's the film about the love of the rich Chinese man, 32 years of age, who lived in Vinh Long and a French girl-student, who lived with her mother and the two brothers in a humble house in Sadec, a country town from the south to Saigon. The story was set during the period when Vietnam was still a French colony, that was supposed to be before the end of W.W.II. Everything happened from the very start of crossing the ferry boat when the French girl, from a bankrupt family, was going on the bus to Saigon for her schooldays. That year she was at 11th grade and 17 years old. Right on this very ferry, she met the Chinese man. The man offered to give her a lift to Saigon on his private car if she wished instead of crowding on the old, noisy and uncomfortable bus. That was also the first starting point of their love. In order to introduce the theme of the culture aspects, I'm going to present briefly about the core of the love story. Since then, the Chinese man often waited for Helen in front of the school-gate and frequented with her, then, took her to his dwelling house, which used to be his father's. As he told her, any rich Chinese men usually had kept-mistresses, and they had to have a dwelling room to keep their mistresses secretly. The Chinese phrase best expresses this, it's called The Mistress-Keeping-Golden-Room. Here is the place the men can frequent with their mistress. The couple live in De-facto relationship Right in this moment and this place, they made their first "love". All happened mostly by the girl's initiative. The girl was the first time to have her virgin sex experience. After that day, they met quite often at that room. And of course the Chinese man helped her family to overcome the difficulty of life, helped them pay all the debts and finally pay for all the family the return travel expenses to Paris, France However, they could not come to marriage due to the different viewpoints and more important, the cultures. Finally, under the command of his traditional

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Lam Nguyen Tai

" The Lover"

family, the Chinese man married another woman whom he had never met before. And the French girl accompanied with her mother and brother to France. She lived on writing novels. The film was set in the form of narrative and the writer was sometimes the first person narrator, and sometimes the omniscient third narrator, who led and told the girl's story. The end of the story was set in France, where she lived and one day she received the Chinese man's call also from France, saying that he still loved her as ever until the day he died. What happened then. No one knows.

III. INTERCULTURAL ELEMENTS PLAYED IN THE FILM: The settings of the movie was in triangle cultures between Vietnam, China and France. Each has its own characteristics and images. As the background of the story was set in Vietnam, we can see from the film the images of Vietnam through people's dressings rather poor at that time. We can see comical straw hats, pieces of cloth winding around women's heads, people putting loads on the heads etc. The traffic buses were poorly in use, crowded, noisy, and a lot of loads were put on the top of the buses. That scene now is still often seen. We can also see the shapes of the houses built in their own wayorient and Chinese-like. The story was set in one area of Saigon called Cholon, meant Big Market. Chinese people called it The Dike - a long wall of earth to keep back water and prevent flooding, Cholon is somehow like China Town everywhere in the world, where Chinese community gather to live together. On the streets of Cholon, we can see, variety of things were displayed and sold along the roads and even on the roadways. There, as the film told us, we can perceive the smell of hot soup, roasted meat, jasmine, dust and gas. The roads were noisy, crowded with people and, of course, were much polluted.

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Lam Nguyen Tai

" The Lover"

One of the French culture elements played in the film was the scene in the restaurant. The girl's eldest brother behaved rather rude to the Chinese man due to the discrimination. The scene of his dancing with a girl was also offensive, that caused his mother to be very upset and ask for an excuse. As one of the main characters of the film was a Chinese, many Chinese traditional customs and beliefs can be observed in the film. First of all, the structures of a big Chinese house, somehow a little bit similar to a Vietnamese one. In the middle, there is an altar, where gifts and sacrifices are offered to their ancestors. One element we can see from the movie is when the Chinese man came back from Saigon to ask his father's permission to get married with a White girl. He had to burn incense or joss stick to show his warship to the ancestor before the altar. Secondly, as the Chinese traditional customs introduce, the sons have to kneel down while talking with the parents to show their respect. This belief is even shown in writing letters to the parents. The child kneels down while the parent is reading the letter until he (she) finishes. But now this regulation has been much simplified. The third element is the dressings of the Chinese servants, rather different from the Vietnamese. The shirt or dress buttons were made of clothballs. The fourth is the bad habit of the rich Chinese opium smoking, lying in the bed with the help of the servants. We can see the scene of the Father Chinese man lying smoking. The last but the core of the story is the scene when the Chinese man taking his girl to his father's mistress' room. He felt a little bit uncontrolled in this atmosphere when he and she were together in such a room. And he said he was afraid he couldn't be self-controlled, for he loved her. He suggested going out, but she refused and asked him to do what he used to do to other women.

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Lam Nguyen Tai

" The Lover"

The problem is that fact that he loved her and he didn't want to have body contact with her before marriage if they could come to. But she pretended to hide her love by saying she didn't love him. Finally she made him fall down in the valley of love. The major matter is that, after the virgin body-contact (sex-intercourse), the French girl said she was told that it was hard for a non-virgin girl to get marriage in the colony. And the Chinese man said his tradition and family regulation did NOT allow him to get marriage with such a girl. That obviously showed that he could only marry a virginal woman. Virgin in China since centuries ago has been considered as the most precious to women. Now even if there has been great changes in the society, many young people nowadays have been modernized and westernized, nearly most of them now ever have sex experience before marriage, many Chinese conservative families still keep virgin as a strong belief in their minds. Consequently, the Chinese man married another woman. The wedding ceremony was also very cultural. We can see an old and expert man pressing his fingers to calculate the best hour, the lucky hour or it's called the zodiac to receive the bride and take her to enter the house. Chinese people call this hour is the most golden hour for the unicorn to arrive. ( an unicorn is like a dragon in Chinese legend).

IV. CONCLUSION: To sum up, this is the film of multicultural settings. The ending of the story is somehow critical due to the maladaptive environment, mutual misesteem and lack of intercultural understanding. My presentation is certainly only my own point of view. Whether they are suitable or representative or not is completely according to the audience of

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Lam Nguyen Tai

" The Lover"

different concepts. The film was watched all in a hurry and not very well understood, so many errors and mistakes must be numerous. Your corrections and comments will be highly appreciated.

Lam Nguyen Tai VVOB, Brussels- Belgium 1998