Gong Li makes it difficult to dismiss a woman simply because she complicates someone else's story. We value the plainness of her acting: in Farewell My Concubine, Juxian's demands feel reasonable even when they cause pain.
Fi1m perspective
In Farewell My Concubine (1993), Gong Li gives Juxian's wishes as much weight as the bond between the two Peking Opera performers. She could have been there simply to get in the men's way. Instead, Gong makes us consider what Juxian wants before we decide whom to side with. We were moved by her insistence on being taken seriously, because Gong makes her wishes seem no less reasonable than the men's.
The long collaboration with director Zhang Yimou began with Red Sorghum (1988). The early parts include a concubine in Raise the Red Lantern (1991) and a peasant seeking justice in The Story of Qiu Ju (1992). These are women with different social positions, but each has to press for what she needs. Gong's direct gaze and unadorned acting suit characters whose choices are restricted and who have good reason to resist.
Chen Kaige puts that steadiness to useful work in Farewell My Concubine. Leslie Cheung makes Cheng Dieyi's attachment to Zhang Fengyi's Duan Xiaolou feel necessary, and Gong prevents their unhappiness from becoming an excuse to ignore Juxian's. The screenplay by Lu Wei and Lilian Lee Bik-Wah is strongest when all three have comprehensible reasons for making one another unhappy. The plotting sometimes pushes too hard, but Gong keeps Juxian understandable without making her conveniently accommodating. She gives Chen a supporting character whose needs deserve attention even when the men's relationship threatens to occupy all our sympathy.
The move towards Hollywood in the mid-2000s brought Memoirs of a Geisha (2005), followed by Miami Vice (2006) and Hannibal Rising (2007). Not all of that commercial work offers material as substantial as the earlier collaborations. Reunions with Zhang in Curse of the Golden Flower (2006) and Coming Home (2014) continued the partnership that had established her. There is plenty to explore, but the familiar description of Gong as a performer of strong women should not decide what we look for. Start with Farewell My Concubine, and resist treating Juxian as an interruption.
Biography
Gong Li is a Chinese actress. She graduated from the Central Academy of Drama in Beijing in 1989. She made her film debut in Zhang Yimou’s Red Sorghum (1988) and collaborated with the director on several films, including Raise the Red Lantern (1991), in which she played Songlian.
She is also known for her role as Juxian in Chen Kaige’s Farewell My Concubine (1993). Gong Li has appeared in international productions such as Memoirs of a Geisha (2005) and Mulan (2020). She became a Singaporean citizen in 2008.
