''Diao Chan'' is a 1938 Chinese sound film directed by

Bu Wancang Bu Wancang (July 1, 1900 – December 30, 1973), also known by his English name Richard Poh, was a prolific Chinese film director and screenwriter active between the 1920s and the 1960s. He was born in Anhui. Career Originally a member of the S ...

and produced by Zhang Shankun's

Xinhua Film Company The Xinhua or New China Film Company (), was one of the film studios to capitalize on the popularity of the leftist film movement in 1930s Shanghai, that had begun with the Mingxing and Lianhua studios. It is not related to the modern-day Xinhua N ...

. The film is a portrayal of one of the "

Four Beauties The Four Beauties or Four Great Beauties are four Chinese women who were renowned for their beauty. The four are usually identified as Xi Shi, Wang Zhaojun, Diaochan, and Yang Guifei. The scarcity of historical records concerning them meant t ...

" of ancient China, in this case the titular Diaochan, from the late Eastern

Han Dynasty The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warr ...

era. Like Diaochan, the film is also known by the literal translation of her name, the ''Sable Cicada''. The film, a lavish historical costume drama, represented something of a revival of Chinese filmmaking in

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

following the occupation of the city by Japanese forces. Under the aegis of the

, ''Diao Chans success allowed for significant output of wartime films from Chinese studios during the "Solitary Island" period of the late 1930s and early 1940s.

Cast

* Gu Lanjun as Diaochan * Jin Shan as

Lü Bu Lü Bu () (died 7 February 199), courtesy name Fengxian, was a Chinese military general, politician, and warlord who lived during the late Eastern Han dynasty of Imperial China. Originally a subordinate of a minor warlord Ding Yuan, he betr ...

* Gu Eryi as

Dong Zhuo Dong Zhuo () (died 22 May 192), courtesy name Zhongying, was a Chinese military general, politician, and warlord who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty. At the end of the reign of the Eastern Han, Dong Zhuo was a general and powerful minist ...

* Wei Heling as Wang Yun * Tang Jie as Li Jue

Production history

Production of ''Diao Chan'', a historical epic based on the life of one of the legendary

of China, began in January 1937 under director

for the

.Fu, p. 6 Originally the film was to be part of an ambitious plan to release a film based on each beauty: Diao Chan,

Xi Shi Xi Shi (Hsi Shih; , ) was, according to legends, one of the renowned Four Beauties of ancient China. She was said to have lived during the end of the Spring and Autumn period in Zhuji, the capital of the ancient State of Yue. In traditional ...

Wang Zhaojun Wang Qiang (Wang Ch'iang; 王牆, also 王檣 and 王嬙), commonly known by her courtesy name Wang Zhaojun () was known as one of the Four Beauties of ancient China. Born in Baoping Village, Zigui County (in current Hubei Province) in the Western ...

, and

Yang Guifei Yang Yuhuan (; 26 June, 719 – 15 July 756Volume 218 of ''Zizhi Tongjian'' recorded that Yang was killed on the ''bingshen'' day of the 6th month of the 1st year of the Zhide era of Tang Suzong's reign. This date corresponds to 15 Jul 756 on t ...

, though only ''Diao Chan'' was ever made. With 90% of shooting complete, however, the production was shut down with the outbreak of the

Second Sino-Japanese War The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) or War of Resistance (Chinese term) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. The war made up the Chinese theater of the wider Pacific Th ...

. As a result of Japanese

bombing of Shanghai The Battle of Shanghai () was the first of the twenty-two major engagements fought between the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Republic of China (ROC) and the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) of the Empire of Japan at the beginning of the ...

, nearly all the film sets were destroyed, and most of the cast fled to the country's interior. With the reopening of the

in late 1937, the company found itself in the center of Shanghai's "Solitary Island." The company's head, Zhang Shankun announced that despite the fact the film was incomplete (and Shanghai's film infrastructure in shambles), the release of ''Diao Chan'' would relaunch Shanghai's "Hollywood of the East." Zhang therefore moved production to Hong Kong, renting the Nanyue Studio in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

) a far more expensive undertaking than filming in Shanghai), and flying most of the cast to Hong Kong from the interior, not to mention transporting equipment from Shanghai. Using the Hong Kong studio (and Hong Kong extras), the production was completed in April 1938.Fu, p. 7

Reception

Zhang invested heavily in the film's publicity in both Shanghai and Hong Kong, declaring the film as China's first big-budget historical epic. Zhang's gamble in the expensive production and publicity would soon pay off, as ''Diao Chan'' became a commercial success in both Shanghai and Hong Kong, and was even screened in Shanghai's Grand Theater, which had heretofore been reserved for first-run American-made features. Zhang then distributed the film to the United States, where it played mainly in the Chinatowns of

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

and

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

. More importantly, the film renewed the fortunes of Zhang Shankun's Xinhua Film Company, which was able to sign on important talent in Shanghai.Fu, pp. 8-10 The success of the film also led to the production of one of the most important and most successful films of the Solitary Island period, Bu Wancang's '' Mulan Joins the Army''.

Notes

References

External links