PLATFORM (2000) ***

Reviewed 3/9/01

Suffice to say, PLATFORM, at 3¼-hours long, is not a film for everyone, and it is now unlikely to ever be seen that way. At the request of distributors, writer-director Zhangke Jia has edited his film down to 2½ hours, though this obscure Chinese film is unlikely to gather many more viewers than the original version in a commercial release if that was the intention. The 3¼-hour PLATFORM certainly needed some judicious cutting, but not having seen the cut version, I cannot comment on that.

PLATFORM follows a few members of a performance troupe throughout the 1980s while they progress from singing Communist Party propaganda to pop/rock music. The focus falls on the headstrong, rambunctious Cui Minliang (Hong Wei Wang, also star of Zhangke's XIAO WU), the quiet, passive-aggressive Yin Ruijuan (Tao Zhao), the laid back, go-with-the-flow Zhang Jun (Jing Dong Liang), and his spirited girlfriend, Zhong Ping (the show-stealing Tian Yi Yang). PLATFORM is made up of tangentially related vignettes -- various performances by the troupe, the courtship between Cui and Yin, the decay of Cui's parents' marriage, Zhong's need for an abortion, and the many hardships experienced by the troupe as its membership gradually declines. One might say not much really happens, and yet by the end of the film, everything is different.

Despite the above description, PLATFORM is more comedy than drama. Zhangke distills comedy by juxtaposing the characters' intentions with their reality. Throughout, they never realize how half-witted they look as they embrace empty artifice in trying to keep up with the latest fashions. This, however, is key to Zhangke's serious concerns. It is all about change; not just change in the characters, but in the nation of China. As outside cultural and economic forces invade, China's rural pieties transform into shameless commodification (not that the former looks any more foolish than the latter). Hollow messages about the supposed good of society turn into a babble of words without meaning set to a beat ("Gen…Gen…Gen…Genghis Kahn!" are the lyrics to one song). Zhangke seems less ambivalent about the change than frustrated with both the state things are coming from and where they are going.

Zhangke shoots in the "master shot" style, often framing long shots in long takes. The most famous utilizer of this style among contemporary filmmakers is Hou Hsiao-hsien, but Zhangke seems more influenced by the slightly less rigid Tsai Ming-liang and the mildly absurdist tone of his films. Zhangke doesn't have Tsai's assuredness yet though. Too often PLATFORM comes off too deliberately arty in proclaiming its self-importance. For example, in one scene, Cui and Yin engage in conversation while taking turns walking out of sight behind a wall while the other reappears, and it just comes off as too self-conscious. Also shots would linger for no apparent reason and finally end on a seemingly arbitrary cut. Refining those edits alone would shave fifteen minutes from the film. Shaving another thirty for commercial release feels excessive.