The Poor in China on River Without a Paddle in Documentary ‘Up the Yangtze’

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CHICAGO – China is on the world’s mind. The once-mysterious communist “enemy” is now the economic friend of all the essential profiteers.

There’s a defining joke told in the new documentary “Up the Yangtze” about American and Chinese businessmen going traveling on a river. They come to a fork in the journey with the signs “socialist” and “capitalist” illustrating the next turn.

Chen Bo Yu (Jerry) in Liberty Square in Chongqing City in Up the Yangtze
Chen Bo Yu (Jerry) in Liberty Square in Chongqing City in “Up the Yangtze”.
Photo credit: Linix Fan

The American picks the capitalist right turn and the Chinese businessman wants the same route just make sure the turn signal indicates left to socialist. “Up the Yangtze” is a documentary that expounds upon China in transition.

Through a new dam project in the Three Gorges area of the Yangtze River, parts of former communities will be sacrificed to new, higher river levels. This film explores the poor people on the banks being forced out with no recompense and with nowhere else to go.

In one such family, a 16-year-old daughter is sent out to work on the cruise ships on the Yangtze.

She is to cater to the foreign visitors who must see China even though the China they see is about to be destroyed. What follows is her transition from pariah peasant to a modern girl courtesy of a paycheck and a couple of willing-to-educate peers. Two other levels of the class system developing in China are on view on the boat.

Tourists on sampans in the Lesser Three Gorges on the Yangtze in Up the Yangtze
Tourists on sampans in the Lesser Three Gorges on the Yangtze in “Up the Yangtze”.
Photo credit: Jonathan Chang

A cocky, lower-middle-class player is using the tourist tips as a springboard into China’s emerging business system. Another rants that he can afford more in his life as his parents can cushion his losing employment.

It is the symbolic anticipation of the river rising swamping the old and anticipating the new. While the pacing in this documentary is slow, the information is telling.

China is moving forward and leaving the old behind despite its lip service to the notion of comradeship. The new money being made means nothing in the old China philosophy. What does it mean for China’s ordinary working class?

Another great symbolic aspect of the whole dam and flood circumstance is the out-of-towners who the tourist boat attendants so desperately want to impress.

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They want in their travels to see the old China or at least the China they think they deserve. They are floating on the river in a country on the make, though, and their tourist dollars are ironically contributing to the reason that traditional China is disappearing.

The Yangtze River is an ancient waterway that’s one of those lifeblood streams. It’s much like the Mississippi River in the U.S. The willingness of men and government to control it, dam it up and sacrifice the very humanity on its banks is indicative of the changing and evolving movement of China.

In the name of progress and profit, there are no comrades. There’s only the desired conclusion of dollars enriching the bottom line.

“Up the Yangtze,” which is directed and written by Yung Chang and features Jerry Bo Yu Chen, Campbell Ping He and Cindy Shui Yu, opened in Chicago on June 20, 2008 at the Music Box Theatre.

HollywoodChicago.com staff writer Patrick McDonald

By PATRICK McDONALD
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

© 2008 Patrick McDonald, HollywoodChicago.com

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