Love and Duty
About Love and Duty
In Jiangwan, student Li Tsu Yi pursues schoolgirl Yang Nei Fan and bandages her leg after a car hits her. Her father still marries her to Huang Ta Jen. Years later Tsu Yi pulls her son from a lake, and Nei Fan leaves her husband and children for him. After a servant of the Huang house recognizes Tsu Yi, he loses his job, takes grinding work, and dies of an old illness. Nei Fan raises their daughter Ping Erh by sewing, then kills herself so that Huang will take the girl. The three children stand before her portrait.
Cast & crew
More about Love and Duty
Bu Wancang directed and Zhu Shilin adapted S. Rosen Hoa's novel, published in Chinese in 1924. Lo Ming-yau produced it for United Photoplay Service, the English name of Lianhua, which was not yet registered when shooting began, so China Sun (Minxin), Lai Man-wai's company, shares the credit. Intertitles are in Chinese and English.
Themes
Background
Lianhua made it in Shanghai in 1931, pairing Ruan Lingyu with Jin Yan, two of the city's leading stars.
Making
Lo wanted domestic films that could stand next to imports and travel. Bilingual titles and English-language newspaper ads were part of that plan.
Audiences
It was a commercial success in China on first release, then dropped out of sight until a print turned up in Uruguay.
Technique
Shared scenes of mother and daughter use a split screen so Ruan Lingyu can appear as both at once.
Music
Silent, with Chinese and English intertitles.
Preservation
Treated as lost for decades. In 1993 a print in a transfer from the National Library of Uruguay to Taiwan's National Central Library was rehoused at the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute. L'Immagine Ritrovata in Italy made a 2K restoration in 2013.
Notes
- Ruan Lingyu plays Nei Fan and also Nei Fan's grown daughter, Huang Koon Ying. Jin Yan, Korean-born, plays Li Tsu Yi.
- Rosen-Hoa gave Lo a copy of the novel in 1923. An English edition appeared in 1926, and a French one in 1932 as La Symphonie des Ombres Chinoises.
- The surviving print runs 2 hours, 31 minutes, and 32 seconds.
- After the 1990s recovery it was shown at the Pordenone Silent Film Festival in 1995, at the Shanghai International Film Festival in 2014, and at the Seattle International Film Festival in 2017.
Scenes
- Tsu Yi tears his shirt to bind Nei Fan's leg after the car hits her.
- He pulls her son out of the lake, and the old attachment starts again.
- The three children face her photographic portrait as if it were an ancestral tablet.
Influenced by
- S. Rosen Hoa's novel Love and Duty (1924)
Also available
- UBC Chinese Film Classics Project
