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The Gate of Heavenly Peace. Directed by CARMA HINTON and RICHARD GORDON. Distributed by NAATA/CrossCurrent Media. San Francisco, Calif: 1996 2 videocassettes (189 minutes); Purchase $325.00; Rental: $85.00.
The Gate of Heavenly Peace gained international renown in 1995 when the authorities in Beijing called the film "insulting" and requested that the New York Film Festival not show it. When the Festival would not comply, director Zhang Yimou was "requested" not to attend the Festival's showing of his film, Shanghai Triad.
In The Gate of Heavenly Peace, directors Carma Hinton and Richard Gordon, with the assistance of top scholars such as Geremie Barme, Gail Hershatter, and Jeffrey Wasserstrom, dramatically recount the history of China's great 1989 democracy movement, asking both why the movement did not succeed and instead ended with the June 4 Beijing massacre, and also asking what might be a better strategy for change than a mass movement confronting the Beijing government and demanding a sudden, large rupture into an uncharted future. These important issues are integral to a fast-paced and captivating piece of film.
Yet there are problems with both questions since (a) there is no evidence in the film that the government ever was prepared to do anything to assuage the movement, which makes the tactics of the movement seem a tertiary matter, and (b) while the movement was prepared at various times to settle for quite small changes, such as the legalization of an autonomous student union, it was the obdurate government that refused to budge even on that one issue. Is it then fair for the film to implicate and almost blame the tactics of the victims for the crime of the Beijing massacre of 1989?
Putting aside the film's story line, the footage is vivid, vital and compelling, a historical tour de force. I have already used it as a classroom assignment, inviting students to draw their own conclusions from the stunning events the film captures with elan. The Gate of Heavenly Peace presents a riveting, action-packed drama. It is tremendously well-informed and most insightful. The film is a winner.
Sadly, it also scapegoats Chai Ling. She is held responsible for the massacre because she would not compromise and leave Tianamnen Square, supposedly preferring instead to force the Beijing...