The Local Colour’s Research Of Zhang Yimou’s Film

Chinese director Zhang Yimou’s early films focuses on rural and civilian life. His movies reveal ordinary people’s personal temperament and their living conditions. His works also describe the cultural environment and the natural environment of country life, and we will find in his works a variety of folklore elements and Zhang Yimou’s artistic pursuit of local colour.The local colour of Zhang’s films firstly reflects on his theme. There are two crucial aspects in his country life films:the power of the elders and the blood inheritance. His films present the impact of the elder’s powers on local people’s living conditions in rural society. The attention attached to blood inheritance greatly influences the choice of roles, and their view of gender and marriage has a tendency of utilitarianism. The Failure to realize inheritance usually leads to fertility anxiety, which becomes a great inducement to their action, produces an important effect on the roles’thought and behavior, and finally led to their tragic destinies.Zhang Yimou’s films’local colour is also reflects in the folklore elements of his films. The folklore elements closely linked to the rural life. Folklore elements have national, regional, civil resistance and other local colour features. Folklore elements such as Belief Custom, Entertainments In Folklore, Rituals of Life in folk traditions, often involve local people’s spiritual or good wishes. Folklore elements play a large role to express the emotions of artist and reveal the beauty of humanity and nature.The local colour of Zhang’s films are also reflects in the construction of film image. His films focus on rural life. It reveals and constructed a unique local spatio-temporal character, the image construction on local ideal home and modern transformation, implicates the attitudes and artistic concept of director Zhang.With the commercialized transformation of Zhang Yimou’s creation, its local colour in the films has also undergone great change. Such change is the result of director’s consciously pursuit of entertainment and consumption, and reflects the practicality and utilitarian needs of the development of national film industry, it also indicates the future development of Chinese films.