The Actress (aka Center Stage)

an examination of the “1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die”

promotional image for “Center Stage”, directed by Stanley Kwan

Rearranging the movies on the list alphabetically sometimes creates very unique film combinations that I was not expecting.

Through simple order of the alphabet, I experienced a Japanese film I had never seen before. I had heard of the film — had, in fact, purchased the film on DVD — but I had never taken the time to view it. I praised it in my review as one of “the best Japanese films I have ever seen”.

This week’s film is from China. It is one of the best Chinese films I have ever seen. It is also one of the most creative bio-pics I have ever seen. Incidentally, it is also one of the most perfectly-crafted performances from Maggie Chueng. I am very familiar with her work due to her frequent collaborations with Wong Kar-Wai. I have not reviewed a film by Kar-Wai yet, but I assure readers that I will be gushing when I do.

I had a struggle finding this movie because it is listed in the original list as The Actress. When I discovered that it had been retitled Center Stage for American audiences, I kept getting thwarted in the quest to retrieve a screener by another film called Center Stage. That film, a 2000 drama about aspiring ballet dancers at an elite New York academy, was the only film I could manage to obtain via streaming or my local library. I was eventually able to score a copy of the Center Stage I needed to see through interlibrary loan. Securing the physical media presented its own confusions as to whether or not I had the right movie, however, because the write-up in the 1001 Movies book mentions that the movie had been trimmed down from the original running time of 167 minutes to 126 minutes. The copy I secured from a library in Elgin, Illinois was 154 minutes. I do not know how many edits of this particular movie exist, but clearly at least three are floating around. Everything in the preceding paragraph has been relayed to you in an attempt to offer explanation as to why it has been some time since I’ve posted an entry.

Let’s proceed . . . Bio-pics. There have definitely been some good ones. There have been many biographical performances over the years that I put on a very high pedestal: Robert Downey, Jr. as Charles Chaplin, Jim Carrey as Andy Kaufman, Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon as Johnny and June Carter Cash. I have always been very fond of both American Splendor and I’m Not There as prime examples of what really creative people can do with the lives of others. Center Stage pushes the boundaries even further by doing something that I have never seen done in a bio-pic before. This film breaks the fourth wall and allows us to see the actors become the real people they portray.

The narrative is focused on a silent film actress named Ruan Lingyu. I had not, until seeing this movie, heard of her. Of Chinese descent, Ruan Lingyu was well-known for emotive performances, so much so that she was known at the time as the “Greta Garbo of China.” Despite her mesmerizing star power, her personal life was also under intense scrutiny by the tabloids of the time. She chose controversial roles, got embroiled in a long legal battle with her cuckolded husband, dealt with the pressure with opium, and then, ultimately committed suicide in 1935 at the age of 25. This bio-pic does an admirable job of demonstrating her unique acting methods while also depicting her as a human being with real issues. Far from the tabloid fodder that eventually killed her, she is depicted here as a conscientious and compassionate artist.

This depiction rests solely in the hands of Maggie Cheung. Known up to this point for comic roles in fluffy entertainment, her appearance in this film not only earned her major acting awards, but it also paved the way for meatier roles in more artistic films. Maggie physically becomes Ruan Lingyu as this film progresses. That aspect of this film is masterminded by Stanley Kwan, who devotes segments of the movie to interviewing Maggie (as well as other performers) about her impressions of the woman she is being asked to embody. We see her preparing for sequences. We watch as she exits a sound stage intended for practice and enters recreations of Lingyu’s most important roles. These recreations — it should be noted —are also interwoven with the real footage of the actual films. It becomes impossible by the end to tell them apart. It’s a very meta- approach to a biographical film. I’ve never seen anything like it.

Maggie Cheung as Ruan Lingyu in “The Actress”

The Actress aka Center Stage (1992) directed by Stanley Kwan written by Chiu Tai An-Ping starring Maggie Cheung, Han Chin, Carina Lau, Shin Hong, Tony Leung, and Lawrence Ng not rated, 154 minutes