The Road Home

Zhang Yimou’s The Road Home (1999) is a fascinating work of memory and reflection, yet it is a film that sustains itself largely through its simplicity. Initially leaving behind most of the subterfuge and political critique of his earlier works, here Zhang crafts a story of love between the young beauty in the mountains and the schoolteacher from the city assigned to educate the village. Within this traditional flashback narrative, though, there still lies an undercurrent of critique, as the old ways are valorized and the freedom to come back home to marry is celebrated amidst the enforcement of Communistic ideals and the threat of jail. This ability to work at both levels of character/story and political critique is what elevates this film beyond the prototypical flashback exercise that I had initially feared it would be.

It first helps to identify some of the main ideas, such as one’s story becoming legend and how small artifacts (especially the bowl, in which Zhao Di (Zhang Ziyi) places all of her trust to woo Luo Changyu (Zhend Hao) with her cooking) become imbued with such power that any damage to them becomes irrevocable. Rather than language, artifacts such as the hair clip Luo bestows upon Zhao become the mechanism through which longing is expressed, as we come to understand that Zhao and Luo’s relationship is not predicated around open communication but instead is one of furtive glances and unnecessary treks across buildings, their devotion to one another manifesting itself in the way in which each symbolically commits to the other.

This is why most of the powerful scenes are so simply orchestrated. Called back by the authorities over an unexplained transgression, Luo leaves the mountainside with an authority figure and a horse escort and we immediately cut to Zhao trying to reach him with a bowl of one of his favorite dishes before he is gone, watching as she dashes across an expanse of land in her devotion to him. It’s a breathtaking moment, even as we recognize the impossibility of her logic, and Zhang masterfully executes the scene. Similarly, when Luo returns to her after a prolonged absence (because the villagers have gotten word back to him about Zhao’s unending devotion to him), he is again collected by the authorities, and here the ordeal of having to serve a two-year sentence for his flight from the city back to the mountainside seems so contemptible that it can’t be anything less than a subversive commentary on the blind enforcement of Communistic ideals against the similarly blind love of men and women.

Beyond the delicacy of the young love story, there is also a noticeable touch of Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami in it, with Zhang, similarly to Kiarostami, framing the mise en scene from a distance so that the landscape shots start to have their own subjectivity, moving from mood to character with ease. Lastly, this was the first feature film that Zhang Ziyi worked on, and, beyond possibly Wong Kar Wai’s 2046, it remains her strongest work to date, as she centers her performance through her expressions and demeanor rather than dialogue, as here and in 2046 she demonstrates what a command she has over her body. While not quite effervescent, The Road Home is certainly a strong piece of Zhang’s cinema.

The Road Home: 8/10