Buckland-Warren-Puzzle-Films-Complex-Storytelling-Contemporary-Cinema

Lou Ye’s Suzhou River and Purple Butterfly 195wondering if Meimei really is Mudan after all, if Meimei is simply playinga game with Mada in revenge for what he did to her. The differentiationbetween the diegetic narrator’s focalized shots and the director’s nonfocalizedobjective shots can be made only after the viewer realizes – at theend of the movie – that the narrator has been “truthful.” Still, even duringsubsequent viewings, some shots – like much of Segment 3 – remainof indeterminable origin.Suzhou River’s aural component is a key element of the movie’s complexstorytelling methodology despite cinema being a primarily visualmedium. Before any images appear on-screen, the soundtrack plays partof a dialogue that is repeated and extended at the end of the movie. Then,the voiceover narration begins. Since the narrator is also a major character,he participates in many dialogue exchanges. The characters’ talkativenessimpedes rather than eases viewers’ understanding of the story.The videographer’s frequent narrative hesitations and uncertainties aboutwhere the story might go next not only hint that the film’s many riverinetwists and rhetorical turns are perhaps opportunistic fabrications designedto favor the narrator’s own cause but also reflect his own weak attachmentto objective reality and therefore challenge his assertion early in the film that“photographs don’t lie.” (Silbergeld 2004, p. 42)The narrator uses suppositional words such as “if,” “maybe,” and “perhaps”that undermine viewers’ trust in him because one has a difficult timeascertaining if the narrator is telling the truth, if the narrator believes whatother people tell him, if the narrator is outright lying, or if the narrator isrambling as he makes up a fictional narrative (after all, the narrator is avideographer). During the tricky transition in Segment 3, the narrator saysthat he is as capable as the next person in inventing a story about doomedlovers. Even though the narrator says that he is not familiar with Mada’sstory, he is the one narrating the events that take place in Segments 4 and5. At this point, one might feel that the narrator has contradicted himself.Even though an alert viewer will be skeptical of the narrator’s reliability,the movie’s visuals are so closely identified with the narrator’s vantagepoint that the viewer’s general impressions of the other characters are filteredthrough the narrator’s perspective. One finds oneself “agreeing” with thenarrator’s sarcastic assessments of Mada and Meimei, though the narratorretains some semblance of impartiality with regards to Mudan (which makessense because the only time he ever meets Mudan is when he stands over