"Lost Horizon" and "Eat a Bowl of Tea"

I was reflecting on the movie Eat a Bowl of Tea and decided that I wanted to look more into the film that the two main characters and the rest of the village in China watched. I think that the director wouldn't have put this specific movie into his film without a significant reason, especially because it is the backdrop of the important scene where the two main characters kiss for the first time and declare their love to one another.

So - the film is called "Lost Horizon" and it is about a group of people who crash over the Himalayas and end up finding a small village called Shangri La. This Chinese village is described in the movie synopsis to be "a peaceful and plentiful place without illness, war or any type of dispute". I think that this is interesting because it describes much of what the Chinese thought about what life in the US would be like - romanticized, perfect, and plenty. And, the two characters kiss while the film is playing, signifying that their romance reflects that similar idea of a romanticized future.

In the film, the people who crashed find out that the crash was a set up and they were actually kidnapped - the pilot crashed on purpose to bring them to the village! And, although this atrocity happened, all but one of the crew that crashed are okay with staying in the village. This mirrors the Chinese experience because even though they experienced hardship, discrimination, and financial difficulty, they stayed in the United States.

Also, the CRT idea about making other cultures seem overly "exotic" appears in the film. The village of Shangri La is described as "fantasy like" and, after watching some clips of the film on YouTube, I can conclude that what I saw was somewhat over the top and over-simplified of the Chinese culture.