#m. butterfly

[hayaomiyazaki]

I am your Butterfly. Under the robes, beneath everything, it was always me. — M. BUTTERFLY (1993) dir. David Cronenberg

#m. butterfly #cronenberg #queer cinema #mine #mine:film #mine:lgbt #op #filmedit #perioddramaedit #weloveperioddrama #perioddramasource #filmgifs #moviegifs #doyouevenfilm #fyeahmovies #dailyflicks

[seventh-fantasy]

He was very responsive to my ancient Oriental ways of love. All of which I invented myself, just for him.

M. BUTTERFLY (1993) dir. David Cronenberg

#m. butterfly #m butterfly #david cronenberg #filmgifs #filmdaily #moviegifs #john lone #jeremy irons #my posts #jielin's edits #mbutterflygifs #a lil nervous making this post but i've been too consumed by this movie not to #i deserve one nice gifset fo it on this site #the way it's all about performance and the gaze...... i'm feral #how it understands the illusory nature of reality... *dies* #sll being a dan actor is the very performance of the male gaze #sll performs for the public and also performs for the delusional and limited gaze of one man #the former and latter looking at the same thing but seeing different things #like. literally rene passing by the 藏头诗 scrolls at the entrance of sll's home multiple times jfc #the information is literally presented in your face! you just don't/can't see it! #(here's me giving the prop designer a BIG KISS MUAH) #then how rene eventually transforms into the performance of the oriental gaze in an auditorium of western men casting gaze at him...crazyy.. #no matter how the story is being read by ppl it's ironic when ppl insist on labelling and putting sll into boxes #does it not feel like sll being subjected to a performance in court with the gaze of foreigners who are resolved to #scrutinise and define sll's life. so exactly the way sll unapologetically resists - no explanations owed #and fun fact. on the day i rewatched this a butterfly lovers skit was playing on tv. serendipity. lies down and weep

[ironpour]

M. Butterfly (David Cronenberg, 1993)

#m. butterfly #david cronenberg #jeremy irons #john lone

[johnlone-collection]

David Cronenberg on the casting of M.butterfly

In M. Butterfly, viewers know that Song Liling is a man. The film, then, is about the creation and delusion of love, sex and romance,and finding the right man to play a woman was a task. A three-hour meeting with Lone, who was Emperor Pu Yi in The Last Emperor, convinced him that he'd found his man-woman. Lone is a believable woman, quiet-spoken but not without a certain steely edge. 【1】19930910 - Edmonton Journal "The original idea was that we were going to have Jeremy Irons and then, say, a beautiful unknown Taiwanese boy who was perfect as a woman and then would be perfect when he was transformed into a guy. "Well, that person turned out not to exist. Beautiful boys who were convincing as women stayed beautiful boys when they were supposed to be men. "And that's what happens to the Jaye Davidson character in The Crying Game. There's a scene where his hair has cut and he still remains this really cute girl. You never see her or have to see her as a man with the exception of the one scene where she is naked, which I think makes it non-threatening for a lot of middle-class men." In M. Butterfly, viewers know that Song Liling is a man. The film, then, is about the creation and delusion of love, sex and romance,and finding the right man to play a woman was a task. B.D. Wong, who played the role on Broadway couldn't get past the Cronenberg test: the actor who played Song Liling had to be believable in close-up. "I loved B.D. Wong. He's a very good looking man, but a very ugly woman. If he was in drag and came up to you at a party, you wouldn't fall for it." And a transsexual Cronenberg considered "would have to run around naked for the whole movie to convince anyone that he really was a man." A three-hour meeting with Lone, who was Emperor Pu Yi in The Last Emperor, convinced him that he'd found his man-woman. Lone is a believable woman, quiet-spoken but not without a certain steely edge.

———————————————————————

I was very convinced after trying to cast several unknowns or not-too-well-known Chinese actors that John Lone was the right man to play this woman. It was obvious that everybody except this character knew that this was a man playing a woman in the Peking Opera. In other words, it was a man who fell in love with a man could not admit that he was in love with a man and so deceived himself. He wanted to believe that this was a woman that he fell in love with. 【2】David Cronenberg Discusses M. Butterfly 2009

… And so then the question of casting went to the Chinese character Song Liling. Who will play this character? Now if you haven't seen the movie you should stop watching this now because from now on there will be many spoilers involved. It's impossible for me to discuss the movie without talking about some of the surprises that there are in it. So watch the movie and then come back. So the question is, who will play the woman who is the Chinese opera singer that the Jeremy Irons character falls in love with, who, in fact, is a man? Because it was very traditional in Peking Opera for men to play women's roles. And it was very interesting. When the movie was released, there was quite a bit of confusion in terms of the response to the movie because there had been two movies that came out at the same time. Well, that confused the response, I think, to M. Butterfly. One was The Crying Game, a Neil Jordan film, which pivoted on a woman who the main character falls in love with who turns out to be a man. That role was played by an actor named Jaye Davidson, who was really totally unknown. And of course the name Jaye is very androgynous. Could be a man, could be a woman. So when you see that name in the credits, it doesn't really give anything away. That movie was very successful and people were quite shocked in that film to discover that the character that they thought was a beautiful woman was in fact a man. The other movie that came out at about the same time was Farewell My Concubine, a Chen Kaige film about ,what？It was about homosexuality in the Peking Opera. Now, the chances of all of these things coming together at the same time was very odd, to say the least, but I now go back to the casting of this character. I was very convinced after trying to cast several unknowns or not-too-well-known Chinese actors that John Lone was the right man to play this woman. The problem there was that John Lone, if you have his name in the credits, he was quite famous for having done many films including The Last Emperor, Bernardo Bertolucci's wonderful film. John Lone was the grown-up last emperor and he was very well-known. So immediately in the credits, if it says Jeremy Irons, John Lone, you know that there's a man and ultimately as soon as you see him, you recognize him. And I think this was considered a flaw in my movie because people were not fooled that this character was a woman.They knew right away that it was a man. But actually, my understanding of the real story having done quite a bit research and talked to many people who had met the acutal people and also having talked to Bernard Boursicot, who was the man who Jeremy Irons is portraying. It was obvious that everybody except this character knew that this was a man playing a woman in the Peking Opera. In other words, it was a man who fell in love with a man could not admit that he was in love with a man and so deceived himself. He wanted to believe that this was a woman that he fell in love with. So it was quite a different structure from something like The Crying Game.

And it's in a way a more subtle response that you need from the audience because the audience is not being deceived but the character is. And that was our approach. And people have criticized the casting of John Lone not because of his acting because he's a wonderful actor but because of the structure that was assumed that was really not what we were trying to do. So that's a preamble into my experience of the movie which was very exciting for me.

#john lone #m. butterfly #david cronenberg #the crying game #jaye davidson #Youtube

[erstwhile-punk-guerito]

#m. butterfly #jeremy irons #john lone #barbara sukowa #ian richardson #annabel leventon #shizuko hoshi #vernon dobtcheff #david cronenberg #1993

[allypacino]

so many people hate m. butterfly because it has such a troubled view on gender but i totally see it (and farewell my concubine) as a thesis on orientalism as a performance like... when does the act become you? when does it stop being written by the white man? i think it's soo interesting as a story

#the hyperfeminised east as both victim and seducer... like at some point you gotta see how racialised gender is!!! #m. butterfly

[carolinebingley-wouldve-hated-me]

M. Butterfly 1993, director David Cronenberg

#m. butterfly #period drama edit #perioddramaedit #1968 #madame butterfly #period drama

[aboutjohnlone]

1990

#john lone #year of the dragon #the last emperor #m. butterfly #iceman

[ferretfyre]

#m. butterfly #film #review #criterion channel #david cronenberg #jeremy irons #john lone

[manan-love-ryul]

"It's one of your favorite fantasies, isn't it? The submissive Oriental woman and the cruel white man." - Song Liling

Chang Ryul as Song Liling

Kim Joo-hun as René Gallimard

M. Butterfly (Play), 2017

#장률 #ChangRyul #Kim Joohun #m. butterfly

[byneddiedingo]

M. Butterfly (David Cronenberg, 1993)

Cast: Jeremy Irons, John Lone, Barbara Sukowa, Ian Richardson, Annabel Leventon, Shizuko Hoshi, Margaret Ma. Screenplay: David Henry Hwang, based on his play. Cinematography: Peter Suschitzky. Production design: Carol Spier. Film editing: Ronald Sanders. Music: Howard Shore. 

If M. Butterfly were made today, 30 years later, I have a feeling that it would be a very different film, more acute in its treatment of sexual identity and in its exploration of cultural disjunction. Though both elements are touched on in David Cronenberg's film, they are subsumed in the more traditional movie preoccupations, love story and spy thriller. Cronenberg's rather languid pacing doesn't help bring out its subtexts, and I think Jeremy Irons is severely miscast as the deluded, obsessed diplomat. Irons is strongest at creating dryly ironic characters with a hint of menace, but he doesn't quite get at Gallimard's vulnerability and naïveté. John Lone, on the other hand, is remarkable in his transformation into Song Liling, so much so that when he appears with short hair and in suit and tie late in the film, it's momentarily hard to realize he's the same person. This is, I think, one of those films that were much better and more provocative as plays. 

#M. Butterfly #David Cronenberg #Jeremy Irons

[hayaomiyazaki]

French film poster for M. Butterfly (1993) dir. David Cronenberg.

#m. butterfly #cronenberg #queer cinema #op

[nasriibrahim]

#M. Butterfly

[johnlone-collection]

#john lone #m. butterfly #iceman #the last emperor #year of the dragon #pbs #paper angels

[strazcenter]

Artists We Love: David Henry Hwang

Since emerging in 1980 with his Obie-award winning FOB, David Henry Hwang has established himself as one of contemporary theater’s major voices. A Tony®-winning three-time Pulitzer finalist, Hwang is a major force in the representation of Asian-Americans in theater. Many Asian-American theater professionals credit his work and success with inspiring them to pursue performing arts careers. Oh,…

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#asian-american #Broadway #david henry hwang #Flower Drum Song #FOB #M. Butterfly #playwright #Prince #straz center #The King and I #theater #theatre #Yellow Face

[thiscreepylittlepunk]

AU version of Pinkerton named Liling where every mention of Japan is replaced with France.

#M. Butterfly #Pinkerton #Would it be called Galliyard? #You #Fucking moron #Galliard is Butterfly