Helen Jones is teaching on DELC212 and planning a session on post-human in cinema. She chose a German film (Ich bin dein Mensch/I'm your Man, 2021), which is about a near future-world where an android is created and programmed solely to make its human partner (a female academic) happy. Lingxia (Jocelin) Zhou recommended a Chinese film Dislocation, which also touches on contemporary society and how it is evolving with new technologies. Helen interviewed Jocelin about the film. This blog post is a transcript of the interview.

Helen: Dislocation is 35 years old, so how is it still relevant in your view?

Jocelin: A good question! The movie was made 35 years ago, without any fancy CGI that is commonly used now, but I think it is still very relevant today. The alienating effect of the machines and technology, the fear of robots, and their replacing and overthrowing of the human race, are still popular topics being explored in many movies nowadays. However, Dislocation has more in it. Through the mouth of the robot, it criticizes the bureaucratism, hypocrisy and double standards. There are many scenes of meetings in the film, some of which we might find familiar (I’m sure our meetings are all very important and necessary!) We want other people to follow the rules and restrictions but ourselves to be exempt from them, especially people with power, who don’t obey the rules that they themselves make. We’ve seen many examples in real life.

Another very relevant point is that, in the movie, the robot observes and learns from the human race. It doesn’t take long for it to be corrupted by bureaucratic power, to enjoy the power, and finally to become an enthusiastic participant in the bureaucratic system. This part reminds me of how Twitter taught Microsoft AI chatbot Tay to use abusive and offensive language. Machine learning works by developing generalizations from large amounts of data. It can reflect back to us some of the worst parts of ourselves.

Helen: The film appeals to me for a couple of reasons. It reminds me of 1920s German cinema with its fears around mirror images, evil selves, and near-future robotics. Another interest of mine is the post-1989 collapse of Eastern Europe as my background is in East German Studies. Why do you like the film?

Jocelin: Dislocation is one of Huang Jianxin’s trilogy, together with The Black Cannon Incident (Hei pao shijian, 1986), and Samsara (Lunhui, 1989). Both are very good movies and I strongly recommend them. Dislocation was shot in 1986 and released in 1987, on the eve of the suppression of the Tiananmen Square protest in June 1989. It’s interesting that you mentioned East Germany and Eastern Europe. The links between Eastern Europe and China were acknowledged back then, when demonstrators in socialist Prague carried candles to show support for their counterparts in Beijing.

I am always fascinated by the culture and society in the 1980s. Paul Pickowicz, an American historian of modern China, used the concept of a distinctively post-socialist condition to refer to the type of popular cultural diversity, cultural ambiguity, and cultural confusion that became so pronounced in China in the 1980s. On a deeper level, Dislocation criticizes bureaucracy as a political culture and the absurdity of the political reality in China. I am sure you will also remember the absurd scene of the ancient Taoist saint Laozi, sitting in the wilderness, and watching TV, which shows the futuristic world the main character Zhao Shuxin comes from. Dislocation also depicted the rebel against conformity and slavish obedience of the socialist state. I am wondering whether a movie like this would get the approval from the Ministry of Radio, Film, and Television today.

Helen: You touched on the issue of absurdity and it struck me that the film does have humor. Yet humor does not travel well across languages and cultural barriers. What makes the humor of this film universally appealing? Is that possible? Am I reading it correctly?

Jocelin: Humor is a universal phenomenon but culture impacts individuals’ perception and usage of humor. Our sense of humor is deeply rooted in our language, culture, and our understanding of the world. In my previous interpreting practice, there were a few occasions when I translated an English joke into Chinese, but no Chinese audience members laughed. Instead, they looked rather confused. I had to explain that it was supposed to be a joke. Then there was some laughter out of politeness. This shows either that humor does not travel well across language and cultural barriers, or I was just a bad interpreter! It is also difficult to translate Chinese jokes into English. Actually, the word 幽默 (youmo) was a phonetic translation, which was translated from English by Lin Yutang in 1924. I think it is hard to find a universal formula but, if there is one, I would say it is a sense of whimsy, as we see in Charlie Chaplin’s silent films, and in this film. On the other hand, this movie is also exploring universal themes such as alienation and bureaucracy as I mentioned earlier.

Helen: I certainly find one scene amusing, and that is when you see the robot walking along with his recharger cable trailing from his back! Perhaps as you say, there is something about this film that travels through time.

Indeed, I am also looking at a German film released in 2021 and screened at Lancaster Dukes. I’m Your Man is about a female scientist who has been signed up to a programme to have a male robot companion. We learn that complex algorithms have been applied to his design to make her happy. As it turns out, the one thing he cannot understand is academic ambition: she is working on a complex archeological project, but when she brings him to the museum, and he scans the library catalogue, he reveals to her that another team in Buenos Aires has just beaten the German team and published results ahead of them. For her it is a disaster, but for him, surely a success for humankind! And yes, the film is humorous!

Thank you for your time and for your recommendation of this film!

Jocelin: Thank you!

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