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SYS: As an artist, how do you handle the subtle relationship between author and character? How do you manage the distance between the two?
 LY: My relationships with the characters differ from film to film. Sometimes I am completely immersed in the film, but other times I am only an observer. As a matter of fact, to a large extent Suzhou River is a work about a film director, about the author himself. His position as an author is hard to pin down. Sometimes he enters the narrative, becoming a character in the story, but at other times he seems to be completely independent of the narrative. His relationship to the narrative as well as with the characters mirrors that of “Meimei and I.” It is a relationship that is neither intimate nor aloof. When he tries to get hold of her, she is nowhere to be found. No matter how desperately he chases her, she keeps running away from him. This actually resembles filmmaking as a profession.
SYS: In your films, female characters are always as important as, if not more than, male characters. But it is often said that the visual presence of a woman in a man’s work is no more than a projection of a male fantasy about the female “other.” As a male director, do you think it is possible for you to switch your position and depict women from a woman’s point of view?
LY: I rely on my own angle of observation to approach female characters, not on a woman’s point of view. When selecting actresses, you always tend to focus on those who have certain traits you feel are right. You have to find something in her that speaks to you or you would not let her act. At least she should have a pleasant disposition. Otherwise you would be pained to death [laugh]. Just imagine: how could you handle the situation if you let an actress you disliked play the lead, considering the fact that you would see her face thousands of times before the film is done? Simply for this reason, you would want to find a lead actress you feel comfortable with and who is pleasant.
As a matter of fact, the line between masculine and feminine is not always so clear-cut. Inside a lot of men, there are many feminine elements and vice versa. These elements are often mixed together. It is my personal belief that gender can hardly be the only category that divides all things. Besides, if you are one hundred percent female, it serves you better to make films about men, because this profession is nothing more than focusing the camera on objects. Male directors, therefore, are the most suited to make films about women, because filmmaking is actually about looking. In this profession of looking, it is more interesting to look at the opposite sex than to examine the same sex. Since men and women are different creatures, there is an interesting tension between them.
Actually, it has become more evident nowadays that many of our previous conceptions were wrong. For example, in the past, we thought tables must be made of wood. This is in fact false. There are tables made of stone and steel, and there are even tables made of paper. Anything is possible. So, if you say, “man is such and such nature,” it too must be false. In other words, by saying so, you have excluded many other possibilities. Your premise is already questionable. It is alright for you to say “I think man is such and such,” because that is what you think. But if you state, “man is such and such,” I am sorry, you are wrong, because there are many kinds of men. The same logic also applies to women. There are many kinds of women. In addition, there are also transsexuals. The general trend of the last century or earlier was to divide and distinguish: divide territories and distinguish things into classes. But as this practice reaches the point where there is little space for further division and distinction, and the line that sets things apart begins to fade. So, we are actually heading back, trying to efface this line. What we are doing nowadays is in fact to erase or cross the lines we set before, including the lines demarcating categories and the line between the sexes. To draw lines is to have a better understanding of things, but now these lines are exactly the ones that obstruct our understanding. Thus, it is inevitable that we are heading back. The world is rich and colorful. You can’t simply claim that the world is either red or black. It is for sure that there is also a “soft” part in my point of view.
SYS: When Suzhou River came out, critics around the world noticed that the film resembles that of many great directors, both stylistically and thematically. Were you influenced by any particular director? Could you mention some names that have had a lingering influence on you?
LY: I was said to be influenced by Kieslowski in Europe, Hitchcock in the United States, and Wong Kar-wai in Hong Kong. Fortunately, all these three are cinematic auteurs. Otherwise, I would be insulted [laugh].
To be serious, speaking of the directors I like, the list is quite long. For example, I like those 1960s’ directors, particularly of the French New Wave and Japanese New Wave. As a matter of fact, there is something special about the 1960s. Quite a few new wave films emerged across the globe during that period. I also like the so-called “New Hollywood” directors, from Coppola and Scorsese to Lucas and Spielberg. The list also includes some Hollywood B-movie directors, such as John Cassavetes. We saw many B movies at the BFA, because the A-list was quickly exhausted. Only later did we learn that they are also Hollywood B-movie directors. As for Hitchcock, he did not have a big influence on me. I wrote the script of Suzhou River myself. I divided the narrative into several sections, and then built each section on the basis of individual characters: “The Story of Meimei,” “My Story,” and so on. Although I roughly followed this structure, the shooting started even before the script was finished. The story was in fact finalized on the editing table. The production process, therefore, was a bit like that of Wong Kar-wai: shooting without a finished script. If you compare my films with Hitchcock’s, first of all you will see they are quite different in appearance. Hitchcock’s films look quite artificial, which makes one very uneasy. It is almost unbearable to watch Hitchcock’s films after you’ve been exposed to films by the French New Wave directors. His films are simply too melodramatic and artificial. If not for needing to complete a homework assignment in order to earn a passing grade, I would never even have watched his films. They are always brightly lit and look quite unnatural, far behind Truffaut’s films of the 1960s in qualities of honesty, passion, and cinematic-ness.
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