Song at Midnight

Song at Midnight

The Cinema Epoch edition DVD of Song at Midnight
Directed by Ma-Xu Weibang
Produced by Zhang Shankun
Written by Ma-Xu Weibang
Starring Jin Shan
Gu Menghe
Zhou Wenzhu
Hu Ping
Cinematography Yu Xingsan
Xue Boqing
Production
company
Release dates
  • 1937 (1937)
Running time
 113 minutes
Country China
Language Mandarin

Song at Midnight (simplified Chinese: 夜半歌声; traditional Chinese: 夜半歌聲; pinyin: Yè bàn gē shēng) (also known as Singing at Midnight or literally Voice of Midnight) is a 1937 film directed by Ma-Xu Weibang. Often referred to as the first Chinese horror film, Song at Midnight is a remake/adaptation of Gaston Leroux's Phantom of the Opera, though the film injects a significant political subplot involving the leftist revolutionary movement to the original story.

The film stars Gu Menghe, Zhou Wenzhu, and Jin Shan as the disfigured anti-hero Song Danping. Ma-Xu made one sequel to Song at Midnight in 1941 during the war. Both films resurfaced in the West at the Udine Far East Film Festival in 1998.[1] Since then, the film has been shown at various film festivals around the world, notably at the 62nd Venice International Film Festival's "Secret History of Chinese Cinema" retrospective.

Reputation

Today the film is well regarded, and was named as one of the best 100 Chinese films by both the Hong Kong Film Awards in 2005, and by Asia Weekly in 1999.[2]

Song at Midnight has also been remade twice. The first remake, translated as The Mid-Nightmare is a two-parter by Hong Kong director, Yuan Qiuxia, released in 1962 (part I) and 1963 (part II). It stars Betty Loh Ti and Lao Zhei. In 1995, Song at Midnight was remade, this time as The Phantom Lover by Ronny Yu, with Leslie Cheung in the role of Song Danping.

Cast

DVD release

As part of their Chinese film retrospective, Cinema Epoch released Song at Midnight on Region 0 DVD on May 8, 2007. The DVD includes subtitles in English.

An earlier DVD edition by the Guangzhou Beauty Culture Communication Co. Ltd was released on December 1, 2006 in the United States.

References

  1. ↑ Robinson, David (Winter 1999–2000), "Return of the Phantom", Film Quarterly, 53 (2): 43, doi:10.2307/1213720
  2. ↑ "100 Greatest Chinese Films of the 20th Century". Asia Weekly Magazine. 1999-12-19. Retrieved 2007-05-10.


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