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More inspiring local television programs needed to turn tide against frivolous culture
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QUITE by accident, I recently watched an old documentary made by Japanese broadcaster NHK that traced the Yellow River all the way back to its origins in the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau.
I found it so well-made that I began to search similar NHK productions online. I found two series (30 parts in all) on the ancient Silk Road, made before and after 1980, equally impressive.
At the end of the last part of the documentary (“All Roads Lead to Rome”), it was revealed that by 1984 the documentary crew had covered a distance of 30,000 kilometers in ten countries in five year’s time. Most of the trips were covered in motor vehicles, but camels were occasionally used, for instance in making the trip to Heishui Cheng, the ruin of a once prosperous town along the Silk Road that now lies in the midst of an Inner Mongolia desert.
For all the effort the NHK crew put into making the documentary, I deeply regretted that the series was made by a foreign crew for a foreign audience.
If we could be pardoned for being financially unequal to such a production 35 years ago, what excuses can we come up with today? By contrast, consider our TV producers’ enthusiasm for churning out TV dramas featuring court intrigue or romantic entanglements, or their adeptness at eliciting cheers or tears in hundreds of reality shows. They’ve come a long way in achieving such splendid mediocrity.
I remember in the early 1990s how I was impressed by a 12-part series on the Great Wall, made by CCTV in cooperation with Tokyo Broadcasting System.
I still remember vividly how I was impressed by the ease and spontaneity of host Jiao Jiancheng; these merits immediately set him apart from all other TV personalities at the time.
Many of our TV professionals today seem no longer capable of such greatness, as they are busy playing to the gallery. When it comes to inflating viewership statistics, no antics are too low and no expenses are too high.
In the afore-mentioned Silk Road documentary, the viewers get the feeling that they are making the journey themselves. The crew is non-obtrusive and often outright self-effacing. The series shows little trace of being prearranged, preconceived or pedantic. Strangely, the message sinks in anyway.
Over the past three-and-a-half decades, NHK had come up with 5,000 documentaries on China-related topics, ranging from “30 years after Chinese reform,” “Sichuan Earthquake,” to “China power.”
They even come out with a multiple-award winning program on the patients at a hospital in Beijing, suggesting how market-driven medicine has led to a concentration of medical resources for the privileged, while the masses have to compete for what little is left for them.
I even found a documentary that follows the life of a village girl surnamed Ding in Shaanxi Province.
Coherent ideology
After graduating from a primary school, Ding risked being another drop-out. As her difficulties became known, donations enabled her to continue her studies. She ended up attending a professional school, and after many false starts, began to work as a hotel cleaner but failed to get hired permanently as business was too slow.
Her boy friend, a car salesman, was kind to her, but her parents and sister disapprove of the relationship, since his family is poor and his career lacked promise. At the end of the series, we are told Ding has begun working in a small restaurant.
Throughout the documentary, the story is told in an unhurried, slightly detached tone by an unseen observer. There is no condescending suggestion of the girl as a loser. The struggle of a humble individual gives us a glimpse into society as a whole. It offered a refreshing take on a story that, in less sympathetic hands, could easily descend into stereotypes and cliched narratives.
But a great deal of work goes into creating such seemingly casual, down-to-Earth productions. For example, a Japanese director revealed that, prior to making a China-related documentary, he read 60 books within three months.
In terms of narration, technical sophistication, depth or scope NHK’s China-related documentaries often far exceed similar output by many domestic or Western producers. NHK is far from being perfect, of course, but it does offer us some food for thought.
If we want to wean ourselves away from junk culture, we need to provide attractive and enriching alternatives first. There is an urgency to inculcate a coherent ideology in our compatriots, by first helping them make sense of their common cultural heritage and their present reality.
In cultural sphere, as elsewhere, unconditional enshrinement of market credo, in reducing us into mere buyers and sellers, can be morally corrosive.
It certainly impedes the formation of strong national sympathies.
In our eagerness for cultural renewal, we should be reminded that a public institution’s primary job, rather than turning a good profit, is to produce quality, inspiring cultural products.
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