Race in Cinema - Fu Manchu – a Chinese Character Manifestation in Film

Name : Xin Yan

Professor: Matthew Feltman

Fu Manchu – a Chinese character manifestation in film

Fu Manchu is a fictional character introduced in a series of novels The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Man Chu. This character also featured in films. And he has become a stereotype as eastern evil genius in the early 20th century. This character first appeared in 1875 in the book When Holmes encountered Dr. Fu Manchu. And, it is said that, “today this image is still the Europeans and Americans impression of Chinese”(The mystery of Fu Manchu). Doctor Fu Manchu is described as a person “who is tall and lean, high- shouldered, with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven skull, and long magnetic eyes”(The mystery of Fu Manchu). Anyhow, when I see him on the screen, he is bald and has two long eye brow also he has a very sinister face. He has three foreign university degrees, also he is a language genius. He can fluently use all civilization language and most savage nation’s language. When facing the Chinese, he speak Chinese. When meet Indian, he speaks with Indian. In order to confuse Britain and hide his true identity for his revenge, he often speaks in French. He is also extremely smart. The root of misfortune in the western world was not only that the existence of Dr. Fu Manchu, who was on behalf of the yellow, and the gang, but also the threat of realistic and potential which is the “Yellow Peril”. It was a color metaphor for race, namely the theory that East Asian people are a danger to the rest of the world. Around late 20s, the yellow peril was a common theme in fiction and film, and most of representative of this theme would be Dr. Fu Manchu. “His popularity in America lies precisely in his conformity to a tradition of predominantly negative images of the Chinses”.(30)

By comparing and contrasting the character Fu Manchu in the older film and contemporary film, I personally felt like the purpose of contemporary film has been changed from older film. In the old film, let’s just say The mystery of Dr. Fu Manchu which is filmed in 1929, it is the first appearance of Fu Manchu in North America area. The plot are about British regiment, chasing Boxer rebels, fires on Fu Manchu’s house killing his wife and son, and Dr. Fu starts his revenge. To be honest, I felt it is controversial to describe a man like Dr. Fu Manchu in either novels and films like that as an evil. Simply, it is because if we all know a little bit of history, you will know why. Around the late 19th century and early 20th century, after the First and second opium war and First Sino-Japanese war, the hatred towards foreigner is increasing among Chinese people. The western missionary are become the first target for some extremely “patriots”( Boxer rebels). They killed many western missionaries and kidnapped ambassadors. Due to the corruption of the Qing government, the situation is getting worse. In order to put down the boxer rebels, international legations formed army to siege Beijing. International legations did lots of anti-human behaviors like massive killing, rape, rob. The most notorious one will be Burning Old Summer Place. Thus, what I thought in the early Fu Manchu’s films and novels, the topic are country-based, people don’t know much about china early on, someone like the author of the Fu Manchu series twisted the image towards Chinese and China based on his personal feelings and imagination which is very irresponsible sort of speak. Besides, as a human-being, it is reasonable and rational for me to think of Dr. Fu’s revenge. So, in the early Fu Manchu’s series books or films, they aim to smear China as a nation.