What kind of person jeopardizes the life of his family just for the sake of staying in the big USA!
Li has figured out how to stay in the USA before he leaves in China. Getting an Amercian girl such as liz is planned ahead.
I am Chinese, I know the exact kind of person such as Li. People like Li are so selfish and cunning. Shame on him!!
I don't think all of what was going through Li's mind is shown in the movie.. maybe you could also read his book.
Sure it was a hard decision, but, based on the movie, he left his family in poverty, in Communist China. Compared to what they "taught" him in school about the West ("they live in darkness") what he actually saw and experienced ("it's fantastic") in the US was very different.
I don't think Li's original intention was to "defect", he was selected and "briefed" as to the temptations of the West. It would appear that, before leaving China, he had every intention of returning home after his duty was done. If he showed any intention to "defect" I don't believe he would have been allowed to go in the first place!
After he was "kidnapped" and was alone in the consulate he was prepared to go back and almost believed the lies ("your friends have already gone home")and ("that foreigners can't be trusted"). The consulate staff continue to "work" on him while the media and other diplomatic efforts are mobilised.
The story, as portrayed, is also a love story and a question of duty and loyalty to country. He apologises for the inconvenience caused to the consul and then is told he will be allowed to stay in the US. China accepts the loss of one of its sons but he will never see his family again.
I can't see any selfishness and cunning. He remained true to love and his love for Liz, even willing to follow her to Florida and take his chances there. Faced with the tough decisions he remained true. I see no shame in his actions.
I am also Chinese and think you should stop using the "I am Chinese therefore I understand things better" card.
Whilst there's a degree of selfishness to his decision to stay, what he would be going back to was cultural revolutionary China. Both sides of my families were intellectuals (my grandfather was one of the first wave communists and risked his life and gave everything to the revolution) and heavily persecuted. The China of that era, well you could live in it obviously if you've never been to any other place in the world. But once you've seen other places, you really can't be rightly expected to willingly go back. Esp. if romantic love is involved (and no just because they divorced later it's not proof that they couldn't have been madly in love) And it's not like he didn't try to return. But that wasn't possible till the late 80's when China had liberalized.
As for "Li has figured out how to stay in the USA before he leaves in China. Getting an Amercian girl such as liz is planned ahead", that's preposterous. He's a none english speaking penniless Chinaman in the 70's. I don't think anybody expected him to pull somebody in 3 months, and to marry too. If he did plan that that would have been the worst most unreliable plan of all time.
Certainly lots of Chinese people do it NOW to stay in the west (but I guarantee you over 95% of those artificial migration purposes marriages involve a chinese woman, there's too much social pressure against men doing it) but remeber this was the 1970's-1980's, such lines of thought were incredibly rare, if existent at all.
What about NOT SENDING THEM ANY MONEY OR CALLING TO CHECK ON THEM????, smfh
'My goal is to be as nice as my pets think I am'
Obviuosly, you did not live in a communist country.
After you defect, no matter how, you do not contact the family nor you send money.
Reasons:
1. Money will never reach them. You don't have a bank, or a bank account or Western Union. In the communist country, you have just one bank, state owned, and whoever is caught having or receiving foreign currency is "donating" it to the country, for the good of the party, its people and whoever happens to take it at that time from you.
2. All phone conversations will be listened. Letters will be censored, better yet, thrown in the garbage. The communist party will not allow such a celebrity to call on his parents, after defecting.
Doing that, would have encouraged others to do the same. And we all know how powerful is the power of example.
Everybody was well aware of the consequences to your family, what will happen to the if you give away the "good life" in communism for the evil and corrupted capitalist life. They would have been persecuted, arrested, kept in jail for a few months without a valid reason, just to force you to come back, or force them to "confess" God knows what. So, any kind of contact with the fleeing son or daughter, would have meant extra time in jail or more persecutions.
Hope you understand now!
He said in the movie that calling them might put them in danger. In a YouTube interview with the real Li, he said he still sent money to his family in China.
shareOh god wonderful reasonable intelligent comment. Amen. I'm also Chinese-living-in-the-West, i think too often Chinese people nowadays apply a 'modern' mindset to an older era and they wonder why people did the things they did. Their mind baffle. Perhaps they should really try to put themselves in other people's shoes and place themselves at a difficult time period and they should ask themselves if they have to capacity to make the difficult life choices people like Li were forced to make.
shareActually sorry, the ONE thing that I thought Li did which was pretty awful was the his treatment of Liz. Nothing specific or not understandable, it was probably the extraordinary events which propelled the relationship, and that wasn't really sustainable.
shareWhat the hell did he do to Liz? Let her pursue her dream, as she couldn't stand to see him achieving his? What an idiotic remark.
shareThe chinese government was pretty shifty, but they weren't going to kill his family, esp if he was famous. Not good pr to kill family.
shareI think if you actually read the book you might end up with a different view of the situation.
shareI co-sign that!! That is very ugly of Li. Thats all I'll say b/c I'm getting ready to watch the movie now & havent seen it yet but it must be pretty darn interesting the way everybody's taking this topic so serious =) Must be a GOOD film!!
Lastly, I wish YOU (op) would have included a 'spoiler' in your title but you didnt say anything that isn't already in the trailer. And, I had to cut that off midway*sigh*. Myself & a few others in here have noticed this yr a lot of trailers have been giving away half the plots =(
'My goal is to be as nice as my pets think I am'
It was a selfish move on his part but he was faced with returning to a country where he could be fully artistic. It's like asking a bird to go back into the cage.
Another thing is this happened in China years ago and not just last year. Things have eased up a bit more but they still have a ways to go.
LOL. You'd rather live in Communist China than in the US? Go right ahead.
share
li is SUCH AN INSPIRATION.
i've watched the film and now i am reading the book. i grew up in south africa, sometimes struggling a bit. but it was devastating to read what goes on in a communist country. we came so close to that.
he made the right decision to try and sty in america. and in the end he did help his parents and his whole family. he is the bird that could fly away and save them all!
and let me tell you, it is not easy. it was EXTREMELY difficult for him. remember, he was taken away as a small boy from his family, from peasant life, the only life he knew, into madama mao's dance academy - which was light years different from what he was used to.
it is very difficult for a child of that age to be taken away from its parents, let alone then have to suffer all he had to.
no, li, you truly are an amazing person. and i don't want the book to end.
~~~ "what *beep* said that!" ~~~
Just because you are Chinese does not entitle you to 'know the exact kind of person' he is. A statement like that in itself discredits any opinion you have to share.
I too am Chinese and unless you have lived through that era--and i do know people who have, you have no right to criticize his actions. In hindsight you can say sure stay in China whats so bad about it. But at that time a boy that age couldn't possibly foresee the future of China.
If he is so selfish and has no redeeming characteristics, why would a young American girl be so attracted to him in the first place? He had to have some personal charisma to be able to charm a girl like that.
Do not launch personal attacks on someone who you do not know and this is someone who can survive at a chaotic time, you probably wouldn't know what the fk to do under the same circumstance.