Disney's live-action 'Mulan' is an unsung masterpiece



Almost a decade ago, Disney announced that it would finally be moving ahead with a live-action remake of “Mulan.”

The animated musical adventure was a huge hit when released in 1998. But now it was 2015, and anxieties surrounding race, transgenderism, and workplace sexual harassment were nearing their peak.

This Mulan is not the liberal feminist icon she’s been made out to be; she’s more Joan of Arc than Captain Marvel. What drives her is love, not ambition.

In retrospect, not the best time for an American company to tell a story set in ancient China and inspired by a well-known Chinese legend. Nor was it the ideal environment in which to cast a heroine who disguises herself as a man to in order to join the imperial army only to fall in love with a superior officer.

'Inappropriate' romance

From the beginning, calls to oust white artists from the project trended online. Disney attempted to play ball; its first choice of director, Ang Lee, was unavailable to direct.

Mulan's love interest from the original film, Captain Li Shang, was dropped in exchange for two new characters in response to the #MeToo movement. Producer Jason Reed explained that "having a commanding officer that is also the sexual love interest was very uncomfortable, and we didn't think it was appropriate.”

This then upset LGBT activists who had, unbeknownst to the world outside their bubble, claimed Li Shang as a “bisexual icon.” Production’s attempts to conform to one moral crusade led to accusations of “erasure” by another.

Politics and pandemic

“Mulan” was finally ready for release in early 2020; by then other problems had emerged. It was revealed that some of the film’s landscape B-roll was shot in the northwest region of Xinjiang, where the government had infamously erected re-education camps for Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslim minorities to retaliate for terror attacks by Sunni separatists.

Western governments and assorted NGOs urged Disney to condemn China. While Disney didn’t fold, the Chinese found the company’s lukewarm defense insulting enough to instruct state media not to cover the movie’s domestic release.

The final and perhaps most devastating setback had to do with the film’s original premiere date: March 2020. While Disney did pull off the standard gala Hollywood screening, COVID and its attendant lockdowns squashed plans for a wide release.

By the time “Mulan” finally crept into multiplexes that July, Disney, eager to be rid of the problem, had done little to promote it.

Not woke? Go broke

Those who reviewed the movie largely seemed to do so through the ubiquitous lens of identity politics, which constrained their thoughts to the political context surrounding the production rather than the story itself.

Critic Joonatan Itkonen’s dismissive reaction was exemplary: “Mulan is a film best described as an ‘if only’ production. If only the script had the input from actual Chinese people.”

Never mind that Disney had originally sought an Asian director and boasted a cast and supporting crew that was nearly 100% ethnically Chinese — so very Chinese, in fact, that in 2019, lead actress Liu Yifei sparked controversy by condemning the pro-democracy riots in Hong Kong. Given the exacting, contradictory demands of the time, it should come as no surprise that “Mulan” also lost points for being too Chinese.

A secret success

In retrospect, I think its harshest critics owe “Mulan” a reappraisal, if not an out-and-out apology.

I watched the movie with my family this week and found myself pleasantly surprised by how good it was. It was visually and audibly stunning, with a physicality to its performances that gracefully incorporates elements of Chinese kung fu film tradition.

The creators tone down the animated film’s goofiness in order to make something more serious — which in fact brings the story closer to its epic source material, "The Ballad of Hua Mulan."

Particularly impressive was the film’s emphasis on honor, virtue, and a specifically Chinese concept of filial piety. Mulan risks death not for her own “self-realization” (an all-too-common motivation for contemporary heroines) but rather to protect both her father and the father of her nation: the emperor.

When she reveals her true identity to the men in her unit, they reject her. A shape-shifting witch-warrior on the enemy side (a creative reimagining of the hawk from the animated film) offers her solidarity in this moment of cold exile.

Mulan rejects her, saying, “I know my place, and it is my duty to fight for the kingdom and protect the emperor.” The sword she carries, stolen from her father, is emblazoned with three Chinese characters: 忠、勇、真 (loyal, brave, and true).

After she saves the emperor, he gives her a new sword, one emblazoned with an additional virtue: filial piety (孝).

This Mulan is not the liberal feminist icon she’s been made out to be; she’s more Joan of Arc than Captain Marvel. What drives her is love, not ambition.

And this love dares to encompass her nation as well as her family. Americans haven’t seen a film so rich in unvarnished national pride since "The Patriot" (2000). “Mulan” left me yearning that we might one day again employ the vast resources of Hollywood to enshrine our own founding myths. I’m inspired by the possibility.

Disney says 'authenticity' drove decision to film Mulan in region accused of throwing Muslims in concentration camps

Disney is doubling down on its Decision to film its live-action Mulan reboot in an area of China where that has been widely accused of putting Muslims in concentration camps.

Chinese State Media Trashes Disney's ‘Mulan’ for Not Being Pro-China Enough

China's state-run newspaper Global Times excoriated Disney's live-action remake of 1990s cartoon film Mulan in a weekend review that dismissed it as "self-righteous," historically inaccurate, and insulting to the patriotism of the Chinese people.

Box Office: Disney's 'Mulan' Bombs in China With Weak Opening

Moviegoing audiences in North America are not rushing back to the theater just yet and “Mulan” is also faltering in its China release as the global box office slowly comes back online in the COVID-19 era.

Report: China Bans Media from Covering Disney's Mulan After Concentration Camp Backlash

The Communist Party of China barred major media coverage of the Disney film "Mulan," Reuters reported on Thursday, following global outrage in response to producers thanking Chinese officials running concentration camps in its end credits.

Daughter of Uighur man 'disappeared' by Chinese government rips Disney 'disgrace' of profiting off persecution of her people



Jewher Ilham has not seen her father since 2013 — when the Chinese Communist government arrested him before he could board a plane to Indiana and "disappeared" him.

Now Ilham, a member of the Chinese Uighur people, is calling out Disney for playing footsie with China's oppressive government in order to gain access to the nation to film its newest movie, "Mulan" and screen the movie in the nation's theaters.

What did she say?

Disney has come under fire for filming "Mulan" in the Chinese province where Uighur Muslims are being held in concentration camps and then using the movie's credits to thank the agency that runs the camps for its help.

In an op-ed for the Daily Beast on Thursday, Ilham, who currently serves as the Uighur Human Rights Fellow at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation in Washington, D.C., explained that her father — a "mild-mannered, studious professor of economics" whose "life's work was using his influence to promote peaceful coexistence between the Uighur people ... and the Han ethnic majority that rules China" — was arrested by the Communist government in 2013 just before he was to get on a plane to the U.S. for an Indiana University Fellowship.

His efforts at "peaceful coexistence," she said, ran counter to the interests of the Chinese government, and he was sentenced in 2014 to life in prison.

She has not heard from her father since the day before his arrest and has heard nothing of his whereabouts since 2017.

So naturally, Ilham is not impressed with Disney's cozy relationship with the very people who have reportedly put some 1 million ethnic minorities in concentration camps while using an ancient Chinese legend to make millions of dollars:

In many ways, I can identify with the title character in Disney's Mulan films, based on the ancient Chinese legend. In the story, as China calls up the men from every family to defend against a foreign invasion, Mulan dresses as a boy and fights in the place of her father, who is too old to go himself. As a child growing up in Beijing, I loved the legend and the fun Disney cartoon version produced in 1998. Little did I know that I, like Mulan, would later be fighting for my own father—helping to carry on his work while he is unjustly imprisoned. I hope, like her, to achieve victory by one day gaining my father's release.

Today, sadly, a new retelling of the Mulan story, once again by Disney, is profiting from the oppression of my people. This live-action version was filmed partly in the Uighur region—officially known in China as “Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region"—where the Chinese Communist government is holding at least one million members of Turkic ethnic minorities in concentration camps as part of a coordinated genocidal campaign. My father, if he is alive, may be among them—nobody will allow us to visit him, or even tell us where he is.

Despite widespread international condemnation of China's brutal tactics in Xinjiang, Disney still chose to go there to film this movie, delivering money and the prestige of an international “family" brand to those directly engaged in genocide. Adding insult to injury, in the closing credits, they even made sure to thank the local government “bureau of public security" (also known as state police) and “publicity department" (or propaganda). These are the very same government agencies in the Uighur region that are imprisoning Uighurs and other Turkic minorities, and then telling their families and the international press they are merely being held in “training centers." The “public security" office is currently under sanctions by the U.S. government for human rights abuses.

Ilham noted that the government have been oppressing the Uighur people since at least the 1950s and have become more aggressive about it.

She's calling on the world to boycott 'Mulan'

Sadly, she said, the West has become increasingly complicit in the government's "cultural genocide" — especially major multinational corporations like Nike, Apple and Gap that rely on China's use of political prisoners for forced labor.

Hollywood, she stated, is as guilty as those other companies about getting suckered into doing business with and cozying up to China. And now she's calling on the world to boycott "Mulan":

Hollywood isn't immune from the charms of Beijing either. The promise of access to the massive Chinese market is irresistible for a movie industry desperate for revenue in the COVID era when movie ticket sales are down. While many theaters in the United States remain shut down, Mulan will be opening in Chinese theaters.

It appears, sadly, that Disney is the latest in the long and disappointing line of Western people and companies taken advantage of by China. We can hope, at least, that the outcry against Disney on behalf of the Uighurs and freedom-loving people everywhere will not only lead others to #BoycottMulan in the short term, but in the long term demand that Western companies cease cooperating with Chinese oppression.

Ilham concluded by saying she hopes this exposure will rally nations around the globe to stop letting China's Communist government get away with its myriad abuses.

Josh Hawley Demands Answers in 'Mulan' Uyghur Controversy: Disney 'Whitewashing Genocide'

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) is demanding that the Walt Disney Co. answer for its collaboration with Chinese officials in Xinjiang during the production of Mulan, saying that the studio is "whitewashing genocide" by partnering with the secret police who are involved in Uyghur concentration camps.

Disney filmed 'Mulan' in Chinese province where Muslims are held in concentration camps, thanked the agency responsible for them



Disney filmed the movie "Mulan" in the Xinjiang province of China, where approximately 1 million Uighur Muslims are believed to be held in concentration camps by the communist Chinese government, according to the BBC.

In addition, Disney thanked the Turpan Bureau of Public Security in the movie's credits. Turpan runs the camps, which are branded by the government as "re-education" camps, despite evidence and testimonies of the human rights atrocities that are inflicted upon the Uighur population.

When Georgia passed an anti-abortion law in 2019 to ban abortions after the detection of a fetal heartbeat, banning most abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy, Disney President Bob Iger suggested Disney may have to boycott filming in the state over the law, saying it would be "very difficult" to continue filming there.

"I rather doubt we will," Iger said last summer. "I think many people who work for us will not want to work there, and we will have to heed their wishes in that regard. Right now we are watching it very carefully."

The Associated Press reported in June that the Chinese government was committing "demographic genocide" in Xinjiang, where "Mulan" was filmed, among the Uighur Muslims and other minorities:

The state regularly subjects minority women to pregnancy checks, and forces intrauterine devices, sterilization and even abortion on hundreds of thousands, the interviews and data show. Even while the use of IUDs and sterilization has fallen nationwide, it is rising sharply in Xinjiang.

The population control measures are backed by mass detention both as a threat and as a punishment for failure to comply. Having too many children is a major reason people are sent to detention camps, the AP found, with the parents of three or more ripped away from their families unless they can pay huge fines. Police raid homes, terrifying parents as they search for hidden children.

"Mulan" was originally scheduled for theatrical release in March, but that release was delayed due to COVID-19. The movie was released on the Disney+ streaming platform in the United States and other areas where that service is available, and released in theaters in China, where it failed to perform well at the box office.

"Disney's 'Mulan' has racked up dismal advance ticket sales for its opening day in China, making it likely that the live-action remake will bomb at mainland box office," Elaine Yau wrote for the South China Morning Post. "According to China's largest film ticketing app Maoyan, as of this morning, advance ticket sales for the opening day (September 11) of 'Mulan' amounted to only 2.1 million yuan (U.S. $307,000) after one day of presale."

I Watched ‘Mulan’ So You Don’t Have To

Setting aside the film’s ties to the Chinese Communist Party, Disney’s remake of ’Mulan’ still lacked the wit and depth of the original animated movie.
Mulan: WOKE & Poorly Written Garbage! | Ep 227

Mulan: WOKE & Poorly Written Garbage! | Ep 227