Resulting from the earliest effort of the CMPC to promote a type of movie to counter those presenting so-called escapist fantasies, Oyster Girl conveys the healthy realist imagination in its initial form. The exploration of the plot of the movie thus will enable an analysis of the components of this model and furthermore the grasp of the social reality of which it treats. This movie champions romantic love, which in turn serves as the affective condition from which individuals rise above the traditional social-cultural mode and are then taken as the object of techniques of knowledge aimed at fostering the life of the species. The issues of bodies and life, shown to be closely tied to the theme of romantic love, are given prominence from the very beginning. The opening scene of the film compares Ah-lan, the female protagonist, to the oyster, which as emphasized by the voice-over has a soft fleshy body covered by hard shells.19 This significant comparison not only, as argued by most commentators of the genre, defines healthy realism as a laudation of the virtuous poor person who forces his or her way out from the hardships of life through the use of optimism and determination, but also sets up a scene of bio-power where people are made objects of techniques designed to improve life. Throughout the film, the audience is presented with scenes in which Guo Mingshun （郭明順）, an active cadre member of the fishermen’s association who is mindful of the need for the the modernization of the oyster village, concentrates on developing modern cultivation methods to increase oyster size or supervises construction of the oyster factory that epitomizes the village’s industrialization efforts. These occasional but persistent glimpses of bio-technological intervention in oyster farming and of measures adopted to maximize production levels of the industry are, in a
affective condition anticipating bio-power, which supports the modernization efforts described by the latter. In other words, this paper is less concerned with the governmentalist practices introduced in response to the transformation of intimate relationships in the society as depicted in the two movies than how the emphasis on fulfillment and satisfaction of romantic relationships in Qiong Yao’s romance facilitates the emergence of an image of the individual body and the notion of species departing from the traditional community and its members.
19 The introductory commentary on some facts about oysters and the resemblance between Ah-lan and the oyster by the authoritative voice-over is as follows: “This is an oyster. The oyster has a hard, impervious shell, but its flesh is soft and delicious. Along the western coast of Taiwan, several tens of thousands of fishermen make a living by oyster farming . . . . There is a girl named Ah-lan in the oyster village. Her personality resembles that of the oyster—hard outside but tender and pure at heart. This is her story.”
sense, manifestations of how the healthy realism genre served as propaganda by the government in promoting its modernization programs. At a more profound level, however, the audience is provided with a glance into the social reality in which issues of bodies and life insinuate themselves as essential elements in the village’s progress toward industrialization. The juxtaposition of Ah-lan with the oyster, whose biological process is overseen and modified by the expert grower from the fishermen’s association, thus anticipates what Foucault calls “the controlled insertion of bodies into the machinery of production and the adjustment of the phenomena of population to economic processes” (Foucault, History 141). The attempt to produce better oysters illustrates the application of a certain field of knowledge to improve life in general. Moreover, just as the oysters are taken as objects by scientific knowledge and serve as the basis of economic expansion, the oyster girls and the village residents will be taken over by the reign of bio-power, and thereby made available for the techniques of power and knowledge meant to control and modify bodies and life. Some lines from the theme song sung in chorus take it a step further, associating the passion for cultivating oysters with the romantic love felt between a couple: “Stick the slips of bamboo firmly into the oyster bed/Bunches of oysters grow abundantly on the surface of the bamboo /The copious harvest meets the expectations of the oyster girls/ . . . /The heart of a beautiful girl is more tender than the flesh of the oyster /Her affection overflows the confines of the shell of the oyster/Where has her beloved gone?/
Will the sentient oysters nurture their love and make their bond?”
Immediately following the song are scenes which introduce the audience to the love affairs of three of the oyster girls, who have been portrayed as diligent workers sustaining the industry as well as great admirers of professional opinion. One of them, Ah-juan （阿娟）, even falls in love with Guo, who leads the modernization project the project of the modernization of the village. At the end of the movie, the same tune is played again with different lyrics which strengthen the link between economic expansion and romantic love even more: “You pull the sail while I row the raft/Let us dress up to harvest the fruit of economic development/We have fallen in love with each other/Lovers like us will eventually live happily together.”
In the first healthy realist film, romantic love as such occupies an indispensable role in the investment of bodies and the control of populations, which constitute the two basic forms of bio-power. How exactly romantic love
takes such effect is yet to be detailed. To begin with, Ah-lan’s story, which describes her love relationship with Jingshui, is shown to the audience through the ample use of melodramatic features. Scenes displaying an excessive expression of emotions incorporate personal dramas within the gears of the changing society, forcefully communicating the restrictions of traditional institutions and the desirability of a new set of emerging social relations. From the outset, the pleasure of love and the moments of poignancy set in motion the emergence of an individual body from pre-modern value systems. Among the group of oyster girls who make up the village workforce, the audience knows only the names of the three of them who are shown to be in love. In other words, romantic love endows them with a sense of individuality which distinguishes them from the rest of the group. It should be noted that the group of oyster girls and even the village residents do not automatically make a population in the bio-political sense because of the number of people involved. The phenomenon of population only comes into being when the species life is invested by an entire array of regulatory controls. The mass of the oyster girls therefore primarily represent the traditional economic systems and the correlative social-cultural modes, which is particularly revealed when most of them sneer at Ah-lan when she becomes pregnant before marriage. As will be discussed later, Ah-lan’s pregnancy constitutes one of the most significant bio-political scenes in the film, which evidences the difference between traditional community and modern population. Before entering into the sphere of life administration, Ah-lan has to explore what it means to have a body through her love relationship with Jinshui. The words of love exchanged between the lovers (such as “Does your foot hurt?” or “Do you feel cold?”), casual touches that bring them sweet satisfaction, and the enchanted evening they spend together which leads to Ah-lan’s pregnancy all contribute to the formulation of an erotically-charged body which rises superior to the influence of any tradition or custom. We can tell from what Ah-lan’s father says when Ah-lan and her younger brother refuse to buy alcohol on account for him that the power of traditional values, though lingering on, has been seriously shaken by the rising appeal of romantic love: “I have been nice to you or I would have already married you to someone else than Jinshui! I am not obliged to approve of you dating him!”
Although the father then asks for a huge dowry from Jinshui, which defers the young couple’s marriage for some months, and loudly voices his disagreement
about Ah-lan’s pregnancy on the basis of traditional values, his happy smile shown at the end of the movie when everything is settled is a sure sign of the triumph of romantic love.
Romantic love thus enables the lovers to disentangle themselves from the clutches of traditional institutions. The bodies of the lovers, whose individual welfare is asserted in their rights to love and happiness, will then be taken over by life-fostering technologies at the population level. Yearning to be loved by Ah-huo （阿火） and therefore envious of Ah-huo’s desire for Ah-lan, Ah-chu （阿珠） raises a quarrel with Ah-lan on the oyster farm which ends up with a mass fight among the oyster girls. The camera closely follows the movement of the bodies of the participants in the fight, even presenting the parts of their bodies which are exposed when their clothes are pulled open. These erotically-charged bodies brought out by the pleasure and displeasure of love will soon pass into the control of medical knowledge.
After the fight, Guo sends the oyster girls to the local clinic to have their cuts and scratches treated by Dr. Su, another figure of modernity in the film.
Special attention should be given to the scenes in which each of the oyster girls, taking turns to receive treatment from the medical professional, gets a drink of water from the water dispenser placed in the waiting room before leaving the clinic. This ritual observed by each patient is very likely a component of a public health project which aims to ensure the health and welfare of citizens and thus constitutes an effort to optimize the capabilities of the individual body. These enhanced bodies will ultimately be integrated into the productive forces. It is seen that Guo takes advantage of the opportunity to talk to Dr. Su to suggest that he run for the position of township mayor. Dr. Su consents to his suggestion on condition that Guo helps him with the economic development program. The fruits of Guo’s efforts are represented by the construction of an oyster factory equipped with modernized assembly lines.
Ah-juan, a former oyster girl and one of the three who are in love, is then seen to be working in the factory in a professional uniform. The bodies invested through and through first with romantic love and then with attempts to increase their productive forces are taken over by the techniques of knowledge aimed at transforming human life. Ah-lan’s pregnancy marks the moment when the life of species becomes the center of the technology of power. Feeling upset by the cruel words of the villagers about her pregnancy before marriage, Ah-lan, accompanied by Ah-juan, goes to Dr. Su to ask for
an abortion. Dr. Su rejects her demand, making the following speech: “If you love Jinshui, you must be patient and take good care of the baby. One born amid hardship is usually stronger. I believe your baby will be strong.” Both Ah-lan and Ah-juan are deeply touched by the doctor’s words; Ah-lan then resolves to keep the baby. This talk is in a sense a continuation of certain techniques concerned with enhancing the capabilities of an individual body. It is also noteworthy that the love relationship between Ah-lan and Jinshui is cited by Dr. Su to reason against Ah-lan’s abortion attempt, which reinforces the central position occupied by romantic love in the process of modernization.
What makes this talk more significant is nevertheless how it introduces a technology of power of a different nature than that which focuses on individual bodies. Here Dr. Su is giving support to propagation of the species body based on mutual love more than to the continuation of a single case of pregnancy before marriage. Reproduction being a part of biological processes which bio-politics seeks to regulate, Dr. Su’s talk can be seen as a sort of intervention utilized to sustain the phenomenon of population. The emphasis put by the medical profession on the significance of procreation contradicts the villagers’ comments that Ah-lan should be ashamed of getting pregnant before marriage, and marks the birth of a notion of population that follows different principles of formulation than traditional community where members are united by traditional relations of production and values. The advantage of the former over the latter is reiterated when the midwife, unable to deal with Ah-lan’s difficult labor, suggests that Ah-lan be sent to the hospital for modern medical care. The happy ending of the film is set against the backdrop of the oyster factory where Ah-lan’s new-born son is held by his grandma and all the other characters are carrying out their work joyously. This is a picture celebrating romantic love and modern techniques of power over the life of the species. The audience is presented with a portrait that realistically delineates the motive force of a society aspiring to economic expansion and modernization. Romantic love plays the role of setting the process of modernization in motion and bringing out the ideas of bodies and life that anticipates the exercise of bio-power.