Feet Unbound - "Pilgrim"

Feet Unbound: Women of the Long March was a film directed by Khee-Jin Ng and the music was composed by Dr. Kelly Tang.

The Synopsis of the Film:

SynopsisOne of the largest troop movements in history was the withdrawal, beginning in 1934, of the Chinese Red Army from the advancing Nationalists, which would become known as the Long March. The losses during this 10,000-kilometre journey were tremendous. Due to lack of food and weaponry, only a small number of the Communist troops managed to survive. In the march, a few thousand women took part, in many cases just teenagers. Feet Unbound is their story. In his directing debut, Khee-Jin Ng chooses a double perspective. Six very old women who undertook the Long March tell not only about the hunger and continuous enemy attacks, but also about the fact that the ones who had been captured (and often seriously maltreated) were later rejected by the Communist party. We also meet a young journalist from Beijing who, tired of her dull job, decides to follow the route of the Long March - this time with more comfortable means of transport. Impressed by the gorgeous scenery, she observes that this beautiful nature does not play a role in any of the survivors' accounts. She gives the souls of the dead a bowl of rice and gains more insight into herself and the gravity of life.

Adapted from: http://www.idfa.nl/en/info/film.aspx?id=067854ed-71d1-4588-b75c-1943d2f1cbc1

ABOUT THE MUSIC:

Movement II. "Pilgrim" (in key of G-minor)

I was very much captivated by the use of open-harmonics of the violins which occurred throughout the movement. It gives a screechy and eerie feel, as if I was brought to the "spiritual" world. I would consider the open-harmonics notes as more of an "effect" role rather than any form of important harmonic role, although some harmonic consideration was obvious in some parts, such as the ending bar where by the note "D" was played as part of the G-minor chord. I thought this was important as the movement reaches the end whereby some form of settlement seemed necessary (i.e., going back to home key). In the other parts, the notes were pretty much alienated from the harmony. For example, E-natural do not belong to the D minor chord (Chord v) in bar 57, and G do not belong to the F major chord (chord VII) in bar 68. There were tinges of sadness and dread throughout the movement, and in particular I realised the consistent use of 4-3 suspensions (e.g., Bars 54; 57; 60; 61; 65; 68; etc.), noting also that preparation note need not always be from the same voice. The cello part seem to be "on its own" as compared to the rest of the instrumentation. Wide leaps were noticed in almost all the bars except for bars 59 and 62 whereby passing notes were used. In the other instrumental parts, the lines were smoother in that preceeding notes were usually step-wise or much smaller leaps.

After asking the composer with regards to this movement, he told me that the use of the open-harmonics was indeed to "create the other-worldly atmosphere". He has also interestingly pointed out that the first verse which was in G-minor, flows downward (descending) in register [melody]. After studying the score, the apparent bar would be bar 60 (Bb-A-G-F-E.nat.). It's also noticed that the E-natural actually leads logically to D the following bar. The second verse as oppose to the first has an ascending sequence [melody]. The heightening of the contour can be noticed (although not a "scalic" ascend) at bars 71-78 (C#-E.nat-G-A-Bb). This heightening of contour brought the music up to the climax of the movement. Very interestingly, the composer also commented that the cello part depicts the "search for high and low" which is relevant to the story line. It is thus apparent of the intentional use of the very wide-leaps noticed.