The film that demanded the most from Gong Li is The Story of Qiu Ju (1992), where her portrayal of a tenacious pregnant peasant woman became the ultimate test of her acting prowess.

In 1992, on the red carpet of the Venice Film Festival, a Chinese actress wearing a plain cheongsam without makeup lifted the first Venice Best Actress trophy in Asia. What she held tightly in her hand was not only her personal honor, but also the admiration of an era for Chinese language films. Gong Li's portrayal of a peasant woman named Qiuju in "Qiuju Goes to Court" shattered the Western stereotype of Eastern women with her tattered cotton coat, unsteady belly, and stubborn gaze.

Why did this movie, which is least like Zhang Yimou, become the ultimate testing ground for Gong Li's acting skills? The answer is hidden in the sandstorms of the Shaanbei Plateau, in her worn-out cloth shoes, and even more so in a subversive self destruction.

The 1987 film 'Red Sorghum' amazed the world with Gong Li's wild and unrestrained Jiu'er. But Zhang Yimou's camera always frames her within visual symbols: whether it's the struggle of lust in the dyeing workshop in "Chrysanthemum Beans" or the suppressed blood in the deep mansion in "Raise the Red Lantern", her beauty always carries dramatic carving.

Until 1992, Zhang Yimou decided to use documentary techniques to film "Autumn Chrysanthemum Goes to Court". The camera is hidden in donkey carts, vegetable baskets, and even the clothes of villagers, and 80% of the footage needs to be secretly filmed. This means that Gong Li must completely dispel her celebrity aura and become a true rural woman in northern Shaanxi. She moved into a cave three months in advance, washed her hair with alkaline water to make her hair rough, and was exposed to the scorching sun until her skin turned dark. She even argued with villagers with her cotton filled belly, which was mistaken by onlookers as a real pregnant woman.

What's even more astonishing is the sacrifice of the physical body: in a scene of chasing a car on a snowy night, Gong Li ran barefoot on a mountain road at minus 20 degrees Celsius, her frozen feet oozing blood and staining the snow red. Zhang Yimou cried and shouted to stop behind the monitor, but she insisted on reshoot seven times: Qiuju's stubbornness must grow out of the pain on her feet.

Unlike previous performances with heavy emphasis, Gong Li needs to do subtraction this time. She studied under a dialect expert and practiced Shaanxi dialect to the point where even locals could hardly distinguish its authenticity; Design unique body language: hunched back and waist support, outward eight character gait, wiping directly with the cuff when blowing nose - these details allow the earthy scent of autumn chrysanthemums to seep out of their bones.

The most subversive is the control over silence. When Qiuju kept muttering, 'I just want an explanation,' Gong Li deliberately lowered her voice, letting her lines cut through like a blunt knife; In the crucial scene where her husband was kicked and injured in the lower body, she turned her back to the camera throughout, using only trembling shoulders and clenched fists to convey humiliation and anger. This performance without performance amazed the chairman of the judges, Godard: she rendered the language of the film ineffective, and all we see is life itself.

After its release, the film sparked polarized reviews: some criticized it for vilifying farmers, while international film critics read out advanced feminism from it. Qiuju's argument is not only a legal demand, but also a declaration of war against the patriarchal system. She travels through layers of bureaucratic institutions with her pregnant belly, using the most primitive physical resistance to resist institutional oppression.

Gong Li's contribution lies in endowing the characters with incomprehensibility. When Qiuju finally saw the police car taking away the village chief, her bewildered gaze deconstructed all grand narratives. At this moment, she is no longer a symbolic protester, but an ordinary peasant woman played by fate. This complexity takes the film out of the common cultural curiosity of the fifth generation and directly points to the abyss of human nature.

After 'Autumn Chrysanthemum', there has never been such an extreme case of actors and characters coexisting in the Chinese film industry. Even Feng Wanyu, who was crowned as a god in 2014's "Return", or Lang Ping, who had both form and spirit in 2020's "Winning the Championship", although their technical accuracy is more mature, they lack the sincerity that burns both jade and stone.

Gong Li once revealed: After filming Autumn Chrysanthemum, I dared not take on roles for three years, afraid of overdrawing my soul. This kind of meat