Myat Moe: 缅甸电影中的少数民族

我的职业主要是电影制片和编剧。因此，我不擅长民族认同或考古学。如果你是相关的学者，我的话对你来说可能有点肤浅。这场讲座不是关于种族问题的，而是试图讨论缅甸电影中不同族群的代表性。

概况及历史背景

我将在此提供一些历史背景。如你们所知，缅甸有许多不同的民族。我们有着不同的文化和语言。尽管如此，但占主导地位的是我们所称的缅族。事实上，英国殖民时期，他们错误地命名了缅甸为英文的“Burma”，这只是缅族的名称。不幸的是，这个名字一直沿用到1990年，当时执政的军政府才将国家的官方英文名称为“Myanmar”。

在我们脱离英国独立后，时任的总理吴努，是一位非常虔诚的佛教徒，也是一位自豪的缅族人。他自觉或不自觉地将缅族思想、缅族风俗习惯、缅族文化强加于日常生活中。这对其他少数民族来说并不太好。随后，在奈温将军执政期间，他更右翼、更保守、更激进地将缅族人的身份作为国家的官方身份。我们称之为缅化过程。

这也反映在我们的电影中。独立后不久，内战就发生了。政府向拍摄关于内战的电影。从50年代到90年代，我们有一些亲军方的宣传电影。这些电影里，一些勇敢的政府军士兵总是在和未知的敌人作战。观众可以看见战斗，但看不见敌人是谁。因为我们不能把敌人描绘成属于某个特定集团的人。

当然，在这些电影中也存在文化挪用的问题。这是说你会用一种非常老套的方式来描绘一个民族文化中的人， 比如口音或着装——当（电影中）的一个人开始改变口音，或者说慢点，他们就是某个民族的一员。这是荒谬的。

负面刻板印象和正面刻板印象

刻板印象既有负面的，也有正面的。每个人都知道什么是负面的刻板印象，所以我对此不想谈更多。相反，我想谈谈正面的刻板印象。正面的刻板印象是对少数民族的一种屈尊的态度。在缅甸，我们有一个默守陈规的假设，即，认为来自农村的少数民族非常“单纯”。

“他们很单纯！”

“他们生活在大自然中！”

“他们不贪心；他们没有任何缺点！”

“他们很善良，心地善良，非常诚实！”

这类正面刻板印象是人为造成的，也有可能使事情简单化。少数民族也是人类，而人类是非常复杂的。所以他们可以是好的，也可以是坏的，可以是邪恶或者卑鄙的，他们会有各种各样的社会问题，他们会有双重标准。这是人的本性。但当你（在电影中）强化这种对族群的正面刻板印象时，就失去了族群本身的复杂性。在这样的电影里，少数民族的人变成了非常单纯、诚实、善良的人。但从这个意义上说，他们是真正的人吗？人其实是会有一些问题的，有一些缺点，有一些卑鄙的。

但是，“不，不，不！”电影人被这样要求着，“简单点就行了，少数民族都很诚实，都很好！”这就是我们在电影中遇到的问题。

缅甸电影的衰落和电影技术的兴起

上世纪60年代到70年代，缅甸电影在整个东南亚曾属领先状态，期间曾制作了100多部剧情片。但80年代之后，由于国家变得非常贫穷，胶片和设备匮乏，电影产量开始下降。到90年代，我们的电影产业基本上消失了，一年只能拍10部左右的电影。这是缅甸电影的正式衰落。

但另一方面，同时出现了确实令人兴奋的新技术——VHS录像带。于是人们开始用录像机做电影。这些电影的分发渠道不再是电影院而是通过录像带租赁店。（15：47）VHS制片….| 与此同时，这些“街头录像带电影”通常是低质量的、廉价的，电影的总体质量开始下降。

当电影质量开始下降，这不仅意味着技术的下降，也意味着艺术的下降。高质量的电影制作人根本不想再在电影行业工作了。然而，取代这些艺术家的人，只是为了更受欢迎而制作电影。他们不在乎一部电影的艺术性。

事实上，我们甚至统计不出1990年代到2010年代之间，有多少“街头录像带电影”被制作了出来。它们实在太多了，一部影片可以在两到五天内制作完成。你可以想象它们的质量如何。而这些“街头录像带”电影对少数民族的描绘是充满偏见和令人反感的。

缅甸电影的表现问题

2010年前后，情况开始好转。人们对低质量的街头录像感到了厌烦。此外，在那期间，我们开始有了数字电影技术，可以不再依赖昂贵的电影胶片。技术上来说，电影制作的成本变低了。

多亏数字技术，从2010年开始，我们本土的电影业有了一点改善。技术、表现以及总体的艺术素养开始提高。2012年前后，一位名叫Aung Ko Latt的导演决定拍摄一部叫做《克扬美女》的电影。这部电影是关于居住在缅甸东部边境的因长脖颈女性而闻名的克扬族的。导演决定在克扬人居住的实际地点进行拍摄。

这部影片开始拍摄于2012年，由于缺乏资金，影片到了2014或2015年才得以上映。尽管如此，我们还是很欣赏这部影片，因为多年以来，终于有了一部尊重少数民族的的拍摄方法。不是像过去那样，让一些缅族演员试图装扮成克扬人，而是实际生活在克扬地区的克扬演员。

这部电影并不完美，在我们看来还是不够好。当它在缅甸上映时，没人真的喜欢它，包括我。因为它有很多问题，剧本也有很多缺陷，还有电影的拍摄方式虽然采取了数字技术，但还是很老土。所以这部电影并不成功。

但我们很感激电影制作人的努力，因为以前没有人这样做过。坦率地说，即使现在也很少有人做到这一点，因为那个过程昂贵且困难。《克扬美女》是独一无二的，某种意义上，它是具有开创性的。但《克扬美女》的另一个问题是，编剧是美国人，导演本人也不是克扬人。所以出现一些有争议的误解。那是一些诚实的错误，但最终也造成了很多正面或负面的刻板印象。这也是《克扬美女》的弱点之一。

2017年或2018年，很多少数民族电影人也开始拍摄电影，他们想用自己ID声音讲述自己的故事。他们拍摄的电影更真实，因为他们知道自己在说什么，知道自己在做什么。

另一部上映于2018年的电影，《吉拉（Gila）》，导演的名字叫D Htel De，他是缅甸北部的日旺族。他决定拍摄一部动作冒险片，由日旺族的演员主演。

D Htel De是一位作家、导演和剪辑师，他特别棒。这部影片的背景是19世纪。导演了解地形、了解丛林、了解人民、了解语言和文化背景，这是完美的。他在2017年拍摄了这部电影，电影于2018年上映——这是一次小小的成功，因为它当然没有大明星。不幸的是，我一直鼓励导演将它提交给国际电影节，但他不知道怎么做这些事。我们帮助了他，但由于某些原因，他对国际电影节不太感兴趣，尽管这部电影应该在国际电影节上放映。最终，除了上缅甸的院线，这部电影没有走得更远。

这是我最喜欢的2018年的缅甸电影。现在，越来越多的少数民族成员在自己ID地区用自己的语言拍摄电影。事实上，我们出现一些由少数民族导演拍摄的关于自己民族文化的短片。所以，我认为未来可期。

在缅甸，我们有一些著名的演员或大明星，其中最著名的演员名为Nay Toe。他实际上是若开族。他说话时有着很浓的若开口音。

这张图片是一个很好的例子能说明，当缅甸演员想表现少数民族时，他们只是换个头饰和服装。这在缅甸电影中是个大问题。

Nay Toe作为电影明星有20年了，但在他20年的职业生涯中，他从未扮演过若开人。他只是穿着缅族服装说着带口音的缅语扮演缅族人。事实上，我去年曾问过他：你从业20多年，为何从未在你的任何电影里扮演过若开人？

他说，“我只是没有得到任何这样的片约。”

没人邀请他扮演若开人。事实上，我不认为我们有过任何电影是关于若开人的。即使有，他也没能参演。当时情况一团糟。

同样，我们有一个非常著名的说唱歌手和演员，名叫Sai Sai Kham Leng，他是掸族人。但从未有人请他扮演掸族角色。

女性演员也面临同样的情况。我们确实有来自不同民族北京的女演员，但在我们的主流电影中，她们不会扮演任何缅族人意外的角色。这是缅甸主流电影需要着力解决的问题。我们的“缅甸（Myanmar）”电影基本上都是“缅族（Bamar）”电影。我们不怎么拍摄关于我国其他民族的电影，只是在拍缅族人和缅族文化。事实上，我自己就是缅族人，是多数人的一部分，也是过失群体的一部分。

关于多数的刻板印象

那么作为多数的缅族人自己呢？在我们的电影中，他们也有刻板印象吗？我的答案是肯定的。在“缅族（Bamar）”电影中，我们也遇到很多正面和负面的刻板印象。

当我们的电影中出现缅族人时，他们往往是那种得体的、有礼貌的、衣着讲究的、沉稳的人。他们不应该有感情，不应该有父母不认可的关系。在2018年拍摄的电影《姆德拉召唤（Mudras Calling）》中，我们可以看见两个主角在一个酒庄里。那个美国身份的男人在喝酒，但缅族身份的女人喝的是草莓奶昔。这太荒谬了。这是另一种关于“缅族女性从不喝酒”的刻板印象——缅族女性喝酒可就不像淑女了。

电影中，当那个美国身份的男人说：“我爱上你了，你为什么不做我的女朋友？”这个女孩说：“你不知道吗？我不应该和外人恋爱，我是一个正派、优雅并且热爱祖国的缅甸女人。”

举这个例子，我只是想澄清：不仅少数民族受到正面和负面刻板印象的影响，在缅甸主流电影中，作为多数的缅族人也是如此。

审查问题

在结束讲座之前，我想谈谈审查制度。在我看来，根据我的研究，我认为缅甸的电影审查制度可能是亚洲最严格、最疯狂的。我可以肯定地如此声称，因为我也研究过其它国家的审查制度。我们的是最差的。因为我们没有任何具体的规章制度。

我们有一个审查委员会，其中有30个成员参与审查。他们会从各自的任务出发来确保影片符合要求，他们分别代表了政府的不同部门。当然，每个部门都有不同的议程。比如，内政部从他们的角度来看待一部电影，交通部从他们的角度来看待一部电影，其它部门也从自己的角度来看待一部电影。

最后，举个例子。在电影《吉拉（Gila）》中，审查员删掉的一个镜头。这部电影是以19世纪的丛林为背景的。在那个时候，如果在丛林里受伤，会在伤口上抹上泥土来止血，这是他们的常规做法。但是审查员认为这不符合我们的规定，所以不得不删掉那一幕。审查制度也会带来刻板印象的问题。正如我在前面所说过的，当我们用一种人性化的方式来描绘一个民族角色的性格时，审查者会认为，为了与少数民族建立共存关系，不应该呈现少数民族的反派角色：“不能让这个民族的人杀了缅族人！”“不能杀了这个民族的角色！他们会生气的。”“反派不应该穿着民族服装！”所以，我认为我们的审查人员也造成我们的问题。

My primary occupation is a filmmaker and scriptwriter. Therefore, I am not specialized in archaeology or ethnic identity. If you are one of those scholars, my talk may probably be a little superficial for you. In this talk, I am going to talk about the representation of different ethnic groups in Burmese films, it is not going to be a lecture about ethnicity.

I will provide some historical background for you first. As you know, we have many different ethnic groups in Burma. We are very diverse with different cultures and different languages. Even though we have many different ethnic groups, cultures, and languages, the dominant group is what we call the Bamar people. In fact, when the British colonized the country, they misnamed the country Burma, which is the name of the majority ethnic group. Unfortunately, the name stayed in time, which made Burma the official name of the country until 1990 when the ruling military government changed the name to Myanmar.

After we gain independence from Britain, the prime minister—U Nu, was a very devoted Buddhist and a very proud Bamar guy. He either consciously or unconsciously, forced the Bamar ideology, Bamar customs, and Bamar culture into people’s everyday life. That didn’t go very well with other ethnic group members. Soon afterward under the new ruling power of General Ne Win, he was more right-wing, more conservative, and more aggressive in pushing the Bamar identity as the official identity of the country. It was what we called the Bamarnization process.

It was also reflected in our movies and films. Soon after our independence, the civil war happened. The government wanted to make movies about the civil war. From the period of 1950s to the 1990s, we had pro-military propaganda movies in which the brave government army soldiers fought with unknown enemies, because Because they don’t want to show the army of ethnic minorities. In those movies, you do know the fighting, but you don’t know who the enemy is. Because we’re not allowed to portray the enemy as those who belong to a certain group.

Of course, in these films, there exist problems of cultural appropriation. It means you portray people from an ethnic culture in a very cliche way, such as speaking in an accent or dressing in costumes. When one starts changing their accent, or talk slower, they start to become an ethnic group member, which is ridiculous.

Negative Stereotypes and Positive Stereotypes

when you are talking about stereotypes, there are negative stereotypes as well as positive stereotypes. Everyone knows what negative stereotypes are. So, I’m not going to go over it.

Rather, I want to talk about positive stereotypes. Positive stereotypes are a condescending attitude towards ethnic people. In Burma, we do have the stereotypical assumptions that ethnic group members from the countryside are very “simple:”

“They are very simple!”

“They live with nature!”

“They don’t have any greed; they don’t have any flaws!”

“They are very kind, good-hearted, and very honest!”

These kinds of positive stereotypes were artificially created also risk simplifying things. Ethnic people are also human beings, right? Human beings are very complex in nature. They can be good, they can be bad, they can be evil, sometimes they can be mean as well. They have all kinds of social problems. They have double standards. These are human nature. But when you reinforce this kind of positive stereotypes about the ethnic groups, you are losing the complexity of the ethnic groups. In that kind of film, ethnic people just become very simple, honest, and good-hearted folks. Are they really human beings in that sense? Humans become humans when some of them are mean, some of them have negative flaws, some of them have problems.

But the filmmakers were required, “no, no, no!” “Just keep it simple, ethnic people are very honest, very good!” That is the problem we have in our movies.

The decline of Burmese Cinema and the Rise of Filming Technology

From the 1960s to 1970s, Burmese cinema is relative in good shape across south-east Asia. Actually, more than 100 theatrical films had been produced during that time. But after the 1980s, due to the country became very poor, the production started to decline due to the lack of film stocks and equipment. By 1990, our film industry became non-existent almost. We were then only able to produce around 10 films a year. It was the official decline of Burmese Cinema.

But on the other hand, we indeed had the exciting new technology—the VHS videos. So, people started to do movies on VHS tapes. They distributed them through the video rental shops instead of going to the theater. The good thing about the VHS production was what we called “street video movies” emerged. But at the same time, the quality started to decline because of this very cheap and low-quality nature of those street VHS tapes.

When your movies started to decline in quality, which didn’t just mean the technical decline, but also meant the artistic decline, the quality filmmakers simply didn’t want to work in the film industry anymore. The people who replaced these artists, however, are only making films for popularity. They didn’t care about the artistic quality of the film.

In fact, we didn’t even have statistics on how many Street video movies were produced during the 1990s-2010s, because they were just simply way too many. It can be made in two to five days. You can imagine the kind of quality of these street videos. In those street videos, they started to portray ethnic people in many biased and offensive ways.

Representation Matters in Burmese Cinema

Things actually started to improve around 2010. People were then sick of low-quality street videos. Besides, we started to have digital technology during that time. With digital technology, we no longer need expensive film stocks. It is much cheaper and also technologically possible to make movies.

Thanks to digital technology, starting in 2010, our local film industry improved a little. It started to improve their technology, their presentation, and also their general artistic quality. Around 2012, the director named Aung Ko Latt decided to make a film called Kayan Beauties. It is about the long-neck Kayan people who live on the eastern border of Myanmar. The director decided to make the film in the actual location where the Kayan people live.

This film was started in 2012, due to the lack of money and other difficulties, by the time the film came out, it was already 2014, or 2015. Still, we appreciated this film, because, for the very first time in many years, we finally have this respectful portraiture of ethnic minority people. It is not some Bamar people trying to dress up as Kayan people, but actual Kayan people living in the Kayan region.

As I said, it is not perfect. The film is still not very good in our opinion. When it was shown in Burma, nobody really liked it, including me. Because it has a lot of problems, the script has a lot of flaws, as well as flaws in how the film was shot—even though they used digital technology, it was still very old-fashioned. So, the film was not a success.

Though we did not like the movie, we actually appreciated the efforts of the filmmaker because nobody had done that before. Quite frankly, not a lot of people can do that even now, because it is a very costly and difficult process. Kayan Beauties is unique in the sense it was groundbreaking. But another problem with Kayan Beauties is that the scriptwriter is an American, and the director Aung Ko Latt himself is not Kayan. So, there were controversial misinterpretations. They were honest mistakes, but they ended up creating a lot of positive and negative stereotypes as well, which is one of the weaknesses of Kayan Beauties.

Many years later, in 2017 or 2018, a lot of ethnic filmmakers started to shoot movies, they want to tell their own stories in their own voices. The films made by these people are much more authentic because they know what they are talking about. They know what they are making.

Another film called Gila made in 2018. The director’s name is D Htel De. He is an ethnic Rawang in the northern part of Burma. He decided to make an action-adventure film starring people from the Rawang ethnic group.

The writer, director, and editor—D Htel De, is amazing. The film was set in the 19th century. The director knows the terrain, knows the jungle, knows the people, knows the language and culture, which was perfect. He made the movie in 2017. It hit the theater in 2018, which was a modest success since it didn’t have big stars of course. Unfortunately, I encouraged the director to submit it to international film festivals. In the beginning, he didn’t know how to do these things. We helped him with that. But for some reason, he was not too keen on international film festivals, even though it deserves to be shown in international film festivals. In the end, it didn’t go anywhere beyond the theatrical release in Burma.

It was my favorite 2018's Burmese movie. Now, more and more ethnic members are making films in their own language, in their own region. In fact, we recently have some short films are made by ethnic directors about their own ethnic culture. So, I think the future is very exciting.

In Burma, we do have famous actors, actresses, and superstars. I am going to show a picture of the most famous actor in Burma. His name is Nay Toe. I don’t know if you know about the ethnic Rakhine people in western Burma. He is a Rakhine actually. He has a very strong Rakhine accent when he speaks.

(By the way, this is a very good assemblage of cultural appropriation. When a Burmese actor wants to represent ethnic people, they just changed the head-dresses and the costumes. This is a big problem in Burma.)

He has been a film star for 20 years. But in 20 years of his career, he has never portrayed himself as a Rakhine person. He has only acted as the Bamar guy in a Bamar dress with a very forced Bamar accent. Actually, I got to talk to him last year, I asked him why you are not playing any Rakhine person in any of your movies in 20 years of your career?

He said, “I just simply did not get any offer.”

Nobody offered him to play a Rakhine guy. In fact, I don’t think we have any movie about Rakhine people. Even if we have, he was not cast in. The situation was messed up in that way.

Likewise, we have a very famous rapper and actor called Sai Sai Kham Leng. He is an ethnic Shan person, but he was never offered to play a Shan character.

Actresses face the same situation as well. We do have actresses from different ethnic backgrounds, but they are not offered to play anything other than Bamar characters in our mainstream films. This is the problem that the Myanmar mainstream films need to work on. Our “Myanmar” films are basically Bamar films. We are not making films about other ethnic groups in our country. We are only making films about Bamar people and Bamar culture. I am actually a Bamar myself, part of the majority, part of the guilty group.

Stereotypes about Majority

But what about the majority Bamar people themselves? Do they suffer from stereotypes as well in our films? My answer is yes. In the Bamar films, we suffer from a lot of positive and negative stereotypes as well.

When we are talking about Bamar in the films, they are often the proper, polite, well-dressed, and well-composed kind of people. They are not supposed to have feelings. They are not supposed to have a relationship that is not approved by their parents. In the film "Mudras Calling" which was made in 2018, we can see the two main characters were in a winery. The American guy, he was drinking wine. But what she was drinking is a strawberry shake, which is just ridiculous. This is another stereotype that Bamarnese women don’t drink. It is not lady-like for Bamarnese women to drink alcohol.

When the American guy was saying, “I am in love with you, why don’t you be my girlfriend?”

The girl said, “don’t you know, I am not supposed to have a relationship with an outsider, I am a proper and elegant Bamarnese woman who loves my country.”

I just want to clarify that not just ethnic minorities suffer from positive and negative stereotypes, but also, the majority Bamar people in mainstream Burmese films.

Censorship Issues

Before wrapping up, I want to talk about censorship. In my opinion, according to my research, I think our film censorship is possibly the strictest and craziest in Asia. I think I can confidently make the statement because I also study censorship in other countries. Ours is the worst. Our censorship is crazy because we don’t have any specific rules or regulations.

We have an examination committee in our film censorship with 30 members involved. They need to see the film depend on their respective tasks to ensure that the film could comply with the requests. Those requests represent different departments of the government. And of course, each sector has a different agenda. The Ministry of the interior looks at a film from their perspective, the Ministry of transportation looks at a film from their perspective, and other departments view a movie from their own perspective.

The film, Gila, the censor cut one scene in that film. The film was set in the jungle in the 19th century. Back in the time, in those places, when you cut yourself, you stopped the bleeding by putting mud or dirt on your wound, which was the normal practice for them. But the censor thinks it is not in accordance with our regulation, so we have to cut that scene. The censorship also tends to add problems to stereotypes as well. As I said at the beginning of my talk when we portray an ethnic character in a very humanly complex way, the censor will think, ethnic people are not supposed to be bad people, we need to build co-existence with ethnic people. “You cannot have this ethnic person killing the Bamar guy!” “You cannot kill this ethnic character! Because they will be pissed off.”The villain is not supposed to dress in an ethnic dress!” So, I think our censors also contributed to the problems we have.