Lest Ye Be Judged
| Lest Ye Be Judged | |
|---|---|
| Theatrical release poster Promotional release poster | |
| Original title | 慎毋責人 |
| Directed by | Daniel Sim |
| Written by | Daniel Sim |
| Produced by | Daniel Sim Rupert Lee |
| Starring | Joshua Tsui Sunny Lee Han Lim |
| Cinematography | Francis Hui |
| Edited by | Chung Kwok-chak |
| Music by | Jonathan Nip |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | New Era Film and Television |
Release dates |
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Running time | 157 minutes |
| Country | Nakong |
| Languages | Paisha Estmerish |
| Lest Ye Be Judged | |||||||||||||
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| Simplified script | 慎毋责人 | ||||||||||||
| Traditional script | 慎毋責人 | ||||||||||||
| Literal meaning | "Be careful not to judge others" | ||||||||||||
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Lest Ye Be Judged (Shangean: 慎毋責人) is a 2023 Nakongese historical drama film written, directed and produced by Daniel Sim. Set against the background of the Patlin trials, the film follows a young couple as their budding romance is overtaken by the events of the Unionist Crisis and the persecution of pro-Shangean students in the 1960s. Starring Joshua Tsui as Rupert and Sunny Lee as Linda, the film uses fictional characters to explore a historical event in Nakongese history that has widely been acknowledged as a miscarriage of justice.
The film was selected by the Nakongese Academy of Cinema as the country's submission to the 84th Montecara Film Festival, where it premiered on 30 October 2023. The film's nomination generated controversy in Nakong, as the sensitive subject matter and sympathetic portrayal of a Shangean unionist character led to accusations that it promotes unpatriotic sentiments and shows a negative view of Nakongese history to the world.
Plot
Rupert Liao is a law student at the National University of Nakong in Ningcho who sits through a lecture on the history of habeas corpus in Estmerish law, after which he watches his friend Kwok-chin get into a debate with the professor about whether colonial laws remain relevant in the nascent Nakongese Republic. On his way home, he meets the young typist Linda on the tram and the two take a liking to each other.
Over the next days, Rupert continues to run into Linda on the tram and the pair begin talking about their lives during their commute. Over these conversations, Linda learns that Rupert aspires to become a lawyer and advocate for the powerless, while Rupert learns that Linda is the secretary to Arnold Yau, the national police commissioner. Rupert eventually asks Linda on a date, and she accepts. They spend the day walking around the city market and discussing their family lives, ending the evening by sharing a kiss by the fountain.
After class the next day, Rupert is invited by Kwok-chin to the first meeting of an anti-imperialist club on campus. He attends out of obligation and meets Henry and Elaine, two committed unionists who induct him into the club. When he relays this to Linda that evening, she becomes concerned and tells him to be careful. Later, the two lovers have kindled their relationship and spend a week hiking around Mount Fui, where Linda reveals that she wanted to study to become a teacher but took a secretarial job out of familial duty after her father was injured and could no longer earn money.
After they return to Ningcho, Rupert learns that Kwok-chin, Henry and Elaine have been expelled for subversive activities. He pays them a visit, where they reveal that they will move to Patlin to join like-minded youth and encourage him to come with them. Torn between concern for his friends and desire to continue his studies, he declines but promises that he will come be with them soon. The opportunity presents itself at a career fair, where he passes up a prestigious clerkship in Ningcho in order to take an articling position in Patlin. Linda is saddened that Rupert plans to move across the country, but the two agree to pursue a long-distance relationship and visit each other frequently.
Once in Patlin, Rupert learns that his friends have joined up with an underground unionist cell that is planning a city-wide general strike. When Linda comes for a visit, she is gravely alarmed by this news and begs Rupert to stay away. Back in Ningcho, Linda overhears plans at police headquarters for a raid on the Patlin cell and rushes to call Rupert, warning him to avoid the area. Rupert chooses to inform the whole group, who flee their apartment just in time. One of the cell members, Kang, is revealed to be a police informant and tells headquarters of a mole within their ranks.
Suspected of being the leak, Linda is interrogated but refuses to incriminate herself. Though not charged, she is fired from her secretarial job and disowned by her family. Feeling betrayed, Linda tells Rupert that she hopes never to see him again. She instantly regrets her words, but he hangs up. With nothing left to lose, he has given up his studies and fully immersed himself with the Patlin cell in an attempt to steer them away from the influence of violent extremists within the group. The general strike is a success and the city is paralyzed by a groundswell of unionist sentiment, though the young organizers are horrified when the military is summoned to crush the movement. They are soon arrested and charged with high treason. After a rushed trial where the biased Judge Tan castigates them as traitors and refuses to admit their evidence despite Rupert's eloquent advocacy on their behalf, the students are devastated when they are sentenced to death by the court.
Upon hearing the news, Linda rushes to Patlin and reconciles with Rupert, visiting him every day in prison as they await news of his appeal. With unshakable faith in the majesty of the law, Rupert is convinced that the judgment was in error and would be corrected soon. One day, they have a heartfelt conversation about marrying and moving in together once he is freed, when a guard barges into the room and announces that the Court of Appeal has rejected his appeal and set his execution for the following morning. With his faith in justice shattered, Rupert bids a tearful farewell to Linda, but not before he makes her promise him to pursue her dreams of becoming a teacher. They admit to each other that they have always loved each other.
In the present day, an elderly Linda is the retired principal of an elementary school. She walks past the courthouse and sees a vision of her young self walking up the steps with Rupert on their wedding day. She wistfully smiles and walks on.
Cast
- Joshua Tsui as Rupert Liao, a law student whose passion for defending the powerless and whose fierce loyalty to his friends leads him to fall into Shangean unionist circles. Though fictional, he is partially based on Ng Ka-leong (1940–1963), a student indicted during the Patlin trials who attempted to represent himself during the trial. Like Liao, Ng was treated dismissively by the judge and sentenced to death by hanging.
- Sunny Lee as Linda Tam, a young typist who dreams of becoming a teacher but whose familial duties lead her to take a job as secretary to the national police commissioner.
- Han Lim as Yuen Kwok-chin, an idealistic student and Rupert's best friend whose anti-imperialist convictions lead him to become a leader in the underground Shangean unionist movement.
- Martina Wong as Elaine Lee, a committed Shangean unionist who attempts to influence Kwok-chin and Rupert into joining their ranks.
- Freddie Lau as Henry Tam, an extremist Shangean unionist student who advocates for violent action to overthrow the Nakongese state and attempts to push the cell towards direct action.
- Peter Choi as Kang, a police informant who infiltrates the unionist student cell and betrays the group to the authorities.
- Ian Lau as Mr Justice Tan, presiding judge of the Patlin county court. Howard Tan (1921–2012) was an actual judge who presided over the trials of several of the Patlin defendants and was later appointed to the Court of Appeal, Nakong's highest court. Tan's family strenuously objects to his portrayal in the film and has threatened to bring suit against Lau, Sim and the production company for defamation.
Themes
Title
Both the Shangean and Estmerish titles of the film come from Matthew 7:1, which reads "Judge not, lest ye be judged" in Estmerish and 「慎毋責人、庶免受責。」 in Shangean. This line, said by Jesus Sotiras in the Sermon on the Mount, cautions his disciples that judgment is not man's but God's to cast and that those who sit in judgment of others would in turn face divine judgment. This line was was selected for the film's title due to its thematic connection to justice and its caution that the judges who mete out unfair punishment would face retribution for their sins, symbolizing the increasingly negative historical reputation of the Patlin trials and a growing recognition in Nakongese society that the trials represent a great injustice. In the character of Rupert, who bore no specific allegiance to the Shangean unionist cause and whose only crime was his excess of compassion for the downtrodden, parallels can be drawn to Jesus Sotiras himself and his martyrdom.
Judgment and retribution
An important theme in Lest Ye Be Judged is the final yet errant nature of judgment, as even Rupert's eloquent advocacy on the students' behalf cannot prevent the nakedly unfair verdict from dooming the group to their predetermined fate. In showcasing the injustice of the Patlin trials, the film condemns the ethics of capital punishment and asks the audience to interrogate their own pre-judged notions about a turbulent era of Nakongese history where the unionists have traditionally been portrayed as villainous anarchists.
In condemning the act of rushing to judgment, the movie also castigates those who seek retribution. Throughout the film, extremist voices on both sides dominate the discourse and create a cycle of violence, with the student leader Henry's misguided romantic notions of revolution leading him to push the group past the tipping point where their actions result in a violent confrontation with the military that costs many lives. In turn, the hanging judge Tan's preconceived notions about order result in him abandoning his own objectivity and presiding over a kangaroo court to make an example out of the students.
Law and justice
Throughout the film, Rupert maintains an unshakable belief in the majesty of the law, beginning in the classroom where he defends the virtues of Estmerish colonial law to his anti-colonial classmates and ending even as he awaits news of his appeal from death row. Desiring to become a lawyer himself in order to advocate for the powerless, he views the law as a noble tool to be harnessed in the pursuit of justice, and fails in his youthful innocence to notice the rotten foundations of a legal system that has fallen silent in a time of war.
It is only when the highest court in the land confirms his death sentence that Rupert's unshakable belief in justice is destroyed, symbolizing the loss of innocence of Nakongese society in the 1960s as it abandoned many of the lofty values upon which the republic was founded in order to root out the existential unionist threat. Accordingly, the film's treatment of the law can be read as either an impassioned plea for building a society upon the rule of law or as a cautionary tale about how the law alone is unable to prevent injustices from being inflicted upon insular minorities.
Production
Lest Ye Be Judged began as a student short film by director Daniel Sim as his capstone project at the Nakong University of the Arts in 2016. The 17-minute film, entitled The Law Falls Silent, follows a young woman as she watches the trial of her lover from the stands of the courtroom during the Patlin trials. After the commercial success of Sim's first feature film The North Bay Limited, interest grew in turning his debut student project into a full-length film.
Producer Rupert Lee, who previously produced The North Bay Limited, secured funding from the state-owned Nakong Development Corporation's Culture Fund to finance the film's production. Filming began on location in Ningcho and Patlin in June 2022, with additional scenes filmed near Mount Fui in August 2022. A well-known classical composer, Dr Jonathan Nip, composed the music for the film.
Release
Lest Ye Be Judged is set to premiere at the 84th Montecara Film Festival, followed by a theatrical release on 10 November 2023. Due to its nomination for an international film award, demand for the film was originally expected to be high and a major advertising campaign promoted the film throughout Nakong in the lead-up to the premiere.
The film was set to be distributed by Nakong Film and Entertainment (NKFE), the largest film distributor in Nakong and the largest distributor of Paisha-language films in the world. However, following the controversy over its sensitive subject matter, NKFE announced that it would no longer distribute the film and sold the distribution rights for a reportedly low price to New Era Film and Television, a small independent distributor based in Ningcho. New Era announced its plans to proceed with the original theatrical release timeline, though the number of cinemas willing to exhibit the film is reportedly low due to concerns about public backlash.
Reception
Controversy
The choice of a subject matter widely considered taboo in Nakong, the sympathetic portrayal of pro-Shangean students, and the depiction of some Nakongese judges and police officers as villainous sparked fierce controversy in the leadup to the release of Lest Ye Be Judged, with many Internet users calling for a boycott of the film and some politicians associated with the ruling Self-Determination Congress urging legal action against the producers and others involved in the film's production.
In the days following the release of the film's promotional trailer, #BoycottUnpatrioticMovie became the top-trending hashtag on Nakongese Chirper. Internet users and press commentators attacked the film as pro-Shangea or libellous to Nakong's founding generation, while the editorial board of the New Express tabloid called for the immediate replacement of the film with a "suitably patriotic alternative" in competition at the Montecara Film Festival. The family of Mr Justice Howard Tan, the judge depicted in the film, has filed a statement of claim for defamation against the director.
Many institutions which facilitated the film have come under public and political scrutiny, with a parliamentary committee opening an inquiry into the Nakong Development Corporation due to the use of public money by the NDC Culture Fund to finance the film's production. The Nakongese Academy of Cinema, the trade group representing the Nakongese film industry, was inundated with a wave of resignations by members over its selection of the film for international competition.
However, some notable Nakongese personalities have come out in support of the film, with Frederic Chak, the "father of Paisha cinema", praising its "bold use of the medium of film to interrogate national myths". The editorial board of The South Seas Herald-Advocate proclaimed the backlash against the film to be "embarrassing" and urged the public to reserve judgment until they could watch the film for themselves. After initially defending the film as an "expression of the artistic freedom which we value in Nakong", Prime Minister Andrew Ng Fan-chiu later described Lest Ye Be Judged as "very offensive to many Nakongese" and "not a good candidate to showcase Nakong to the world at a major film festival". Despite a parliamentary motion calling on him to dismiss the head of the Nakong Development Corporation over the agency's role in financing the film, he has yet to take any action.