Huaju Film Company

The Huaju Film Company was a film production studio active in Shanghai, Republic of China, between 1925 and 1932. Established by the brothers Zhang Qingpu and Zhang Huimin, it mostly produced wuxia films starring Huimin and his girlfriend Wu Suxin. The company, which also produced a magazine to promote its films, closed after the January 28 incident destroyed its studios.

History

The Huaju Film Company was established in late 1925 by the brothers Zhang Qingpu and Zhang Huimin, sons of a wealthy Cantonese businessman. In 1924, their brother Zhang Huichong had established the Lianhe Film Company; he later helped with several Huaju productions. Huimin starred in most of the company's films, while Qingpu stayed mostly behind the scenes. The company was headquartered in Shanghai, at the corner of Sichuan North and Haining roads. In October 1927, Huaju joined the Liuhe Film Sales Company, a consortium of film companies intended to facilitate distribution.
In 1926, Huaju produced a short documentary film on the Shanghai Fire Brigade. To complement Zhang Huimin, the company hired Wu Suxin, who had previously acted for the Tianyi Film Company, as its main star. She later served as assistant director for the company, and was living with him as his girlfriend. Another employee, Cai Chusheng, was discovered by Huaju in Shantou while the crew was filming White Lotus. He was cast in Huaju's The Simpleton's Luck, but worked only briefly for the company and later omitted it from his memoirs. Another employee of the company was the director Chen Tian, who was active as early as 1926.
Huaju made White Lotus in 1927, drawing from a Cantonese opera about a young man who sees the spirit of his beloved in a white lotus; in the film, she had not died, but been rescued by a fisherman. Another 1927 production, Lustrous Pearls, depicted a conflict over pearls that resulted in a young man being kidnapped by his colleagues. He is rescued by his girlfriend and his sister, who subsequently save another captive and arrange for the pearls' retrieval.
In 1928, following the success of the Mingxing Film Company's The Burning of the Red Lotus Temple, Huaju made Hero in Fire. It followed a young man who, after rescuing a woman from the rapids of the Qiantang River, joins her father's fire brigade; he later must use these skills to rescue his benefactor. Another film, Orphan of the Storm, was a melodrama that borrowed from D. W. Griffith's Way Down East by depicting the suffering of a young woman before segueing into an action film following the hero's attempt to rescue her from her abductors.
To promote its films, Huaju intermittently published the Huaju Special Issue, a magazine edited by He Ken and Huang Zhigang. Aside from coverage of the company's productions, the magazine published works of poetry and essays on topics ranging from screenwriting to the philosophy of film. These essays, while making references to Western thinkers such as Lord Byron, Henrik Ibsen, and Oscar Wilde, advocated a view that cinema should serve the needs of the Republic of China. One essay called for "smash the silver screen" and advancing a new vision of cinema.
The wuxia genre became problematized in the early 1930s, and film production was reduced. Later, the Kuomintang government banned martial arts films for spreading superstition. Huaju's studio was destroyed during the January 28 incident, a Japanese incursion into Shanghai in 1932. The company was closed thereafter.

Partial filmography

The majority of the films produced by Huaju were in the wuxia genre, with elements of adventure and detective fiction. Many drew from serial dramas and Westerns. Most starred Zhang Huimin and Wu Suxin. Generally, its main characters were presented in modern attire and dealt with modern technology. Several of the films featured leading lady Wu Suxin portraying characters who passed as men, and in this capacity establishing a partnership with a male warrior while also drawing a woman's romantic affections.
The majority of Huaju's films are lost. However, Orphan of the Storm has survived in its entirety, and Lustrous Pearls is likewise available. Much of The Valiant Girl White Rose is lost; only 27 minutes are known to have survived.

Indicates film is extant

English title	Traditional Chinese	Simplified Chinese	Release
Hero of Troubled Times
The Bandit of Shandong			1927
White Lotus			1927
Lustrous Pearls			1927
The Beauty and the Tiger
Aviation Hero			1928
Hero in Fire
The Village Hero
Hero of the Dust Seas
The Detective's Wife			1928
A Shadow Thief
The Valiant Girl White Rose			1929
Orphan of the Storm			1929
The Hero and the Beauty
Lan, a Female Thief			1930
King of Heroes
Night of Horrors
Immortality
A Narrow Escape
Strive
Colourful World