Hey, d'you remember how my last omake was originally just the plot summary section of a wikipedia-style article? And how I said that I had most of the Production section done? Yeah, well...
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Songs of the City: Development and Production
Conception and Development
The concept that would later be developed into Songs of the City was initially conceived in 1972, when the creator Hu Chu Won was in his first year studying Fine Arts at Maobao University. This initial version was imagined as a comedic anthology series that would be published in the University's newsletter – in the style of newspaper comics – and would satirise the then-ongoing feud between the management of the Arts Faculty and the Theatre Department. This reimagination of Eastern Europe was designed to evoke the stories one of Hu Chu's adoptive fathers told of his native Belarus, which he had been forced to flee due to homophobia. However, the newsletter rejected Hu Chu's proposal, and he dropped the idea to focus on his studies. It was shortly thereafter that Hu Chu first encountered animation, when one of his professors showed her class a collection of Chinese and Russian animated shorts. Following this, Hu Chu and several other students interested by the films would collaborate with their professors to create one of Guangchou's first video circle: they would import and copy foreign animated films – including much of the Disney Animated Canon – and meet with like-minded students from other Universities at various Culture Festivals to both play and share them. It was during this time that Hu Chu Won met and befriended Sho Jo Weng and Mei Wei, becoming part of a group – a precursor to the legendary "Magic Circle" of Guangchou animators – who collaborated in order to learn how to animate by reverse-engineering the Principles of Animation. With the encouragement of these friends, Hu Chu began work on his own animated short – The River's Dance – in early 1973.
Following the Iwo Jima Crisis, however, Hu Chu Won would be distracted from this project upon learning that Maobao University had obtain high quality American film-making equipment as part of the settlement. Hu Chu grew increasingly fascinated with film-making, and considered reviving Songs of the City as a live-action film – going so far as to prepare a script and conduct some test shooting. It was at this stage that the darker sides of the story began to take shape, leading to the invention of the central murder-mystery plot as a narrative through-line. Hu Chu was unsatisfied with the project, however, and abandoned it in favour of renewing his efforts in animation. As a result, Hu Chu managed to complete The River's Dance in time for the 1973 Celebrated Universal Exhibition of the Fruits of the Labour of Guangchou's Peerless Artists and Entertainers in the Capital, where he and several other Magic Circle animators had arranged a screening wherein each would take turns showing their own animated shorts.
One attendee of this screening was Ai Wo, a young agent of Guangchou Security who had been sent to investigate the group for potential seditious activity. She was amazed by the group's work, and met them following the screening to share contact information and obtain copies of their work. Ai Wo then used these copies to arrange a second, internal screening within the Guangchou Security Department. This attracted interest throughout the government, and gradually became an impromptu fundraiser for the Magic Circle: indeed, one senior official who attended this internal screening would connect several TV producers with Ai Wo, which eventually resulted in a televised showing of the shorts in 1975.
Meanwhile, the Circle were hungry to graduate from making shorts onto animating a full feature-film. Several members of the group provided pitches for the project, including Hu Chu Won sharing the script he had written for Songs of the City. However, there were concerns regarding the size of the project, especially with several of the group's members still nominally being in full-time education. Therefore a compromise was agreed upon where each member was given scenes to work on at their leisure. The group immediately began storyboarding, and by the end of 1973 the film had entered the early stages of production. In this, the Circle were supported by Ai Wo, who was gradually feeding funds to the project from the stockpile accrued by the Government screenings. Not only did this financial support allow the group to dedicate their time to animation, but it also created interest and rumours within the film community of a fully funded Guangchou film. While come were disappointed upon learning of the film's animated nature, others were keen to join the animation team, leading to an influx of talent into the project – which only grew stronger following the Thai and Cambodian Brain Drains, with the now-legendary Thai-Indian animator Arjuna Niram joining the core Magic Circle in 1975.
Not long before the film reached completion, however, the Guangchou government began a scheme to generate domestic film production – designed to create the institution colloquially known as "Commiewood". During this time there was a scramble by the authorities to find adequately developed film projects to serve as flagships for the program. To this end, Ai Wo was contacted in late spring of 1976 by Lai Xien, the TV producer behind the screening of the Magic Circle's shorts. He was surprised to discover the group had not only begun development of a feature film, but were nearly finished. With the team's funds almost fully depleted, Lai Xien was able to give a much-needed infusion of cash: the team were able to hire professional recording equipment to record the film's score, foley and voice-track, as well as being able to work full-time during the final push of production. All of this allowed the film to be completed on time, and Songs of the City was officially screened for the first time on New Year's Day, 1977, at the Glorious Celebration for the Success of Guangchou in All Artistic and Cultural Fields Festival.
Animation and Sound
The development of Songs of the City was troubled on account of the film's informal early production. The initial core of animators – the first ten members of the "Magic Circle" – were not only separated across five different universities, but were also expected to maintain their studies while working on the film. Furthermore, due to Guangchou's inadequate telecom infrastructure at the time, and the group's infrequent physical meetings, most directorial communication for the film's early development was conducted by mail. To alleviate these problems, Hu Chu Won decided to divide the group into smaller teams, with each geographic group being assigned to animate scenes for one of the in-universe cities. During this time, Hu Chu would commute to from Maobao University to the neighbouring Fenxiao University to lead the Tembara team, while Sho Jo Weng led the Luthol team, Tai Fang the Prizgrad team and Mei Wei worked exclusively on the Morozsk scenes. This approach gave each team leader directorial experience, and also led to the film's uniquely experimental and varied animation styles; with each city animated differently, their individual atmosphere and tone are better reflected in the film's animation while emphasising the juxtaposition between locations.
However, this approach also created significant problems for production. Most notably, Hu Chu Won was forced to adapt the story to each team's different levels of progress and speed, rewriting the script several times to move scenes from Prizgrad and Morozsk to Luthol and Tembara. This created significant friction between the teams, exacerbated by the communication bottlenecks causing misunderstanding within the group. Accusations were made of scene theft, and several cuts of animation had to be scrapped after significant work. Production threatened to break down entirely in early 1975, but was saved by the intervention of Ai Wo, who managed to obtain authorisation for the team to use government channels to contact each other, as well as creating arrangements for the Circle to be brought together following the graduation of several of their members in the summer of that year.
Following those graduations, production became significantly smoother. Hu Chu Won, Ai Wo, Sho Jo Weng and Mei Wei all moved into a single office, while Tai Fang and the other remaining undergrad members of the group continued to work remotely – albeit with significantly more frequent visits by Hu Chu Won. Several of their trainee animators joined them. To commemorate their new status as a full production studio, the group renames themselves as the Lagona Production House after the view from their offices – becoming the first of several studio set up by members of the Magic Circle. Now able to work under the same roof, production of the film continued with relatively few issues, especially after the extra infusion of cash by Lai Xien. The animation of the film was declared finished in October of 1975, with a frantic period of editing thereafter to prepare the film for its release at New Year. Despite the problems it caused, Hu Chu Won would use modified iterations of this production style on his later projects, albeit with significantly more direct oversight. In contrast, several of his fellow Magic Circle animators would later use more traditional forms of staff management when producing their own films.
An entirely different set of problems plagues the development of the film's sound and score. Initially, the film was set to receive music and sound direction from Qiang Shi – an acquaintance of Hu Chu's from his earlier schooling – who offered to perform the role after having done so for The River's Dance. However, friction began to develop between Qiang Shi and Hu Chu Won regarding the soundtrack of the film; while Qiang wanting to mix of traditional Guangchou music and western orchestra to create a sense of familiarity and foreignness in the soundtrack, Hu Chu wanted to incorporate a jazz influence to reflect the film's period and its less rigid sense of reality. This tension would grow as production continued, and while Hu Chu would praise Qiang's work on the foley and soundscape of the project, he remained highly resistant to to the proposed soundtrack. This would come to a head in early 1976, when Hu Chu decided to hire a second composer for the film – the student and recent refugee from Cambodia, Kanleakhana "Hana-Chan" Chan. Hana-Chan would provide the jazz-influenced tracks that Hu Chu requested, while Qiang was further pressed into the sound direction and editing role. Qiang frequently complained about feeling degraded in the role, and left the project shortly after. Ironically, this gave Hana-Chan the confidence to stand up to Hu Chu's demands, pushing to keep and rework much of Qiang Shi's work on the film. Qiang was brought back on board, and collaborated with Hana-Chan to create the film's final score, which all three found satisfactory. The soundtrack was recorded in September of 1976, played by the Graduate's Orchestra of Fenxiao University in said University's music hall. While Qiang and Hana-Chan became close friends during this process, Qiang Shi refused to speak to Hu Shu Won for years following the feud, and adamantly refused to work on any future projects with him even after they reconciled.
Casting
During early production for the film, a temporary voice track for the film was created by the animators themselves, using their own basic performances as a basis for their animation and timings. As production continued, however, it became increasingly apparent that a professional cast needed to be assembled for the film. To this end, Hu Chu Won made overtures towards his friends from the Theatre Department – with whom he had made screen-tests for a live-action Songs of the City – but was rebuffed. Meanwhile, Ai Wo approached several more professional Theatre troupes, but none were interested in the work for the rates being offered. Without any further recourse, the Magic Circle decided to post advertisements for paid voice roles at their local universities, arranging open auditions across four separate locations. Over the course of a week in June of 1975, Hu Chu Won and Ai Wo would drive the length of Guangchou to attend these auditions, alongside the local members of the Magic Circle. These auditions proved to be a success – with unexpectedly high levels of interest in all locations – and the group were able to agree upon the voice cast.
Later that summer, at the Grand Commemoration of Guangchou Artists and Entertainers Following Their Ambitious and Laudable But Ultimately Futile Efforts to Help The Glorious Workers Beat the Summer Heat Through Distraction Festival in August 1975, the cast was assembled for the first time to create the provisional voice track for the film. While the team agreed that the new cast was a substantial improvement, the new voice-work did necessitate several minor alterations to the film's animation – which diminished the team's already dwindling funds. As a result, the actors were not contacted again following their initial payment, with several believing that the entire project had fallen apart. However, following the financial intervention of Lai Xien, they were contacted again, and were invited to record the film at the group's new Lagona Production House. While most of the cast returned, the actor playing Aleksandrov had unfortunately died in a climbing accident earlier that year, leading to Sho Jo Weng to reprise the role from the group's initial scratch audio. Over the following week, the cast recorded their lines for the public release of the film, experimenting with different techniques before finally settling on group recording sessions. Despite technical difficulties with the new equipment, the actors would later comment on this time fondly, and would all subsequently work again with either Hu Chu Won or one of his fellow Magic Circle animators in the future.
Several years later, all surviving members of the cast would return to provide their voices to the new language cut of the film, following the Language Rationalisation reforms.
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AN: Will be edited in after I've got some sleep. Of note: I conceived of the "Magic Circle" as something of a foil to Disney's Nine Old Men, as a group of young students who emerged as talented animators. I've made up a lot of names, including some suitably ostentatious festival names. Ultimately, though, this is just my exercise in justifying how an entire animated film could be released quickly as a flagship of Commiewood. I probably won't finish the rest of the wiki-style article, if only because the big sections left are Release and Reception - which I understand even less than communist film production - and an Interpretation, Themes and Legacy section, which feels a bit too self-congratulatory to write myself. More stuff later.
