If you are familiar with the image of Fu Manchu, you will naturally see the clues. Fu Manchu is a character in a series of novels by British novelist Sachs Romer. He is the most evil existence in the world. The image of Fu Manchu comes from the British's observation and imagination of the Qing Dynasty people in the 19th century. In the book "Killing a Thousand Swords", a monograph about Lingchi punishment in China, Bu Zhengmin revealed that in the 19th century, Europeans were full of interest in the Chinese's barbaric punishment system. The image of the Qing Dynasty officials as arrogant and cruel gradually became a "prejudice" in the minds of Europeans through the narratives of reporters in China at the time. The character Fu Manchu has a profound influence. He seems to be an evil ghost, existing in literature, comics, and movies.
Leaving aside the influence of Fu Manchu, the "Qing Dynasty" zombies designed by Hong Kong filmmakers may have deeper psychological factors. Nowadays, when talking about the reasons for the popularity of Hong Kong horror films in the 1980s, almost everyone will say that "the signing of the Joint Declaration between China and Britain, the issue of the 1997 return and other 'deadlines', invisibly formed a sense of collective destiny, and it emerged in society. To eliminate suspicion and superstitious mentality." The uncertainty of the future made Hong Kong people very anxious at that time.
"Qing Dynasty official uniform" is undoubtedly a symbol of the imperial era. It is naturally self-evident where this reckless danger leads. In Li Bihua's film "Ghost Cadre", this danger is even more obvious. The evil in "Ghost Cadre" is the remnant of the Japanese invasion, and the "zombie" in "I Have a Date with a Zombie" is also related to the Japanese invasion.
Whether it is in "Liao Zhai" or other notebook novels, the ghosts understood by the Chinese people are almost formed by "absorbing the essence of the sun and the moon, and the aura of the heaven and the earth." For example, there are common foxes, snakes, flower demons, etc. Some rely on their own cultivation, while some absorb the spirits of heaven and earth unintentionally and become demons or even immortals. There may be vicious demons who often find conventional cultivation too slow, so they take desperate risks and suck people's essence and blood to achieve the goal of becoming immortals.
▲Stills from the movie "Green Snake"
"When the oil runs out and the lamp dries up, the person dies and the body perishes." The most direct manifestation of death is the elimination of the body. However, zombies break the law of death and become immortal. Zombies are neither demons nor immortals. Demons and immortals have clear pedigrees, especially immortals, who have extremely strict social systems and power structures. Zombies should be classified as "weird", as is the so-called "no words, strange power and chaos". The status of "weird" in Chinese supernatural culture is extremely low, far inferior to that of "demon". After all, demons can still cultivate this ascending channel and ascend to the fairy world through personal efforts.
The formation of zombies is due to the transformation of corpses, without the purpose of cultivating immortals. This kind of corpse transformation seems to be a "gene mutation" in the death process, which develops horrifying results. Pu Songling wrote a story about "Corpse Transformation" in "Liao Zhai", which tells the story of four travelers staying in an inn at night. The shopkeeper's wife died recently, "in the morgue." Unexpectedly, a corpse mutilation occurred that night. This female corpse smells a bit like a zombie, but it does not suck blood. Instead, it will "blow" on sleeping people - anyone who is "blowed" by it will die.
However, what is interesting is that the zombies here actually have physical limitations: "There are white poplars outside the door, about four or five feet around. Because the tree is its own building, those on the right will go to the left, and those on the left will go to the right. The corpse is angry, but everyone is tired." Being tired means getting tired slowly. It can be seen that this "zombie" still retained its humanity, and it was not until later that it became a motionless, veritable zombie. Considering that the novel emphasizes the two contrasting factors of "silence" and "increased breathing", perhaps we can understand that Pu Songling is actually telling a scary joke: snoring too loud will cause corpse transformation of. However, Pu Songling did not directly state the cause of the corpse's transformation.