The making of the collective is the central question of two of director Chen Kaige's early films, Yellow Earth (1984) and The Big Parade (1985). Both films re-enact the problematic, sometimes violent process through which individuals are transformed into members of 'the People.' In Yellow Earth, this transformation hinges on the relationship between collecting folk songs and 'collecting' peasants - 'mobilizing and recruiting them into the ranks of the People. Collecting, in other words, is means to a pedagogical end; the latter is achieved by replacing the peasants' old tunes with new, revolutionary songs. This presentation focuses on an ambiguous moment in the film when collecting fails, and the failure becomes a lesson. In showing how this uncollected moment answers to the two main issues around which the conflict between the old and the new is played out, namely, arranged marriage and superstition, my reading draws out the film's critique of the People and its ambivalent view of the peasants.