Abstract
Prior to the early 1980s, the study of Chinese cinema in academia was a rarity in the West. This situation changed in the mid-1980s in the wake of a number of events that generated new interest in Chinese cinema.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Zhang Yingjin
My gratitude to the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan for granting me a postdoctoral research fellowship in 1995-96, and to its faculty and staff for making that academic year my most productive one. This essay was first completed and presented at Michigan in December 1995; a Chinese version was presented at Beijing University, Nankai University, and Xiamen University in June 1996.
Notes
The pre-1980 publications, usually of informational rather than academic nature, supplied basic but much-needed materials on the cultural and political history of modern China, or on significant film events, figures, and studios; some of them also came with biographical entries on major directors and plot summaries of selected films. For samples, see Jay Leyda, Dianying: An Account of Films and the Film Audience in China (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1972); Régis Bergeron, Le cinéma chinois, 1905-1949 (Lausanne: Alfred Eibel, 1977); Cinema e spettacolo in Cina oggi, XlV Mostra internazionale del nuovo cinema quaderno informativo, n. 75 (a cura dell'ufficio documentazione della Mostra, 1978).
References
- Mül-ler, Marco , 1982. Ombre elettriche: Saggi e ricerche sul cinema cinese . Milan: Regione Piemonte/Electa; 1982, produced two fine Chinese film programs, and Ombres electriques: Panorama du cinéma chinois 1925-1982 (Paris: Centre de Documentation sur le Cinéma Chinois, 1982). For a detailed report, see John Ellis, “Electric Shadows in Italy,” Screen 23, no. 2 (1982): 79-83. For other retrospectives of Chinese films, see Paul Pickowicz, “Early Chinese Cinema—The Era of Exploration,” Modern Chinese Literature 1, no. 1 (Sept. 1984): 135-38. For the Eastern Horizons retrospective, part of the September 1987 Toronto Festival of Festivals that exhibited films from Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, the Philippines, and Vietnam, see Pat Aufderheide, “Oriental Insurgents,” Film Comment 23,no. 6 (1987): 73-76. The National Film Theater in London organized two small Chinese film seasons in 1976 and 1980. See Rosalind Delmar and Mark Nash, “Breaking with Old Ideas: Recent Chinese Films,” Screen 17, no. 4 (1976-77): 67-84; Tony Rayns and Scott Meek, ed, Electric Shadows: 45 Years of Chinese Cinema, Dossier No. 3 (London: British Film Institute, 1980). A “China Film Week” that toured through the United States in 1981 is briefly discussed by Tom Allen in Film Comment 17, no. 6 (1981): 10. Growing public interest in the West was reflected later in a number of special sections or issues devoted to Chinese or Hong Kong films in journals such as Film Comment (1988), Camera Obscura (1989), Jump Cut (1989), Wide Angle (1989), Cineaste (1990), and Modern Chinese Literature (1993).
- 1993. Dissanayake, Wimal , , ed. Melodrama and Asian Cinema . New York: Cambridge University Press; 1993. pp. 258–258, In the subsequent years, Cheng and Chen team-taught at other institutions, including the University of Southern California, the University of Iowa, the University of Wisconsin at Madison, and the State University of New York at Stony Brook. For a sample list of institutions that have offered Chinese film courses recently, see Yingjin Zhang, “Rethinking Cross-Cultural Analysis: The Questions of Authority, Power, and Difference in Western Studies of Chinese Films,” Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars 26, no. 4 (Oct-Dec. 1994): 44, n. 1..
- Browne, Nick , Houston, Beverle , and Rosen, Robert , 1985. China Is Near: A Visit to the People's Republic . 1985. pp. 11–17, On Film 14, George S. Semsel, Chen Xihe, and Xia Hong, ed., Film in Contemporary China (New York: Praeger, 1993), pp. xxii-xxiii..
- Dissanayake, , Melodrama . pp. 259–259, Ni Zhen supplies an example of the dramatic impact of Western critical acclaim on the fate of Yellow Earth: when first released in 1984, the film attracted only a small audience at home, and aBeijing theater had to refund tickets and replace the film with another program; after the 1985 Hong Kong Film Festival, “when an attempt was made in Shanghai to devote two or three movie houses exclusively to experimental narratives, Yellow Earth ran to capacity audiences for a week and had a nationwide impact” (Semsel et al.,Film in Contemporary China, p. 31).
- 1993. Eder, Klaus Rossell, Deac , , ed. New Chinese Cinema . London: National Film Theatre; 1993. pp. 8–8, Dossier 11, Eder forgot to mention a Taiwan film, The Wedding Banquet (Xiyan, directed by Ang Lee [Li An], 1992), which was the co-winner-with Women from the Lake of Scented Souls (Xianghun nü, directed by Xie Fei, 1992)-at the 1993 Berlin Film Festival. Top prizes were awarded to Red Sorghum at Berlin in 1988 and to City of Sadness (Beiqing chengshi, directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien, 1989) at Venice in 1989. For a list of these and other prizes won by Chinese films from the mainland and Taiwan at major international film festivals since 1984, see Sinorama (Guanghua) 18, no. 5 (May 1993): 40.
- Berry, Chris , , ed. Perspectives on Chinese Cinema . Ithaca, N.Y.: China-Japan Program, Cornell University, 1985; EastAsian papers, no. 39, which consists of six articles; a second and enlarged edition-with six new chapters as well as filmographies and appendices-was issued in 1991 (London: BFI Publishing). See also Paul Clark, Chinese Cinema: Culture and Politics Since 1949 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987); George S. Semsel, ed., Chinese Film: The State of the Art in the Peoples Republic (New York: Praeger, 1987); and Wimal Dissanayake, ed., Cinema and Cultural Identity: Reflections on Films from Japan, India, and China (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1988). Attempts at a political history of Chinese cinema similar to that of Paul Clark's were made earlier in Europe: Jörg Lösel, Die politische Funktion des Spielfilms in der Volsrepublik China zwis-chen 1949 and 1965 (Munich: Minerva Publikation, 1980); Régis Bergeron, Le Cinéma chinois, 1949-1983, 3 vols. (Paris: L'Harmattan, 1984). Another European publication bearing a similar title is Le Cinéma chinois, ed. Marie-Claire Quiquemelle and Jean-Loup Passek (Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou, 1985). Like some previous dossiers mentioned in note 1 above, Le Cinéma chinois contains such essential reference features as biographical entries, film synopses, and an amazing number of quality pictures, but has managed at the same time to provide critical perspectives by including a dozen topical studies (by Chinese and European writers) and appending commentaries (gleaned from the original sources) to nearly all synopses.
- Zhang, Xudong , 1997. Chinese Modernism in the Era of Reforms: Cultural Fever, Avant-garde Fiction, and the New Chinese Cinema . Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press; 1997.
- Wilkerson's, , 1994. Journal of Asian Studies 53 (1994), pp. 510–510, no. 2.
- Modern Chinese Literature 1 . pp. 185–200, no. 2 (fall 1985), Catherine Yi-Yu Cho Woo, “The Chinese Montage: From Poetry and Painting to the Silver Screen,” in Berry, Perspectives (1991), pp. 21 -29..
- Dissanayake, , Melodrama . pp. 259–259, Chinese filmmakers like Xie Fei, Wu Yigong, and Zhang Nuanxin also participated in film criticism, while film scholars sometimes joined in film production (e.g., Ni Zhen was the screenwriter of Raise the Red Lantern, among others).
- 1990. Semsel, George S. , and Hong, Xia Jianping, Hou , , ed. Chinese Film Theory: A Guide to the New Era . New York: Praeger; 1990.
- Huai, Li , and Pickowicz, Paul , "Chinese Electric Shadows: A Selected Bibliography of Materials in English". In: Modern Chinese Literature 7 . pp. 117–53, is impressive, but the reader may also consult H. C. Li, no. 2 (fall 1993), and his “More Chinese Electric Shadows: A Supplementary List,” Modern Chinese Literature 8, nos. 1-2 (spring/fall 1994): 237-50. Li's third and final bibliography is forthcoming from the same journal in 1997..
- research on Chinese cinema is still in its infancy , This statement was meant to cover the field in China and elsewhere (see his “Early Chinese Cinema,” p. 137).
- Berty, , 1985. "Sexual Difference and the Viewing Subject in Li Shuang-shuang and The In-laws ". In: Perspectives . 1985. pp. 32–46.
- 1991. Woman and Chinese Modernity: The Politics of Reading between West and East . Minneapolis: University of MinnesotaPress; 1991, and WritingDiaspora: Tactics of Intervention in Contemporary Cultural Studies (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993).
- Semsel, , Film in Contemporary China . pp. xi–xi.
- Film in Contemporary China . pp. 185–185.
- Dissanayake, , Melodrama . pp. 262–262.
- Yoshimoto, Misuhiro , 1991. "The Difficulty of Being Radical: The Discipline of Film Studies and the Postcolonial World Order". In: Boundary 2 . Vol. 18. 1991. pp. 242–257, no. 3, and Yingjin Zhang, “Rethinking Cross-Cul-tural Analysis.”.
- 1993. The Woodenman's Bride . Yanshen: directed by Huang Jianxin; 1993, a film that looks like a remake of Red Sorghum; Red Firecrackers, Green Firecrackers (Paoda shuangdeng, directed by He Ping, 1994), a winner at the 1994 Hawaii Film Festival and a crowd-pleaser at art theaters in the West; andErmo (Ermo, directed by Zhou Xiaowen, 1994), an artistic, at times comic variation on the theme of repressed female sexuality set in contemporary China..
- Berry, , 1991. Perspectives . 1991. pp. 4–4.
- Harris, Kristine , 1995. " The New Woman: Image, Subject, and Dissent in 1930s Shanghai Film Culture". In: Republican China 20 . 1995. pp. 55–79, no. 2, Paul Pickowicz, “The Theme of Spiritual Pollution in Chinese Films of the 1930s,” Modern China 17, no. 1 (1991): 38-75; Yingjin Zhang, “Engendering Chinese Filmic Discourse of the 1930s: Configurations of Modern Women in Shanghai in Three Silent Films,” positions 2, no. 3 (winter 1994): 603-28. For Taiwan cinema, see Stephanie Hoare, “Innovation through Adaptation: The Use of Literature in New Taiwan Film and its Consequences,” Modern Chinese Literature 7, no. 2 (fall 1993): 33-58; Yingjin Zhang, “The Idyllic Country and the Modern City: Cinematic Configurations of Family in Osmanthus Alley and The Terrorizer,” Tamkang Review 25, no. 1 (autumn 1995): 81-99. For Hong Kong cinema, see Rey Chow, “A Souvenir of Love, “Modern Chinese Literature 7, no. 2 (fall 1993): 59-78; Kwai-Cheung Lo, “Once upon a Time: Technology Comes to Presence in China,” ibid, pp. 79-96. Two forthcoming collections of essays will greatly facilitate further research in this growing field: Romance, Sexuality, Identity: Cinema and Urban Culture in Shanghai, 1910s-1940s, edited by Yingjin Zhang (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), is devoted entirely to early Chinese cinema; Transnational Chinese Cinema: Identity, Nationhood, Gender, edited by Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1997), contains many essays on Taiwan and Hong Kong films. For information regarding auteurs, genres, and themes, Encyclopedia of Chinese Film, co-authored by Yingjin Zhang and Zhiwei Xiao (London: Routledge, 1998), is a comprehensive reference work comprising three essays on film histories of mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, as well as hundreds of entries of varied lengths.
- Berry, Chris , 1994. "A Nation T(w/o)o: Chinese Cinema(s) and Nationhood(s)". In: Dissanayake, Wimal , , ed. Colonialism and Nationalism in Asian Cinema . Bloomington: Indiana University Press; 1994. pp. 42–64, This collection is not reviewed here because it contains only two essays on Chinese cinema, both published previously in East-West Film Journals.
- Zhang, Yingjin , From ‘Minority Film’ to ‘Minority Discourse’: Questions of Nationhood and Ethnicity in Chinese Film Studies , Cinema Journal 36 (3 (spring 1997))pp. 73–90.
- Browne, , New Chinese Cinemas . pp. 120–120.