Chinese Cin Exam 1

Other Asia Film Company founder

Started Asia Film Company

Make money? or Social commentary?

• Decide on commentary

• Realized they could make money that way

Director and film critic 

Pushing film community towards left pre Communist Party

Film Group (sub of League of Left Wing Writers)

Pre 1949 leader

Nationalist

Leader of communist party

First place where Chinese film was made

Filmed Beijing Opera show

First film company in China

Educational emphasis

Nationalist

Leftist film studio

Film studio known for “traditional” films

Costume dramas

Centrist

Socialist commentary sometimes

Huge company

Post Japan-war/WWII film company

Left leaning

Reaction to Treaty of Versailles

Major turning point for Nationalist

Wanted to be total Chinese nation

Student worker riots

Boycott of Japanese goods

NATIONALIST LITERARY MOVEMENT

Led to Left Wing Writers Group

Push for political film and literature

Wow of special effect of film

Not artful film, but gimmicky

Specific genre

Wouldn’t go to movie theater, it was in background of coffee house and stuff

Metaphorical island

Shanghai after Japanese invasion

Shanghai surrounded by Japanese troops

Making movies to appeal to Chinese audiences

Can’t get them past Japanese censors

Non-Japanese controlled area, basically

Only lasted a few years until Japan did take over

Established in 1932

Group of 50 Shanghai intellectuals

Agreed to unity of Left to face CMT oppression 

Introduced realism through leftist ideology

Worsening international situation due to Japanese causing depression

Would go on to write film criticism

During this period, Nationalists were in power

• Controlled film through censorship

• Censorship towards traditional ideas

Communists did not have a lot of power yet

• Acted as critics

• Left Wing Writers Group

• Infiltrated studios with writers, actors, etc.

Pre 1949:

• Opera (filmed the stage)

• Martial arts (banned at one point for superstition)

• Costume drama

• Social dramas (Goddess)

Move by film studios to promote Chinese pride messaging

• Costume dramas for Right

• Social dramas for Left

Chinese people should own film industry (distribution, theaters, studios, etc)

Chinese pride, basically

Right wing = ethnic or cultural homogeneity and traditional values

• Preserving China’s identity from other influences

Left wing = national identity tied to social justice, liberation from colonialism, anti imperialism

Right views nation as tied to heritage and unity (Confuscious values)

Left sees platform for equality and resistance against exploitation (Mao values)

Should serve the people

• Working class

• Peasants and soldiers

Writers and artists must embrace socialist values

Must align with Communist Party goals

Everything has to serve politics, otherwise it’s useless

Leader of Communist Party

Made film subservient to politics

Mao’s wife

Prior actress

Gang of 4

Set strict guidelines about film

Persecuted free thought

Kills creative film work during Communism

Most famous actor in 1950s

Little Broadcast in Crows and Sparrows

Very left leaning

Got put in jail anyway

Famous director

Criticized for being “too Hollywood”

Carries out ideal that film serves politics before Mao

Socialist cinema figurehead

Mao thinks Communists have become new ruling class

Decides people should rise up and criticize

BUT IT’S A TRAP because they all went to jail

Collective interest over personal frustration type of filmmaking

Art must be political

Class consciousness

• People at the bottom are the good Communists

Schools close

Sent youth to countryside

Jiang Qing makes crazy rules for filmmaking

Noble hero must be shot to look large

Rules of filmmaking to promote revolutionary ideals (cinematography)

Highlight the hero

Good, heroes, THE hero

Traditional stage plays

“Ideal film” follows these traditional styles

Only films allowed to be made and shown

Criticized for misrepresenting Chinese history and going against revolutionary ideals

Didn’t have peasants as heroes

Didn’t promote class consciousness

Director is publicly criticized

Turning point for filmmakers where they’re now all scared about what the government will say

Increased control by Communist Party

More accessible distribution (so everyone could see propaganda)

Thematic reorientation: peasants and workers are heroes!

Mobile movie theaters to show more propaganda

Films have to include class struggle

After Communist nationalization, war films became popular

All films showed class struggle

Social realist (Mao gets more strict)

• Ethnic minority

• Opera and theater

• Animation

• War/Military

• Children’s sports films

Initially broadened genres and types of films

• intellectuals “welcomed” to share criticism

Anti-rightist purge then narrowed subjects addressed in films

• Intellectuals got labeled as rightists and punished

Film having to serve politics meant there was less creative freedom

Artists were hindered

Distanced from other world film and theory

Politics must serve art

Extremely restrictive

Previous film locked away

Hardly any film is being made because young people get sent to country

• And schools are closed

Films were more open pre-socialist

Strict guidelines during socialist era

• Art must serve the cause

• Emphasis on the “us”

Opened up China politically, economically after Mao died

Allows 5th gen to thrive

Farewell My Concubine

Yellow Earth

5th gen director

Yellow Earth cinematographer

5th gen director

Criticized for too narrative, too Hollywood

Too much spoon feeding

Mao dies

Xiaoping previously kicked out of government twice for being too rightist

He returns to take leadership

Opened China politically and economically

Allows rightists back in government

Cultural revolution ending = college entrance exams resume

Film scholars go to academy

Study other world cinemas for first time in long time

Very experimental for both students and educators

Fifth Gen film

Chen Kaige

First internationally recognized Chinese film

Made first major fifth gen film called “One and Eight”

Made Yellow Earth

There was still public funding for film companies

Filmmakers able to experiment with low risk

Wide angle

Deep depth of field

On-location

China opened up

Film vault opened for first time

Filmmakers grew up during revolution

Available money to experiment with low risk

1st generation: pioneers who founded film industry in 1920s

2nd generation: progressive filmmakers in 1930s-40s

3rd generation: shapers of 1950s-60s

4th generation: filmmakers trained in 50s, but interrupted by revolution

5th generation: Beijing Film Academy grads in early 1980s

Literature Film:

• Literary quality

• Dramatic structure

• Coherent plot

• Abundant dialogue

• Fully developed characters

• Defined message

• Linear editing

• Theatrical effects

• Spoonfeeding

Film Film

• Ambivalent or contingent meaning

• Jump-cuts

• Documentary effects

• Active spectator (have to think about it)

Pre-liberation films focused on countryside 

• That’s where the filmmakers grew up

Post-reform films liked the city

• Romanticized it, but also were edgy about it

5th gen films focused on countryside, 6th gen focused on cities 

5th gen focus on Chinese history, 6th gen focused on contemporary China

5th gen had a lot of historical social criticism, 6th gen had focus on individual psychology

Generations could be boxed in to relate to Chinese nationalism

They were just integrating into the cinema world

6th gen filmmaker

Made Suzhou River