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- Volume 21, Issue 1, 2010
Asian Cinema - Volume 21, Issue 1, 2010
Volume 21, Issue 1, 2010
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Conversations with Actress Devika Rani Roerich and Painter Svetoslav Roerich (1980)
By John A. LentI had been in New Delhi only a day or so in mid-July 1980 when this beautiful, 70-ish lady caught my eye. She was being escorted into the dining hall of the Imperial Hotel where our group (Columbia University Group Study in India for Journalism Faculty) was staying. Her almost regal-like demeanor and the way her escorts doted on her set her apart. I asked a waiter who she was and was told she was one of India's most famous actresses, Devika Rani Roerich. I off-handedly said I'd like to meet her.
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Shall We Depart from Globalization Ring? Hollywood Remakes of East Asian Films and the Emergence of Cultural Reinvasion
More LessFrom the global perspective, remakes of foreign movies are of concern in that what is made is not merely a story, but a whole host of cultural signifiers (Schneider, 2002). The accelerating interest of Hollywood studios in East Asian blockbuster remakes, and their recent successes, has prompted Hollywood to widely expand its horizon in the East and also has raised global awareness of East Asian talents. More importantly, despite the film remake business being economically driven, it has inevitably evolved the discussion on the changing dynamic of American film hegemony under the weight of global information flow. This paper begins by clarifying what is meant by a movie remake and providing examples of recent Hollywood remakes of East Asian movies. Three films will then be evaluated and synopsized to reveal key socio-cultural aspects of East Asian cinema. Through a globalization discourse, this paper sets out to illustrate the danger of cultural reinvasion to the Asian popular culture industry.
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Living on the Edge: The Vestigial World of Adoor Gopalakrishnan's Elippathayam/Rat Trap
More LessSet against the backdrop of his native Kerala-the locale of virtually all his films—Adoor Gopalakrishnan has produced a loose trilogy which focuses on the vestiges of feudalism. The trio-Elippathayam/Rat Trap (1981), Vidheyan/ The Servile (1993), and Kathapurushan/The Man of the Story (1995)—feature men from land—owning families who grapple with the challenge of living in a post—feudal society. These films are, in effect, is a study of a consciousness shaped by the destructive ideology of a system that has lost its historical frame of reference. To make a mockery of keeping such a system alive is to court neurosis and perversion.
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From the Archives of a Cinéphile: On the Stuff Dreams Are Made of
More LessThis article explains how the author's love of cinema developed from his early childhood years spent living in India.
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Emergent National Discourses: Mythmaking and the National Story in Taiwanese Roadtrip Films
By Dennis LoThe Taiwanese New Cinema (TNC) seems as fresh and relevant today in academic circles as the films actually were in the 1980s and early 1990s, with the rapidly rising popularity of Sinophone cinema studies. Relatively little emphasis, however, seems to be placed on the harsh reality that the TNC is by all practical measures, a relic of a currently non-existent Taiwanese film industry. The year 2007 saw the concomitant releases of not one, but a series of roadtrip films. Roadtrip narratives are as effective in one mythical space over another when it comes to the production of "national" discourses.
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Transcultural Spaces of a Vanishing Hong Kong: Johnnie To's Sparrow
More LessWhen Sparrow premiered in Hong Kong during early 2008 and later at the Berlin Film Festival, most audiences and critics noted a distinct difference from the other types of films associated with Johnnie To Kei-fung. the director made a surprisingly lightweight romantic comedy thriller far removed from his usual style and themes. Sparrow is also a film requiring that its audiences see the presence of familiar landmarks which may no longer exist. Sparrow also expects audiences to actively hear familiar songs from the past, both Cantonese and Western, that may also be transitory in a changing world characterized by a cultural clash between past and present values.
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National Cinema, Local Language, Trans-regional Adaptation: Dialect Comedy in the Early People's Republic of China
By Ying BaoAs the Mao era is generally considered a period of national isolation and totalitarianism, its cinema has seldom been examined from the perspectives of the local and the transnational. A closer look at film comedies produced in the early PRC period, however, shows dynamic interaction between the local and the (trans-)national in Chinese cultural production during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Many dialect comedies and comedies adapted from regional performing traditions were produced and distributed across the country and even overseas during this period. The cinematic interest in dialect and regional comedic traditions in this period prompts many critical questions and problematizes the seemingly homogeneous official culture in the early PRC. By focusing on the particular genre of dialect comedy, this essay attempts to retrieve the complex interaction between the local and the national and encourages further reconsideration of Maoist national cinema.
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The Ascension of a Photo-poet: Garin Nugroho's Quest for Beauty
More LessBy the virtue of the ones engaged upon a profound journey, the world of the photo-poet sees images as a signification of the membrane, a colossus of events in their nerves that transpires the momentary engulfment of its meaning, subdued and forgotten by the spectators, but is an imprint in the sincere heart of the photo-poet. Existence to Garin seemed to be pointless without salvation and the spirit has to be communed towards recognizing the real. This, to Shklovsky (1917), is first and foremost a special way of thinking and knowing with images that determine it to be a piece of artwork, for without it, poetry will cease to exist.
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By Way of Melancholia: Remembrance of Tiananmen Square Incident in Summer Palace
By Yiju HuangHow should a traumatic historical event be approached, remembered, and represented in retrospect? The Tiananmen Square Incident that occurred two decades ago has remained an ineffable topic in China due to both political censorship and the brutality of the event. Lou Ye's Summer Palace (2007) is significantly the first Chinese film dealing with the remembrance of the incident. This paper suggest that the representation of historical trauma in an unmediated form ultimately partakes in the violence of the dominant language that has caused the trauma in the first place. By way of melancholia impasse, Lou Ye directs the gaze from the present and firmly dwells on the historical ruins from the past for the past's sake alone. Through a close reading of Summer Palace, this paper aims to unravel the power of melancholia in defiance of the triumphant historical culture.
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Connected through Remakes: Intercultural Dialogue between Hollywood and Chinese Cinema Industries
More LessConnected is a China-Hong Kong co-produced action-crime thriller released in September 2008. Remade from the 2004 American film Cellular, it is regarded as the first official Chinese remake of a Hollywood film. Specially focusing on the new case of Chinese remaking Hollywood film, this paper sets out to study the phenomenon of film remakes between Hollywood and the Chinese-language cinemas, and explores what has triggered the trend of remakes of East Asia in Hollywood. By tracing back the respective trajectories of remakes between Hollywood and Chinese cinemas, I will explore their different initiatives, modes, and outcomes of cross-cultural remaking, and examine the different attitudes of appreciating foreign culture and ways of appropriating the strength of foreign competitors embodied in the cross culture remake phenomenon.
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Stories Written in Sunlight and Water: The Cinema of Yoshida Yoshishige: Pt.1 The Studio Years
By Adam BinghamOne unfortunate aspect of these examinations of the Japanese new wave has been an almost total lack of engagement with Yoshida Yoshishige. Critical discourse from both Japan and the West has long since treated Yoshida, implicitly or otherwise, as a peripheral figure. Of course, there are extenuating circumstances for this critical neglect, chief among which would doubtless be the complete lack of ready availability of his work outside Japan. Another factor attendant upon Yoshida's obscurity is the perceived esoteric nature of his cinema. Several of his most prominent works particularly the independently produced political, revolutionary trilogy of Erosu purasu gyakusatsu (Eros plus Massacre, 1969), Rengoku eroica (Heroic Purgatory, 1970) and Kaigenrei (Coup d'etat, 1973) are markedly difficult and obtuse.
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On Organizing Asian Animators and Cartoonists
By John A. LentExplanation of the process of organizing the Asian-Pacific Animation and Comics Association annual meeting 2010.
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"Promoting Chinese and Asian Cartoon Arts to the World Through the Platform of AYACC"
More LessOne of the individuals involved with AYACC from 2007 is Sander K. Johnson, president of American Television in China and International Television for Asia. Below is his unedited talk presented at AYACC 2008.
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Film review: The Taste of Tea (2004), directed by Ishii Katsuhito
By Ikuho AmanoCha no aji (aka. The Taste of Tea, 2004) by Ishii Katsuhito (1966-) is a daring attempt at visualizing nonsensical dreams while masquerading its outlook as a portrayal of a gentle, even traditional Japanese family, the Harunos. Its markedly off-beat narrative corresponds to Japanese people's yearning for "iyashi" (healing), a desire widespread since the end of the Bubble Economy in the mid-1990s
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Report from the Sheffield Documentary Film Festival, 2009
By Adam BinghamA report of the international Sheffield Documentary Film Festival 2009.
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Volumes & issues
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Volume 34 (2023)
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Volume 33 (2022)
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Volume 32 (2021)
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Volume 31 (2020)
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Volume 30 (2019)
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Volume 29 (2018)
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Volume 28 (2017)
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Volume 27 (2016)
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Volume 26 (2015)
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Volume 25 (2014)
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Volume 24 (2013)
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Volume 23 (2012)
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Volume 22 (2011)
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Volume 21 (2010)
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Volume 20 (2009)
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Volume 19 (2008)
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Volume 18 (2007)
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Volume 17 (2006)
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Volume 16 (2005)
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Volume 15 (2004)
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Volume 14 (2003)
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Volume 13 (2002)
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Volume 12 (2001)
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Volume 11 (2000)
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Volume 10 (1998 - 1999)
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Volume 9 (1997 - 1998)
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Volume 8 (1996)
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Volume 7 (1995)
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Volume 6 (1993)