The Construction of the ‘Western Other’ in Hong Kong Post-colonial Cinema Hong Kong has always remained a very unique city, one which is said to have ‘a Western past, an Eastern future’. Since its colonisation by the British in the 1860s, it has maintained to a very large extent its Chinese identity and its connection to its Motherland, while at the same time, has frequent contact with the Western world, politically, economically, and culturally. Hong Kong’s unique position has made the city a
National Identity is the notion and cohesive whole of a nation. It’s the particular way factors such as culture, language and tradition build a nation. In this essay I will examine how Hong Kong (HK) horror is empirical to the nation’s identity. My case study will be ‘A Chinese Ghost Story’ (1987) as well as other supportive substantiations i.e. Books and websites. The integrity within Chinas national identity is said to be ephemeral changing since the archaic China. After The Treaty of Nanjing (1842-1997)
of Asian directors, particularly in the context of Hong Kong cinema, one name that immediately comes to mind would be none other than Wong Kar-wai. Any Asian film student would probably be familiar with his signature works. Wong Kar-wai has been considered as "the very latest auteur produced by the second wave" in Hong Kong cinema (Teo 193). His passion for stylistic filmmaking and pursuit of film artistry gave him the recognition as a Hong Kong auteur. His auteur status arose from the distinctive
Full Service Cinema: The South Korean Cinema Success Story (So Far) Fifteen years ago, South Korean cinema was in precipitous decline. It was facing deadly competition from Hollywood as import barriers were dismantled, and had almost no export market. Today, South Korean cinema is widely considered the most successful and significant non-Hollywood cinema anywhere in the world today. It is successful both in the domestic market, and internationally. This essay sets out to understand this phenomenon
Comparing the Narrative and Formal Devices of ChungKing Express and A Bout de Souffle Wong Kar Wai’s movie ‘ChungKing Express’ bears many similarities to Godard’s ‘A Bout de Souffle’. To start with, Wai employs a number of cinematic techniques, obviously derived from the French New Wave, such as for example the jump-cut which is evidently taken from Godard’s film. His use of the Godard-ian jump cut seamlessly blends temporally-exclusive scenes together, making the passage of time unnoticeable
The movie When a Man Loves a Woman is a story of Alice Green who has a serious drinking problem that ultimately ruined her family relationship but she was rescued and is forgiven by her family. She is a school counsellor who has a beautiful family of an airplane pilot husband alongside two beautiful and intelligent daughters revealed her alcoholic side to the family. The alcoholic mother and school counsellor, who is the main character of the film, repeatedly got herself into trouble with her alcoholism
The film, Paradise Now, begins with a woman named Suha, arriving at one of the guard stations entering into Palestine. The main characters, Said and Khaled, are shown working at a mechanic shop, going about their day. In that instance, Khaled and Said are having trouble with a customer, but Khaled over reacts causing him to get fired. Soon after, Suha arrives at the mechanic shop to pick up her car, and meets Said, having an instant connection, which foreshadows her importance in the film. Their
Ang Lee has done it again! In his 1994 film, “Eat Drink Man Woman,” Lee is able to bring one into the home of a very loving, but very eccentric family. Food and love are definitely intertwined in this film to bring out the best, and most interesting details in each character.Although the film is a foreign film, with subtitles, it is easy to be instantly sucked into what is happening, every minute. Some occurrences that take place seem predictable, but then are thrown into a completely different
The award winning film, Chungking Express, is a tale of two stories told in sequence, each about a lovesick Hong Kong policeman contemplating his relationship with a woman. The movie is filmed in impressionistic splashes of motion and color, which are used to help the audience get a better sense of the time period. In particular, the mise-en-scene, especially the setting, stands out in separating the different stages of relationships that the two policemen find themselves in, but due to the setting
American and Hong Kong Action Films When comparing the action films of Hong Kong to the typical action films of America, certain differences are clearly visible. The films from Hong Kong feature more melodrama, more fast-paced action scenes, and most noticeably, more graphic violence, than the action films released in the US. When looking at what these Hong Kong films were influenced by, especially the films of John Woo, it is surprising to see that many of these differences from American cinema are,
Love in Shades of Wrong "In the Mood for Love" is a 2000 film directed by Wong Kar-Wai, and made in Hong Kong. The two protagonists, Chow Mo-Wan and Su Li-Zhen, become neighbors where they soon find out their significant others have been cheating on them. Through their mutual betrayal they begin to develop an intimate bond, but fear expressing for the reason that they do not want to resemble their spouses and love in a shade of wrong. Even though Chow and Su remain moderately reserved, and physical
In the Mood for Love: Deconstructed The first few things I noticed when I began watching Wong Kar-Wai’s In the Mood for Love were the interesting mise en scène, the frequent use of off-screen space and the fact that almost every shot in the film is a frame within a frame. Using this internal framing is common in many films but I have never seen it used quite so extensively. Not only is it used more frequently than in most films, I also feel as though it blocks off more of the available space within
Lust, Caution is a 2007 erotic espionage thriller film directed by Ang Lee, based on the novella of the same name by Chinese author Eileen Chang. The cast includes Tony Chiu-Wai Leung, Wei Tang and Joan Chen. The story is mostly set in Hong Kong in 1938 and in Shanghai in 1942. With this film, Lee won the Golden Lion Award at the Venice Film Festival for the second time, the first being with Brokeback Mountain. Tony Leung and Ang Lee are my favorite Asian actor and director. I watched almost all
they identify with the protagonist. In this paper, I will examine chase scenes of action movies from five different cultures: Hong Kong, Thailand, France, U.S. and Canada, and compare the differences with regards to cinematography between these movies and discuss the significance for such differences. In the famous bicycle chase scene from Jackie Chan’s Project A (Hong Kong), the scene employs a full body shot of the protagonist to showcase his actions. Throughout the whole scene, the bicycle chase
In the Mood for Love according to me in a classic romantic movie which captures the emotion of love very beautifully. The story is about the doomed romance between two neighbors Mr.Chow and Mrs.Chan , whose spouses are having an illicit affair. While their spouses are away "on business"/"taking care of a sick mother" the neighbors go out for dinners and hang out together on lonely nights. While trying to not be like their spouces they end up falling in love with each eather although resisting
Drama Academy under the guidance of Master Yu Jim- Yuen, a famous Peking opera wu-shen performer, who is considered to be the grandfather of Hong Kong martial arts movies. Not only did he learn a lot from the opera and academy that helped him enter to the U.S. movie market, but also his inspiration from and working with Bruce Lee, who helped bring Hong Kong Cinema to the United States. However, there is a significant difference in fighting styles between the two famous actors. All films Bruce Lee starred
Jung’s analysis of The Get Down, “B-boying is the epitome of pop-cultural dance, because they took, unbeknownst and knowingly, stuff from the Nicholas Brothers, from Bruce Lee, from kung fu theater, [and] from '70s gang culture ...If it wasn't for Hong Kong cinema, hip-hop street-dancing culture would be a bit different” (E. Alex Jung, Vulture). Aspects of Asian culture also show up during the voguing scene in the episode. In one scene, you see a drag queen wearing a short Cheongsam dress and voguing on
to talk about his mouth. He does cool things with his mouth. Smoking cigarettes is no longer an emblem of cool in the USA, but Chow does wonders with cigarette smoke in Prison On Fire. Director Ringo Lam understands this; like most of the great Hong Kong directors, he loves using slow motion and freeze frames to pinpoint important moments in his movies, and he saves a few of the most elegant slow-motion sequences for Chow blowing smoke and looking cool. In John Woo's over-the-top classic, Hard Boiled
unconventional themes like existentialism or paranoia, often with excessive violence or sex or a combination of both, with obvious attempts to displace its audiences from the film were often attributed with the generic label of ‘foreign’ or ‘art house’ cinema. In recent times, such stereotyped categorizations of films are becoming inapplicable. ‘Blockbusters’ with celebrity-studded casts may have plots in which characters explore the depths of the human psyche, or avant-garde film techniques. Titles like
John Woo The bread-and-butter of the film industry is the action movie. Each summer, audiences can expect to see car chases, gunfights and explosions, and studios can expect to see millions and millions of dollars in return. Though most viewers and critics see these movies as "fluff" entertainment (and rightfully so), there is one director that puts as much heart and soul into his "fluff" as any number of talented directors put into their "serious" movies. His name is John Woo. Even though you