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Western China on Screen
An Urban Exploration
by Hongyan Zou
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Book Presentation:
Explores the relationship between cinema and the cities of Western China
• Bridges the gap where the cinematic landscape in China has long been dominated by developed metropolises
• Breaks the cinematic stereotypes of the region characterised by rural and ethnographic images in films such as Yellow Earth (dir. Chen Kaige, 1984) and Old Well (dir. Wu Tianming, 1987) by adding the urban facets of western China
• Explores four Han-dominated urban centres of western China (Chongqing, Chengdu, Xi’an and Lanzhou) represented in films investigating material spaces
• Discusses class, gender, post-colonialism and the history of post-socialism
Exploring the stories, memories and experiences attached to places, Western China on Screen is the first monograph to explore the affinity between the cinema and cities of western China through a spatial perspective. Investigating how cinematic cities in western China appear as both spaces of national power and enclosed spaces of traditional cultural values, the book diversifies the glamourised image of the post-socialist, technocratic metropolises of Beijing and Shanghai, breaking the long-existing rural and ethnographical images of western China established by Chinese Fifth Generation directors. Through case studies of films such as Rainclouds Over Wushan (1996), Buddha Mountain (2010) and Weaving Girl (2010), the book establishes a new way of looking at western urban China on screen: from a space of production to a space of increasing consumption.
About the Author:
Hongyan Zou is a lecturer at the Foreign Language School of Sichuan University, China. She is the co-author of the book Chapter “Chinese films and the sense of place: Beijing as ‘Thirdspace’ from In the Heat of the Sun to Mr. Six” in the edited book Making Publics, Making Places (University of Adelaide Press, 2016). Her research focuses on the dynamic relationship between cinema and cities, Chinese urban cinema, Chinese minority films and Chinese Westerns.
Press Reviews:
Hongyan Zou’s skilful analysis rewrites the Chinese West and the Chinese Western genre we thought we knew as dry and dusty pioneer lands in 1980s films like Yellow Earth. Her lively writing reveals a regional cinema of many genres depicting historic cities with distinct identities and rich cultures undergoing explosive growth and ultra-rapid modernisation.– Chris Berry, King’s College London
See the publisher website: Edinburgh University Press
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