Wow! eBook
Women in Chinese Martial Arts Films of the New Millennium: Narrative Analyses and Gender Politics
Author(s): Ya-chen Chen (Author)
- Publisher: Lexington Books (UK)
- Publication Date: 12 April 2012
- Language: English
- Print length: 314 pages
- ISBN-10: 0739139088
- ISBN-13: 9780739139080
Book Description
The liberation is never sustaining or complete, however; Chen reveals the presence of a glass ceiling marking the maximal exercise of feminism and women’s rights which the patriarchal order is willing to accept. As such, these films are not to be seen as celebrations of feminist liberation, but as enunciations of the patriarchal authority that suffuses Chinese cinematic martial arts feminism. The film narratives under examination include Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (directed by Ang Lee); Hero (Zhang Yimou); House of the Flying Daggers (Zhang Yimou); Seven Swords (Tsui Hark); The Promise (Chen Kaige); The Banquet (Feng Xiaogang); and Curst of the Golden Flower (Zhang Yimou). Chen also touches upon the plots of two of the earliest award-winning Chinese martial arts films, A Touch of Zen and Legend of the Mountain, both directed by King Hu.
Editorial Reviews
Review
“Ya-Chen Chen’s Women in Chinese Martial Arts Films of the New Millenium is a full-length, intensive and passionate interrogation of the feminist possibilities of Chinese martial arts cinema. Film by film, Chen shows both the achievements of their contemporaries and how those achievements are at the pleasure of the men who control the industry. The result is a major intervention in the ongoing debate.” –Chris Berry, Kings College London
“A refreshing look at an age-old genre that injects an energetic feminist perspective into the jaded analysis of a Chinese cinematic legacy.” –Ying Zhu, author of Television in Post-Reform China: Serial Dramas, Confucian Leadership and Global Television Market
