---------------------------------------------------- Internet Guide for Chinese Studies Newsletter http://www.sino.uni-heidelberg.de/igcs/ignew.htm ---------------------------------------------------- 29 Jun 2004, entry by Matthias Arnold New in IGCS - Film and Movies (http://www.sino.uni-heidelberg.de/igcs/igfilm.htm): A City of Sadness Ed./Corp.: Abe Mark Nornes and Yeh Yueh-yu, Cinemaspace, Film Studies Program, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA; 1992. URL.: http://cinemaspace.berkeley.edu/Papers/CityOfSadness/ Language: English. Self description: "[...] The film's complex representation of history, combined with Hou's unique style in unraveling political taboo and his portrayal of family life, inspire us to closely analyze the film. [...] Because study of mainland China's history, politics and culture has overshadowed any consideration of Taiwan, we have provided several layers of contextualization for the reader and film viewer. City of Sadness is an extremely dense film, and deeply engaged in Taiwanese history (both past and present). These sections on context proceed with increasingly narrow focus, beginning with the history of Taiwan, examining the history of Taiwanese cinema, the 228 incident itself, and the controversy that the film sparked. Hou's approach to narrative filmmaking is quite unique and rigorously systematic. The section on style will explore the contours of his filmmaking with great specificity, and other sections on violence and writing will attempt to connect these observations to representations of history. [...] There is no order to the analysis; it is designed to work on varying levels and areas. We invite the reader to proceed by whim." Description: This is an extraordinary in-depth study of Hou Hsiao-Hsien's well-known movie of 1989. It thoroughly analyses both matters of style (style, sound, writing, photography), and many facets of the movie's context - from a short history of taiwan and taiwanese film over interviews with Hou and a discusuin of violence within the movie to critical discussions about the film, a comparison between Ozu and Hou. One can read the chapters by following the table of contents, but there is also a "Hypermap" available, showing the structure of the analysis with linked images. Contents: (1) Table of Contents; (2) Introduction; (3) Conclusion; (4) Hypermap of Analysis; (5) Authors' Biographies; (6) Bibliography; (7) Behind City of Sadness (Context I: History of Taiwan; Context II: The Taiwan New Cinema; Context III: The February 28 Incident; Context IV: The Controversy); (8) Distant Analysis; (9) STYLE: An Introduction; (10) Hou Hsiao-hsien Filmography; (11 City of Sadness Credits; (12) Sound/Writing/Photography; (13) Hou Hsiao-hsien Interviews; (14) Violence: Seen and Unseen; (15) soc.culture.taiwan Thread on 2.28; (16) Ozu and Hou: Introduction. _______________________________________________________ With kind regards, Hanno E. Lecher INTERNET GUIDE FOR CHINESE STUDIES -- editor http://www.sino.uni-heidelberg.de/igcs/ _______________________________________________________ An archive of this list as well as an subscribe/unsubscribe facility is available at: http://listserv.uni-heidelberg.de/archives/igcs-l.html