Wang Bing's filmmaking of the China dream : narratives, witnesses and marginal spaces / Elena Pollacchi.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Pollacchi, Elena, author.

Series:

Critical Asian cinemas

Critical Asian Cinemas

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Wang, Bing, 1967---Criticism and interpretation.

Wang, Bing.

Wang, Bing, 1967-.

Criticism and interpretation.

China--In motion pictures.

China.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Physical Description:

241 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm.

Place of Publication:

Amsterdam : Amsterdam University Press, [2021]

Summary:

This volume offers an organic discussion of Wang Bing's filmmaking across China's marginal spaces and against the backdrop of the state-sanctioned 'China Dream'. Wang's work has contemporary China as its focus and testifies to the country's contradictions, not dissimilar to those of contemporary societies dealing with issues of inequality, labour, and migration. Without being an activist, Wang Bing gives voice to the subaltern. His internationally awarded documentaries are recognized as world masterpieces. His unique aesthetics bears references to film masters, therefore this investigation goes beyond the divide between Western and non-Western film traditions. Each chapter takes a different articulation of space (spaces of labour, spaces of history, spaces of memory) as its entry point bringing together film and documentary studies, Chinese studies, and studies in globalization issues. This volume benefits from the author's extensive conversation with Wang Bing and from insider's observations of film production and the film festival circuit.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: The relevance of Wang Bing's filmmaking

Themes, form, and narrative structure: A linked approach to Wang Bing's filmmaking

Wang Bing a la Wong Kar-wai

The book's genesis and structure

1. Wang Bing's Cinematic Journey: A Counter-Narrative of the China Dream

The centrality of space in Wang Bing's narrativized reality

Chinese marginal spaces and uneven development

Wang Bing's counter-journey of the China Dream

Spaces in Wang Bing's oeuvre: An overview of the films and the issues at stake

2. History in the Making: The Debut Epic Tiexi qu: West of the Tracks

The debut epic Tiexi qu: West of the Tracks and its context

Tiexi qu: West of the Tracks as a contemporary cinematic reportage

Filming `history in the making' and the legacy of the Lumiere films

Towards an epic of labour: From Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven to Tiexi qu: West of the Tracks

3. Spaces of Labour: Three Sisters, 'Til Madness Do Us Part, Bitter Money

Filming spaces of labour and cinema as labour

The transition from the industrial space of the Tiexi district to rural and marginal spaces

Three Sisters: An epic of survival reminiscent of John Ford's The Grapes of Wrath

Duration in Wang Bing's cinema: The case of Three Sisters and Alone

No Way Out: From Three Sisters to 'Til Madness Do Us Part

`Til Madness Do Us Part: The camera work between `madness' and `love'

Reaching the new centres of labour: From Tiexi qu: West of the Tracks to Bitter Money

Earning money in hardship: Bitter Money

4. Spaces of History and Memory: The Works on the Anti-Rightist Campaign

pt. I A Space Too Much: The Ditch

The genesis of The Ditch (2003

2010)

The Ditch: Carving out a space for documenting the past

Historical spectacles: Wang Bing's The Ditch and Pier Paolo Pasolini's Said

Ghosts of the past: Wang Bing's The Ditch and Brutality Factory and Pedro Costa's Colossal Youth

pt. II Spaces of Memory: Dead Souls

From Fengming, A Chinese Memoir to Dead Souls

The genesis of Dead Souls

Spaces for survival: Archiving audiovisual witnesses

The act of filming and spaces of death

Wang Bing's Dead Souls and Claude Lanzmann's Shoah

5. Collective Spaces

Individual Narratives

Man With No Name: Individual spaces of self-isolation

Father and Sons: Individual spaces and deteriorating family structures

Mi Niang and Ta'ang: Spaces of refuge and escape

Mrs Fang: Individual spaces of death

Beauty Lives in Freedom: Individual spaces of exile

6. Concluding Remarks: Spaces of Exhibition and Spaces of Human Practice.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9789463721837

9463721835

OCLC:

1255856711