Aesthetics of New Age Chinese Cinematography

(in English)

Abstract

China, on the crux between tradition and modernization, has entered a new age of discovery and change where diverse historical and contemporary ideas tend to richness in perspective. The movement for the liberation of the arts and culture, in fact, demanded that it break free from the shackles of the leftist ideology, but also in its form, as it reflects modesty and reform of life based on the principles of tradition. The history of Chinese cinematography first started in 1905. It was the year when the opera The Battle of Dingjunshan, staged successfully at the Beijing Opera, was recorded for the very first time.

The centre of Chinese film, at the time, was Shanghai, where the first movie theatre was built in 1908. During the 1920s the first movie production companies, based exclusively on the native capital, were founded in Shanghai. One of them was Mingxing Film Company founded by Zheng Zhengqiu and Zhang Shichuan. Its most prominent hits were Zhang Xinsheng (1922) and Orphan Rescues Grandfather (1923), both made by Zhang Shichuan. The films produced at that time were mostly melodramas, family dramas and screen versions of Chinese legends.

The situation in the whole country and, therefore, also in the Chinese cinematography changed in 1927 when Kuomintang came to power in the country. The main subject, of the films, became the class warfare and the awakening of the Chinese national spirit against the foreign menace. Moreover, it was also the time when sound first appeared in the cinema, which complicated film production and decentralised the film business. The Cantonese speaking directors moved to Hong Kong which has been a mainstay for the commercial cinema, independent from the government’s dictate ever since. The directors creating in Mandarin, the official language stayed within the circle of the official authorities and their directives. The national socialistic movement brought such movies as Spring Silkworms/Chun can (1933) and To the Northwest/Dao xi bei qu (1934) by Bugao Cheng or Goddess/Shen nu (1934) by Wu Yonggang.

This study is based on an analysis of historical documents and basic aesthetic science material. The impact of the science of aesthetics on filmmaking has been studied, and the specifics of each have been studied hermeneutically.