A Companion to Hong Kong Cinema

A Companion to Hong Kong Cinema provides the first comprehensive scholarly exploration of this unique global cinema. By embracing the interdisciplinary approach of contemporary film and cultural studies, this collection navigates theoretical debates while charting a new course for future research in Hong Kong film.

• Examines Hong Kong cinema within an interdisciplinary context, drawing connections between media, gender, and Asian studies, Asian regional studies, Chinese language and cultural studies, global studies, and critical theory
• Highlights the often contentious debates that shape current thinking about film as a medium and its possible future
• Investigates how changing research on gender, the body, and sexual orientation alter the ways in which we analyze sexual difference in Hong Kong cinema
• Charts how developments in theories of colonialism, postcolonialism, globalization, neoliberalism,  Orientalism, and nationalism transform our understanding of the economics and politics of the Hong Kong film industry
• Explores how the concepts of diaspora, nostalgia, exile, and trauma offer opportunities to rethink accepted ways of understanding Hong Kong’s popular cinematic genres and stars

Acknowledgments x

Notes on Contributors xi

Foreword xviii
Ackbar Abbas

Introduction 1
Esther M.K. Cheung, Gina Marchetti, and Esther C.M. Yau

Part I Critical Paradigms: Defining Hong Kong Cinema Studies 15

1 Watchful Partners, Hidden Currents: Hong Kong Cinema Moving into the Mainland of China 17
Esther C.M. Yau

2 The Urban Maze: Crisis and Topography in Hong Kong Cinema 51
Esther M.K. Cheung

3 Hong Kong Cinema as Ethnic Borderland 71
Kwai�]cheung Lo

4 Hong Kong Cinema in the Age of Neoliberalization and Mainlandization: Hong Kong SAR New Wave as a Cinema of Anxiety 89
Mirana May Szeto and Yun�]chung Chen

Commentary: Dimensions of Hong Kong Cinema 116
Sheldon Lu

Part II Critical Geographies 121

5 Hong Kong Cinema’s Exotic Others: Re�]examining the Hong Kong Body in the Context of Asian Regionalism 123
Olivia Khoo

6 Animating the Translocal: The McDull Films as a Cultural and Visual Expression of Hong Kong 140
Kimburley Wing-yee Choi and Steve Fore

7 Globalizing Hong Kong Cinema Through Japan 168
David Desser

8 Creative Cinematic Geographies Through the Hong Kong International Film Festival 185
Cindy Hing�]yuk Wong

9 Postmodernity, Han Normativity, and Hong Kong Cinema 207
Evans Chan

Commentary: Critical Geographies 225
Stephen Yiu�]wai Chu

Part III The Gendered Body and Queer Configurations 235

10 Feminism, Postfeminism, and Hong Kong Women Filmmakers 237
Gina Marchetti

11 Love In The City: The Placing of Intimacy in Urban Romance Films 265
Helen Hok�]sze Leung

12 Regulating Queer Domesticity in the Neoliberal Diaspora 284
Audrey Yue

Commentary: To Love is to Demand: A Very Short Commentary 303
Shu�]mei Shih

Part IV Hong Kong Stars 305

13 Return of the Dragon: Handover, Hong Kong Cinema, and Chinese Ethno�]nationalism 307
Paul Bowman

14 Transitional Stardom: The Case of Jimmy Wang Yu 322
Tony Williams

15 Camp Stars of Androgyny: A Study of Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui’s Body Images of Desire 341
Natalia Siu�]hung Chan

16 Cooling Faye Wong: A Cosmopolitical Intervention 359
Kin�]Yan Szeto

Commentary: Hong Kong Stars and Stardom 379
Gary Bettinson

Part V Narratives and Aesthetics 389

17 Making Merry on Time: A Feast of Nostalgia in Watching Chinese New Year Films 391
Fiona Yuk�]wa Law

18 A Pan�]Asian Cinema of Allusion: Going Home and Dumplings 410
Bliss Cua Lim

19 Double Agents, Cameos, and the Poor Man’s Orchestra: Music and Place in Chungking Express 440
Giorgio Biancorosso

20 Documenting Sentiments in Video Diaries around 1997: Archeology of Forgotten Screen Practices 462
Linda Chiu�]han Lai

Commentary: The Dynamics of Off�]Centeredness in Hong Kong Cinema 489
Yingjin Zhang

Part VI Screen Histories and Documentary Practices 499

21 The Lightness of History: Screening the Past in Hong Kong Cinema 501
Vivian P.Y. Lee

22 The Tales of Fang Peilin and Zhu Shilin: From Rethinking Hong Kong Cinema to Rewriting Chinese Film History 523
Ain�]ling Wong

23 The Documentary Film in Hong Kong 539
Ian Aitken and Mike Ingham

24 Representations of Law in Hong Kong Cinema 560
Marco Wan

Commentary: Cinema and the Cultural Politics of Identity: Hong Kong No More? A Commentary on the Verge of Postcolonial Locality 577
Stephen Ching�]kiu Chan

Filmography 585

Index 602

The New copy of this book will include any supplemental materials advertised. Please check the title of the book to determine if it should include any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.

The Used, Rental and eBook copies of this book are not guaranteed to include any supplemental materials. Typically, only the book itself is included. This is true even if the title states it includes any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.