Shin No Shikoutei

[Lori Hitchcock]

In this vein, you might have a look at Clara Law's Autumn Moon, Ann
Hui's Song of the Exile and Boat People, and even Daniel Lee's (otherwise
very unspectacular) recent film, Moonlight Express, just to name a few,
for some other perspectives on Hong Kong portrayals of Japanese.  Even
Chen Kaige's Farewell My Concubine offers a somewhat more ambivalent
perspective on Japanese in China during the war in the character of the
Beijing Opera-loving general.  And then, for fun, there's the Hong Kong
obsession with Yamaguchi Momoe (lots of her old films are available on VCD
now); Tsui Hark's The Chinese Feast offers a *funny* parody of her version
of Izu no odorikko (?).

Of course, there are always counters to such depictions - more recently,
Umbrella Story and Shanghai Grand are good examples of
old-depictions-dying-hard.

Paul Foronoff offers an interesting, if brief, historical overview of
Japanese in Hong Kong movies in his book "Silver Light," which is a
pictorial history of HK films from the 20s to the 70s.

Lori Hitchcock

On Fri, 5 May 2000, C. Jacqui Chen wrote:

> 
> Graham,
> 
> First, an FYI: the director for Shin no Shikoutei is (quite possibly) Shigeo
> Tanaka.
> Secondly, I too have seen many Hong Kong films where the villain is
> noticeably identified as Japanese. However, this tends to occur in stories
> that take place during the war of resistance against Japan (1937-45) - such
> as Fist of Legend that you mentioned. Understandably, this is a period in
> the Chinese psyche where aggression and brutality mark the Japanese
> expansionism in greater Asia. I'm not passing a judgment on whether Japanese
> villains should be justified in these HK action films, but this is the
> historical context for such portrayals. China's perceived "impotence" in the
> first half of the 20th century of international affairs, has, to an
> overwhelming extent, shaped the narratives to come later. Film narratives
> are part of this "psyche" - if it can be characterized as such - where past
> experiences of traumatic invasions have be understood or at least attempted
> with screen creations of heroes who were perceivably absent when the nation
> was under siege.
> 
> Of course, we still see a lot of Otherness in Chinese films today, as we do
> in films of other nation/cultures. Wong Kar Wai's films are riddled with
> South Asians who are practical targets for hired assassins, for instance.
> And I do remember a film of Imamura's, from the 60s, where Shanghai
> gangsters are supposedly running part of Japan's underworld, dirtying their
> hands in the sordid affairs of black market, hog wholesales, etc. Who played
> these Chinese characters? Japanese actors, of course, and mouthing distorted
> Japanese as if it were Chinese. Stereotypes don't go away easily. Witness
> Jackie Chan's latest US-made film, entitled Shanghai Noon.
> 
> JC
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
> [mailto:owner-KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu]On Behalf Of graham lincoln
> Sent: Monday, May 01, 2000 8:59 PM
> To: KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
> Subject: RE: Shin No Shikoutei
> 
> 
> >
> > >From the limited info on the web, it stars Shintaro Katsu and is about
> > the first emperor of China (subject of recent films like
> > Emperor and Assasin; Emperor's Shadow.) For those who have
> > seen the 1962 film or know more about it, how does it stand in
> > the overall sub-genre of Japanese adaptations of historical
> > dramas set in China?
> >
> > Jacqui
> >
> 
> thanks for your help, it certainly sounds interesting. I'll post some
> comments on the film when/if I eventually receive it. As to your query, I
> wonder how such works compare with the portrayals of Japanese people/culture
> in Chinese film (I'm thinking here mainly of Hong Kong cinema).
> For many years Japanese characters seem to have been used as staple villains
> in popular Hong Kong film (for example the explanation of Japanese Karate
> given in Wang Yu's film 'One-armed Boxer' which seems to relegate all of
> Japanese culture to brutality and aggression). Only a few films that I can
> think of have made much attempt at any real cultural understanding, such as
> Liu Chia Liang's 'Shaolin Challenges Ninja' and some of the work of Eddie
> Fong, such as 'Kawashima Yoshiko'.
> Also, more recently, Yuen Woo Ping's 'Fist of Legend' has re-worked Bruce
> Lee's horribly racist 'Fist of Fury' to include much more sympathetic
> portrayals of Japanese characters. (I was hoping here to include some
> comments on Leong Po-chih's 'Hong Kong 1941', which deals with Japan's
> occupation of the colony, having just received the dvd. Unfortunately the
> disc is faulty so any comments will have to be postponed.)
> 
> Apologies if my comments might seem off topic.
> 
> Graham
> 
> 
> 
> 
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