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In the Shadow of the Sleeping Giant
| Article
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17949 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
Date : |
5 / 1990 |
2,704 Words |
| Author
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Scarlet Cheng
Scarlet Cheng, based in Los Angeles, is a contributing editor
to the arts section of The World & I. |
In the shadow of China lie two smaller countries whose fate and fortune in the 1990s will color the geopolitics of the entire Pacific Rim. Hong Kong, with its prospects of reversion to China in 1997, has been much in the news; and Taiwan, with its ending of martial law and budding search for new democracy, is also undergoing dramatic social and political upheavals.
The recent films and the film industry off these two countries reflect both the malaise and the fat-forward drive of overheated economics and changing social relationships.
Given the proximity of countries and cultures, many cinema talents - including directors, cinematographers, and especially actors - work almost interchangeably in Taiwan and Hong Kong. And thanks to the fact that almost all Chinese films are post-dubbed, an actor's native dialect - whether Mandarin, Taiwanese, or Cantonese - doesn't get in the way of the exchange. But the films themselves are not interchangeable: They retain an identifiable national sense and sensibility.
Appropriately enough, last December's Golden Horse International Film Festival in Taipei found two films, one Taiwanese and one from Hong Kong, competing neck to neck for most of the top prizes. In this key Chinese film event, Taiwanese director Hou Hsia-hsien's politically controversial A City of Sadness vied with Hong Kong director Stanley Kwan's sensitively realized drama Full Moon in New York. The two films and their directors represent what is best in cinema in those two countries.
An Astonishing
... (1958 of 15796 Characters)
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