Hong Kong in the 1980s and 90s produced some fantastic movies. Now censorship threatens to erase them, and the culture they celebrated.
In 2011, the Chinese government released a statement condemning movies and television shows that "casually make up myths, have monstrous and weird plots, use absurd tactics, and even promote feudalism, superstition, fatalism and reincarnation" (original statement here). There are some who argue that the statement refers only to time-travel stories that misrepresent historical characters and events, but the statement has had a chilling effect on a film industry that has a history of coming under attack.
The Chinese government has made no qualms of suppressing political speech, going so far as to imprison authors for writing stories that the government dislikes. So there is reason for filmmakers' reluctance to pursue creative endeavors that can be seen as promoting superstition.
But Huang Ying and other Hong Kong filmmakers of the 80s weren't promoting superstition; they were reclaiming a forgotten portion of their nationalistic heritage. Why should they make movies about European vampires, when Chinese culture has its own myths, its own ghosts and goblins? These filmmakers explored the horror and the comedy of the jiangshi (weirdly translated as "hopping vampires"), as well as witches with flying heads, beautiful ghost maidens, demonic trees, and the spirits of ancient foxes. And for protection, people could turn to the Dàoshi, or Taoist priest.
These movies are called linghuan gongfu pian, which translates to "spirit magic kung fu movies." In Return of the Demon, Huang Ying gave us an immortal villain whose power came from Daoist internal alchemy, and a kind of werewolf created by a Daoist magical spell.
See? These films seem to be saying. Our cultureis as rich as Western culture. And the 1980s saw a stream of movies from Hong Kong and Taiwan, celebrating Daoist magic, Chinese folklore, and the authors of ghost stories, particularly Pu Songling.
But things have changed. The popularity of the spirit magic kung fu movie died down. Epic and spectacle still exist, like this year's Painted Skin 2, which clearly decided to "casually make up myths" for its "monstrous and weird" plot. But the homely machismo of the Taoist priest wielding a peach wood sword to decapitate ghosts is a bygone. In its place we have movies like 2011's disappointing Moonlight, where the hopping corpses turn out to be fakes, like an episode of Scooby Doo.
The Chinese government statement did not explicitly outlaw the making of spirit magic kung fu movies. But it certainly made Chinese filmmakers think very carefully before producing a film that can be interpreted as promoting superstition. Whether or not the government's statement was intended to ban movies that reclaim traditional Chinese folk magic as a basis of nationalistic pride, the statement can definitely have a chilling effect on the nation's film industry.
"Smash all old things" is a slogan of the Red Guard. It seemed appropriate now. This is Banned Books Week, and I've been thinking about stories that go silent, and stories that are stifled.
I was watching a spirit magic kung fu movie, MR. VAMPIRE, when I had the idea that made me want to write fiction. I could draw on my studies of Chinese language and religion, and I could do research, and conduct interviews, and write a novel that would explore the folkloric depth of the spirit magic kung fu movie with a strong female protagonist. MR. VAMPIRE meets BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, if you will.
A lot of white authors wouldn't touch this kind of material, and with good reason. Cultural appropriation can be harmful; it can lead to unintentional mockery of a culture one doesn't share; it can exoticize the people of that culture, causing them to be seen as "other," inherently different. Cultural appropriation has the ability to do real harm.
But at the same time, when a white author refuses to explore cultures he or she didn't grow up with, then that author is embracing ethnocentrism, and failing to encourage broader perspectives in his or her readership. He or she is contributing to the marginalization of a culture. And, in many cases, such as the wealth of cultural material underlying Hong Kong's supernatural kung fu movies, authors who refuse to delve into other cultures are choosing to stand by and witness the erasure of those cultures, their history and their voices.
In 2011, the Chinese government released a statement condemning movies and television shows that "casually make up myths, have monstrous and weird plots, use absurd tactics, and even promote feudalism, superstition, fatalism and reincarnation" (original statement here). There are some who argue that the statement refers only to time-travel stories that misrepresent historical characters and events, but the statement has had a chilling effect on a film industry that has a history of coming under attack.
The Chinese government has made no qualms of suppressing political speech, going so far as to imprison authors for writing stories that the government dislikes. So there is reason for filmmakers' reluctance to pursue creative endeavors that can be seen as promoting superstition.
But Huang Ying and other Hong Kong filmmakers of the 80s weren't promoting superstition; they were reclaiming a forgotten portion of their nationalistic heritage. Why should they make movies about European vampires, when Chinese culture has its own myths, its own ghosts and goblins? These filmmakers explored the horror and the comedy of the jiangshi (weirdly translated as "hopping vampires"), as well as witches with flying heads, beautiful ghost maidens, demonic trees, and the spirits of ancient foxes. And for protection, people could turn to the Dàoshi, or Taoist priest.
These movies are called linghuan gongfu pian, which translates to "spirit magic kung fu movies." In Return of the Demon, Huang Ying gave us an immortal villain whose power came from Daoist internal alchemy, and a kind of werewolf created by a Daoist magical spell.
See? These films seem to be saying. Our cultureis as rich as Western culture. And the 1980s saw a stream of movies from Hong Kong and Taiwan, celebrating Daoist magic, Chinese folklore, and the authors of ghost stories, particularly Pu Songling.
But things have changed. The popularity of the spirit magic kung fu movie died down. Epic and spectacle still exist, like this year's Painted Skin 2, which clearly decided to "casually make up myths" for its "monstrous and weird" plot. But the homely machismo of the Taoist priest wielding a peach wood sword to decapitate ghosts is a bygone. In its place we have movies like 2011's disappointing Moonlight, where the hopping corpses turn out to be fakes, like an episode of Scooby Doo.
The Chinese government statement did not explicitly outlaw the making of spirit magic kung fu movies. But it certainly made Chinese filmmakers think very carefully before producing a film that can be interpreted as promoting superstition. Whether or not the government's statement was intended to ban movies that reclaim traditional Chinese folk magic as a basis of nationalistic pride, the statement can definitely have a chilling effect on the nation's film industry.
"Smash all old things" is a slogan of the Red Guard. It seemed appropriate now. This is Banned Books Week, and I've been thinking about stories that go silent, and stories that are stifled.
I was watching a spirit magic kung fu movie, MR. VAMPIRE, when I had the idea that made me want to write fiction. I could draw on my studies of Chinese language and religion, and I could do research, and conduct interviews, and write a novel that would explore the folkloric depth of the spirit magic kung fu movie with a strong female protagonist. MR. VAMPIRE meets BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, if you will.
A lot of white authors wouldn't touch this kind of material, and with good reason. Cultural appropriation can be harmful; it can lead to unintentional mockery of a culture one doesn't share; it can exoticize the people of that culture, causing them to be seen as "other," inherently different. Cultural appropriation has the ability to do real harm.
But at the same time, when a white author refuses to explore cultures he or she didn't grow up with, then that author is embracing ethnocentrism, and failing to encourage broader perspectives in his or her readership. He or she is contributing to the marginalization of a culture. And, in many cases, such as the wealth of cultural material underlying Hong Kong's supernatural kung fu movies, authors who refuse to delve into other cultures are choosing to stand by and witness the erasure of those cultures, their history and their voices.