Session 62: The Local and Global Dynamics of Asian Film, Performance, and Culture

Organizer and Chair: Kin Yan Szeto, Northwestern University

Discussant: Kyung Hyun Kim, University of California, Irvine

Keywords: film, performance, culture, global studies.

This panel examines how local politics, the rise of global capitalism and the history of the Asian disapora have shaped the political, economic, social and cultural interflows between Asia (China, Korea, Japan, and Singapore) and other parts of the world (particularly America and Ireland). Under various different circumstances, technological changes and the emergence of the global market are the key factors in the development of culture, media and performance in Asia. Under other circumstances, it is the political and social content of the nation-state that determines the course of ownership and content. Against the backdrop of these socio-political transformations, the panel analyzes the interactions of local and global dynamics in media, culture and performance. Kin Yan Szeto (USA) examines the trans-regional influences of Chinese martial arts film and performance in the re-conceptualization of cultural citizenship in Asia and America. See Kam Tan (China) examines the global networking of the contemporary Singaporean film industry, and focuses on Raintree Pictures’ attempt to produce globally successful films in collaborative projects with different Asian countries. Moonim Baek (Korea) discusses the political economy of the recent boom of Korean popular culture in Asia, and the evolution of the East Asian media environment. Chia-Hsin Chou (Ireland) focuses on the transnational influence of Japanese Butoh performance in contemporary Irish theatre, and looks at the significance of interculturalism between Japan and Ireland that produces the paradigm-shifting means for understanding the political and cultural identity of postcolonial Ireland. The effects of transnationalism are varied. Consequences are comparable but take different shape across various regions. This panel aims at drawing on multiple perspectives and methodologies from more than one discipline for examining contemporary Asian arts and cultures in the age of globalization.

Battle for the World: The Transnationalization of Chinese Martial Arts Film and Performance

Kin Yan Szeto, Northwestern University

This paper primarily offers a study of the recent cross-cultural influences of Chinese martial arts film, performance and culture in Asia and America, and examines the re-conceptualization of cultural citizenship in the world of martial arts cultures. The Chinese martial arts performance remains one of the most active forms of culture that has originated from China. The world tour performances of the Shaolin monks have helped to promote the global visibility of the cultures. The Chinese martial arts choreography and performance have been highly popular among regional film productions in Asia, and transnational collaborations in America. The global appeal of the Chinese martial arts cultures results in the making of blockbuster movies that aim at appealing to Asian and even international markets. The previous arthouse Mainland Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou has completed two martial arts movies Hero (2002) and House of Flying Daggers (2004). Korean productions Bichunmoo (2000), Musa (2001) and Hollywood works The Matrix trilogy (1999–2003) are other examples of transnational co-operations that incorporate Chinese martial arts choreography and performance. The Chinese martial arts culture that flourishes with the regional success of Hong Kong cinema has now generated a new trend of cross-cultural fetishism. Martial arts have become the intercultural battlefield for various values, and socio-economic interests in Asia and beyond. The paper examines the transnationalization of martial arts cinema and performance across Asia and America, and focuses on how social, cultural and political values that derive from Chinese martial arts have now undergone transformations in cross-cultural film and performance, and result in new conceptualization of cultural imaginary in today’s interconnected world.

Singapore Filmmaking: Raintree Pictures as a Brand-Name in the Pan-Asian Film Market?

See Kam Tan, University of Macau

This paper primarily offers a case study of Raintree Pictures, the filmmaking arm of the state-run Media Corporation of Singapore (MediaCorp). The paper will do this by: (1) obtaining and collating interview data from industry people, including the CEO of Raintree and local and regional filmmakers associated with Raintree productions; (2) charting the production, distribution, exhibition and marketing patterns of Raintree films within Singapore and elsewhere; and (3) critically assessing its films.

It has been more than ten years since film production in Singapore was revived in 1991 after being dormant for almost two decades. A former British colony, Singapore became self-governing in 1959. By the start of the 1990s, it was clear that the goal of economic prosperity generated by the Singaporean government had been achieved. The authorities, ever pragmatic, decided there was economic value in artistic activity and determined to transform Singapore into a "vibrant global city of the arts." Raintree is a product of this economic and political environment in Singapore. Set up in 1989, Raintree Pictures remains the most active filmmaker in Singapore. In addition to fostering ties between the TV industry and the filmmaking community, it has also sought transnational collaborations with regional (Hong Kong) film companies. Raintree’s objective is to make mainstream and commercially successful movies that will appeal to Asian and even international markets. These strategies appear to be in tandem with Raintree’s explicit aims to make globally successful movies that will make "Raintree Pictures" a brand name in the pan-Asian film markets (and beyond).

Is There an Asian Popular Culture? The Korean Wave (HanRyu in Korean) and the East Asia Cultural Network

Moonim Baek, Yonsei University

Korean culture is in crisis. On the one hand, the rising popularity of Korean film, television and popular culture is noticeable in East Asian countries. On the other hand, social unrest and political interests become the countervailing or parallel force to globalization. For one thing, Korean films and soap operas are prevailing in China and Japan while diplomatic tensions continue because of the history of Japanese imperialist invasion in the territories, and the unresolved problems of the two Koreas. The interregional flows of Korean culture collude with the rise of neo-nationalism and the investment of foreign capital in Asia. This paper will examine this controversy between cultural circuit and political, economic discourses in East Asian media environment. Korean Wave (a.k.a. HanRyu) is defined as a boom of Korean movies, soap operas, and popular songs in East Asian popular culture. It is initially based on the economic infrastructure of new media that make possible the airing of Korean popular products abroad. What is interesting is that it was Japanese popular culture and its boom in East Asia during the 1980s and early 1990s that consolidates the intra-national networks across Asia. Through the evolution of the region’s media, the social and economic discourse to imagine the emergence of an "East Asian Cultural Network" emerges. This imaginary invokes the shaping of an alternative zone to Western popular culture, but also covertly aims at the vast Chinese market that is being opened. The struggles in the cultural hegemony in East Asia becomes the agent of economic initiative in Asia and, moreover, East Asia’s response to global capitalism.

Kandachime in Ireland: Ready-made Butoh, Disciplined Body, and Cultural Anxiety

Chia-Hsin Chou, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

In February 2004, Torifune Butoh-Sha (Japanese theatre company) collaborated mainly with Irish local performers to workshop Butoh techniques and premiere Kandachime (literarily as wild horses in the snowy northeast of Honshu, Japan) at the Samuel Beckett Center, Trinity College Dublin. Choreographed by the Japanese artist Yokio Mikami, the six-segmented Kandachime relied on the inspirations and images of Kandachime to explore the Japanese Butoh techniques on the Irish stage. Echoing Tatsumi Higikata’s understanding of the Butoh dancer as "a dead corpse standing straight up in a desperate bid for life," Kandachime displayed a dark ensemble of visions and movements of the sublime, but simultaneously exposed the political questions derived from intercultural arts exchanges: what, if any, are the limits and purposes to a culture-specific, Japanese stylized art form, such as Butoh, re-staging in Ireland? What, if anything, is left or transformed of that intercultural exchange between Japan and Ireland when Japanese culture is embodied and transposed upon the disciplined foreign body of white Irish actors?

In response to the above questions, this paper presents the ethnographic research that investigates the dynamics of the four-week Butoh workshop process. The paper deals with the transformation of Irish performers, and the aesthetics and reception of Kandachime. By doing so, this paper wishes to comprehend how that displaced and ready-made Butoh practice in Dublin posits continual political struggle and cultural anxiety of and for national identities in the postcolonial Irish context.