Diana Walsh Pasulka
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195335224
- eISBN:
- 9780199868810
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195335224.003.0011
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter explores contemporary representations of death in American popular culture, and elaborates on their meaning for today's youth. Death appeals to the young for several reasons. The heroes ...
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This chapter explores contemporary representations of death in American popular culture, and elaborates on their meaning for today's youth. Death appeals to the young for several reasons. The heroes of television shows and movies present a way to negotiate the finality of death. Such characters can be interpreted as modern versions of the psychopomp. Current representations of death, particularly those that target youth, avoid a traditional interpretation of death characterized as final. Instead, death in popular culture is an extension of life—one where good and evil are more clearly defined, and where the fantastic lives. Although the apparent whimsical aspects of these representations seem to indicate that today's youth are denying death, the experiences of the classes the author of this chapter has taught suggests otherwise. The students in those classes maintained a healthy “suspension of belief” while consuming these images. These representations allow students to reflect upon death without the emotional involvement associated with more realistic portrayals of death.Less
This chapter explores contemporary representations of death in American popular culture, and elaborates on their meaning for today's youth. Death appeals to the young for several reasons. The heroes of television shows and movies present a way to negotiate the finality of death. Such characters can be interpreted as modern versions of the psychopomp. Current representations of death, particularly those that target youth, avoid a traditional interpretation of death characterized as final. Instead, death in popular culture is an extension of life—one where good and evil are more clearly defined, and where the fantastic lives. Although the apparent whimsical aspects of these representations seem to indicate that today's youth are denying death, the experiences of the classes the author of this chapter has taught suggests otherwise. The students in those classes maintained a healthy “suspension of belief” while consuming these images. These representations allow students to reflect upon death without the emotional involvement associated with more realistic portrayals of death.
P. J. McKenna, E. Lorente-Rovira, and G. E. Berrios
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199208913
- eISBN:
- 9780191723759
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199208913.003.07
- Subject:
- Psychology, Cognitive Neuroscience
This chapter argues that the phenomenon of confabulation can be seen in schizophrenia. It is clear that it is very uncommon in a spontaneous form, and when it does occur it always seems to take the ...
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This chapter argues that the phenomenon of confabulation can be seen in schizophrenia. It is clear that it is very uncommon in a spontaneous form, and when it does occur it always seems to take the form of so-called fantastic confabulation. With the possible exception of general paralysis of the insane, this schizophrenic form of confabulation appears to go considerably beyond even the most adventurous and illogical forms of spontaneous confabulation encountered in neurological disease.Less
This chapter argues that the phenomenon of confabulation can be seen in schizophrenia. It is clear that it is very uncommon in a spontaneous form, and when it does occur it always seems to take the form of so-called fantastic confabulation. With the possible exception of general paralysis of the insane, this schizophrenic form of confabulation appears to go considerably beyond even the most adventurous and illogical forms of spontaneous confabulation encountered in neurological disease.
Daniel Cook
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474487139
- eISBN:
- 9781399501903
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474487139.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
Walter Scott’s historical novels dominated the literary marketplace for much of the nineteenth century. As an author of short fiction, in which he also excelled, he has received far less attention. ...
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Walter Scott’s historical novels dominated the literary marketplace for much of the nineteenth century. As an author of short fiction, in which he also excelled, he has received far less attention. Walter Scott and Short Fiction is the first extended study of The Author of Waverley’s only collection of short stories, Chronicles of the Canongate; periodical and gift-book pieces; and interpolated tales that appeared in the novels, such as ‘The Fortunes of Martin Waldeck’, a devilish folk story, and ‘Wandering Willie’s Tale’, which remains one of the most widely anthologised short prose works ever written. Through extensive readings of the Highland stories (‘The Highland Widow’ and ‘The Two Drovers’), his Indian novella (The Surgeon’s Daughter), Gothic keepsakes (‘My Aunt Margaret’s Mirror’ and ‘The Tapestried Chamber’), his Calabrian tale Bizarro, and other texts, this book offers new insights into the production and consumption of the short story, the novella, the tale, the sketch, and other forms of fiction in the early nineteenth century and beyond.Less
Walter Scott’s historical novels dominated the literary marketplace for much of the nineteenth century. As an author of short fiction, in which he also excelled, he has received far less attention. Walter Scott and Short Fiction is the first extended study of The Author of Waverley’s only collection of short stories, Chronicles of the Canongate; periodical and gift-book pieces; and interpolated tales that appeared in the novels, such as ‘The Fortunes of Martin Waldeck’, a devilish folk story, and ‘Wandering Willie’s Tale’, which remains one of the most widely anthologised short prose works ever written. Through extensive readings of the Highland stories (‘The Highland Widow’ and ‘The Two Drovers’), his Indian novella (The Surgeon’s Daughter), Gothic keepsakes (‘My Aunt Margaret’s Mirror’ and ‘The Tapestried Chamber’), his Calabrian tale Bizarro, and other texts, this book offers new insights into the production and consumption of the short story, the novella, the tale, the sketch, and other forms of fiction in the early nineteenth century and beyond.
Kat Ellinger
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781800348295
- eISBN:
- 9781800342590
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3828/liverpool/9781800348295.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
‘Daughters of Darkness’ (1971) is a vampire film like no other. Heralded as psychological high-Gothic cinema, loved for its art-house and erotic flavors, Harry Kümel's 1971 cult classic is unwrapped ...
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‘Daughters of Darkness’ (1971) is a vampire film like no other. Heralded as psychological high-Gothic cinema, loved for its art-house and erotic flavors, Harry Kümel's 1971 cult classic is unwrapped in intricate detail in this book to unravel the many mysteries surrounding just what makes it so appealing. The book, as part of the Devil's Advocates series, examines the film in the context of its peers and contemporaries, in order to argue its place as an important evolutionary link in the chain of female vampire cinema. The text also explores the film's association with fairy tales, the Gothic genre, and fantastic tradition, as well as delving into aspects of the legend of Countess Bathory, traditional vampire lore, and much more. The book contains new and exclusive interviews with director Harry Kümel and actress and star Danielle Ouimet.Less
‘Daughters of Darkness’ (1971) is a vampire film like no other. Heralded as psychological high-Gothic cinema, loved for its art-house and erotic flavors, Harry Kümel's 1971 cult classic is unwrapped in intricate detail in this book to unravel the many mysteries surrounding just what makes it so appealing. The book, as part of the Devil's Advocates series, examines the film in the context of its peers and contemporaries, in order to argue its place as an important evolutionary link in the chain of female vampire cinema. The text also explores the film's association with fairy tales, the Gothic genre, and fantastic tradition, as well as delving into aspects of the legend of Countess Bathory, traditional vampire lore, and much more. The book contains new and exclusive interviews with director Harry Kümel and actress and star Danielle Ouimet.
Kenneth Chan and Andrew Stuckey (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Although Chinese film audiences, including those in the PRC, Taiwan and Hong Kong, have always maintained a foundational cultural interest in the fantastic, this trend has dramatically increased over ...
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Although Chinese film audiences, including those in the PRC, Taiwan and Hong Kong, have always maintained a foundational cultural interest in the fantastic, this trend has dramatically increased over the last decade. Sino-Enchantment is the first work in English to approach this recent explosion of fantastic films in Chinese cinemas, where each re-envisioning of the form is determined by cultural, economic, political and technological factors to produce fresh inventions and creative reinventions of familiar narratives, characters and tropes. As a whole, the book argues that fantastic cinemas serve a fundamental function of re-enchanting mundane modern society with wonder and awe. Individual chapters present detailed examinations of works by famous filmmakers such as Zhang Yimou, Tsui Hark and Stephen Chow, as well as case studies of films like The Assassin (2015), Monster Hunt (2015) and The Great Wall (2016). The book focuses on a range of cinematic forms, practices and themes, which include blockbuster films, art cinema, exploitation B-movies, digital effects, ecocinema, film blanc and contemporary adaptations of traditional Chinese classics. Sino-enchantment functions as a new theoretical lens through which readers can engage with elements of the fantastic in Chinese cinema in nuanced, complex and innovative ways.Less
Although Chinese film audiences, including those in the PRC, Taiwan and Hong Kong, have always maintained a foundational cultural interest in the fantastic, this trend has dramatically increased over the last decade. Sino-Enchantment is the first work in English to approach this recent explosion of fantastic films in Chinese cinemas, where each re-envisioning of the form is determined by cultural, economic, political and technological factors to produce fresh inventions and creative reinventions of familiar narratives, characters and tropes. As a whole, the book argues that fantastic cinemas serve a fundamental function of re-enchanting mundane modern society with wonder and awe. Individual chapters present detailed examinations of works by famous filmmakers such as Zhang Yimou, Tsui Hark and Stephen Chow, as well as case studies of films like The Assassin (2015), Monster Hunt (2015) and The Great Wall (2016). The book focuses on a range of cinematic forms, practices and themes, which include blockbuster films, art cinema, exploitation B-movies, digital effects, ecocinema, film blanc and contemporary adaptations of traditional Chinese classics. Sino-enchantment functions as a new theoretical lens through which readers can engage with elements of the fantastic in Chinese cinema in nuanced, complex and innovative ways.
Paul Kincaid
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780252041013
- eISBN:
- 9780252099564
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252041013.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This is the first book-length study of the entire oeuvre of Scottish novelist Iain Banks. While it concentrates on the science fiction as by Iain M. Banks, in particular his novels of the Culture, it ...
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This is the first book-length study of the entire oeuvre of Scottish novelist Iain Banks. While it concentrates on the science fiction as by Iain M. Banks, in particular his novels of the Culture, it demonstrates stylistic, structural, thematic and political links between these and the supposedly realist novels. It places his work in the context of contemporary Scottish literature, the Scottish fantastic, looks at his deliberate overturning of the usual cultural and political norms associated with space opera, and proposes that the Culture novels contain a counter-narrative to the usual utopian readings.Less
This is the first book-length study of the entire oeuvre of Scottish novelist Iain Banks. While it concentrates on the science fiction as by Iain M. Banks, in particular his novels of the Culture, it demonstrates stylistic, structural, thematic and political links between these and the supposedly realist novels. It places his work in the context of contemporary Scottish literature, the Scottish fantastic, looks at his deliberate overturning of the usual cultural and political norms associated with space opera, and proposes that the Culture novels contain a counter-narrative to the usual utopian readings.
Simon J. James
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199606597
- eISBN:
- 9780191738517
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199606597.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
The scientific discoveries of the Victorian era enlarged the scope of fantastic fiction. Wells extrapolates from evolutionary theory, geology, temporal physics, and optics to imagine alternate forms ...
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The scientific discoveries of the Victorian era enlarged the scope of fantastic fiction. Wells extrapolates from evolutionary theory, geology, temporal physics, and optics to imagine alternate forms of cultural production. Wells’s use of the fantastic does not constitute escapism, however. The irruption of the fantastic into an otherwise realistically narrated fictional world is a reminder that the indefinite passing of history will repeatedly threaten or displace humanity’s misplaced faith in its imagined superior position in the hierarchy of nature. Darwin’s formulation of the theory of evolution, and Wells’s imagining of fictional possibilities, constitute both an opportunity and a warning for humankind: Wells repeatedly insists on the impermanence of the status quo. This chapter also notes the frequency of images of reading and writing in Wells’s fiction: numerous texts include images of defaced or ineffective books and other artworks.Less
The scientific discoveries of the Victorian era enlarged the scope of fantastic fiction. Wells extrapolates from evolutionary theory, geology, temporal physics, and optics to imagine alternate forms of cultural production. Wells’s use of the fantastic does not constitute escapism, however. The irruption of the fantastic into an otherwise realistically narrated fictional world is a reminder that the indefinite passing of history will repeatedly threaten or displace humanity’s misplaced faith in its imagined superior position in the hierarchy of nature. Darwin’s formulation of the theory of evolution, and Wells’s imagining of fictional possibilities, constitute both an opportunity and a warning for humankind: Wells repeatedly insists on the impermanence of the status quo. This chapter also notes the frequency of images of reading and writing in Wells’s fiction: numerous texts include images of defaced or ineffective books and other artworks.
Ivy G. Wilson
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195337372
- eISBN:
- 9780199896929
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195337372.003.0009
- Subject:
- Literature, African-American Literature, American, 19th Century Literature
This concluding chapter extends the book's readings of aurality and visuality over a wide-range of late 20th-century African American cultural production including works by hip hop artists Common and ...
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This concluding chapter extends the book's readings of aurality and visuality over a wide-range of late 20th-century African American cultural production including works by hip hop artists Common and OutKast, political figure Malcolm X, artist Robert Colescott, and musicians Parliament/Funkadelic. Intimating the applicability of the book's critical currency of “the remix,” the chapter illustrates the continued salience of art to political discourse.Less
This concluding chapter extends the book's readings of aurality and visuality over a wide-range of late 20th-century African American cultural production including works by hip hop artists Common and OutKast, political figure Malcolm X, artist Robert Colescott, and musicians Parliament/Funkadelic. Intimating the applicability of the book's critical currency of “the remix,” the chapter illustrates the continued salience of art to political discourse.
Monica Germanà
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748637645
- eISBN:
- 9780748652259
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748637645.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Women's Literature
This introductory chapter explains the theme of this book, which is about the gothic and fantastic writing of Scottish women. The book proposes an earlier date for the fantastic revival and begins ...
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This introductory chapter explains the theme of this book, which is about the gothic and fantastic writing of Scottish women. The book proposes an earlier date for the fantastic revival and begins its investigation in 1978, the publication date of Emma Tennant's The Bad Sister. It pioneers in-depth investigation of largely neglected contemporary texts including Alice Thompson's Pandora's Box and Ali Smith's Hotel World, and offers new readings of A. L. Kennedy's So I Am Glad and Kate Atkinson's Behind the Scenes at the Museum.Less
This introductory chapter explains the theme of this book, which is about the gothic and fantastic writing of Scottish women. The book proposes an earlier date for the fantastic revival and begins its investigation in 1978, the publication date of Emma Tennant's The Bad Sister. It pioneers in-depth investigation of largely neglected contemporary texts including Alice Thompson's Pandora's Box and Ali Smith's Hotel World, and offers new readings of A. L. Kennedy's So I Am Glad and Kate Atkinson's Behind the Scenes at the Museum.
Tony Bolden
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781496830524
- eISBN:
- 9781496830593
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781496830524.003.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
Groove Theory traces the concept of funk from the beginning of the blues era around 1890 to its manifestation as a full-fledged genre in the 1970s. This chapter provides an introduction. In the ...
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Groove Theory traces the concept of funk from the beginning of the blues era around 1890 to its manifestation as a full-fledged genre in the 1970s. This chapter provides an introduction. In the chapters, Bolden examines the development of blue funk in a multidimensional discussion that engages songs, fiction, memoirs, interviews, scholarship, and more. The discussion proceeds in two parts. Side A presents a conceptual introduction to funk aesthetics, an historical overview of funk during the blues era, and a chapter on Sly Stone that examines his foundational role as an architect of funk. Side B includes chapters on Chaka Khan, Gil Scott-Heron, and Betty Davis, whose recordings and aesthetics exemplify distinct variations of blue funk and the black fantastic.Less
Groove Theory traces the concept of funk from the beginning of the blues era around 1890 to its manifestation as a full-fledged genre in the 1970s. This chapter provides an introduction. In the chapters, Bolden examines the development of blue funk in a multidimensional discussion that engages songs, fiction, memoirs, interviews, scholarship, and more. The discussion proceeds in two parts. Side A presents a conceptual introduction to funk aesthetics, an historical overview of funk during the blues era, and a chapter on Sly Stone that examines his foundational role as an architect of funk. Side B includes chapters on Chaka Khan, Gil Scott-Heron, and Betty Davis, whose recordings and aesthetics exemplify distinct variations of blue funk and the black fantastic.
Monika Kaup
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474483094
- eISBN:
- 9781399502115
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474483094.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Metaphysics/Epistemology
This chapter examines Maturana and Varela’s autopoietic theory and José Saramago’s Blindness. It argues that Blindness stages a new realist ontology of knowledge that shows striking parallels to ...
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This chapter examines Maturana and Varela’s autopoietic theory and José Saramago’s Blindness. It argues that Blindness stages a new realist ontology of knowledge that shows striking parallels to autopoietic theory. The chapter’s first part examines Maturana and Varela’s anti-representational theory of knowledge: its pivotal insight is that all knowledge is primarily about worlds, and about world-making. Far from involving a pre-given observer representing a pre-given reality, knowledge is about the co-constitution of minds and worlds in the process of living.
The second part focuses on Blindness’s depiction of the apocalyptic collapse of a city in the wake of a fantastic epidemic of white-blindness. It highlights the novel’s critical examination of the age-old connection between vision and knowledge. Saramago is shown to present a phenomenology of blind perception offering two insights. First, in destroying the fiction of the Cartesian detached observer, white-blind perception is immersed in its embodiment, demonstrating that blind minds are “embodied minds” in Maturana and Varela’s sense, minds thrown back on the sensorimotor apparatus of their bodies. Second, the white-blind discover that survival requires them to reconstitute their world from the ground up in an enactive rather than autonomous process: they reclaim their humanity as a symbiotic collective.Less
This chapter examines Maturana and Varela’s autopoietic theory and José Saramago’s Blindness. It argues that Blindness stages a new realist ontology of knowledge that shows striking parallels to autopoietic theory. The chapter’s first part examines Maturana and Varela’s anti-representational theory of knowledge: its pivotal insight is that all knowledge is primarily about worlds, and about world-making. Far from involving a pre-given observer representing a pre-given reality, knowledge is about the co-constitution of minds and worlds in the process of living.
The second part focuses on Blindness’s depiction of the apocalyptic collapse of a city in the wake of a fantastic epidemic of white-blindness. It highlights the novel’s critical examination of the age-old connection between vision and knowledge. Saramago is shown to present a phenomenology of blind perception offering two insights. First, in destroying the fiction of the Cartesian detached observer, white-blind perception is immersed in its embodiment, demonstrating that blind minds are “embodied minds” in Maturana and Varela’s sense, minds thrown back on the sensorimotor apparatus of their bodies. Second, the white-blind discover that survival requires them to reconstitute their world from the ground up in an enactive rather than autonomous process: they reclaim their humanity as a symbiotic collective.
Dominic Lash
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781474462778
- eISBN:
- 9781474490603
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474462778.003.0003
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter concentrates on the rhetorical figure of metalepsis as an important example of the ways that the two senses of confusion distinguished in the prospectus can intersect in narrative films. ...
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This chapter concentrates on the rhetorical figure of metalepsis as an important example of the ways that the two senses of confusion distinguished in the prospectus can intersect in narrative films. In film, metalepsis refers to situations in which ontological layers that "should not" be able to intersect nevertheless do so, such as when Buster Keaton enters the cinema screen in Sherlock Jr. (1924). The theory of metalepsis, and what it helps reveal about the ontology of fiction, are explored largely by means of French theory and philosophy (Genette; Souriau). Finally, it is argued that metalepsis can serve as an important reminder that questions about a film's rhetoric – the way it addresses the viewer – can not always be neatly separated from its diegesis. Diegetic status (e.g. whether an event is "real" within the fictional world, or instead a dream, fantasy, or memory) is not a "fact" but a product of a film's rhetoric.Less
This chapter concentrates on the rhetorical figure of metalepsis as an important example of the ways that the two senses of confusion distinguished in the prospectus can intersect in narrative films. In film, metalepsis refers to situations in which ontological layers that "should not" be able to intersect nevertheless do so, such as when Buster Keaton enters the cinema screen in Sherlock Jr. (1924). The theory of metalepsis, and what it helps reveal about the ontology of fiction, are explored largely by means of French theory and philosophy (Genette; Souriau). Finally, it is argued that metalepsis can serve as an important reminder that questions about a film's rhetoric – the way it addresses the viewer – can not always be neatly separated from its diegesis. Diegetic status (e.g. whether an event is "real" within the fictional world, or instead a dream, fantasy, or memory) is not a "fact" but a product of a film's rhetoric.
Kenneth Chan and Andrew Stuckey
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.003.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This introductory chapter employs the theoretical concept of Sino-enchantment to explore the cultural, political and ideological complexities, contradictions and complicities of contemporary Chinese ...
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This introductory chapter employs the theoretical concept of Sino-enchantment to explore the cultural, political and ideological complexities, contradictions and complicities of contemporary Chinese fantastic films. The chapter briefly maps out the history of the fantastic in Chinese cinemas and locates the contemporary resurgence of the fantastic in that historical timeline. The theoretical exploration of Sino-enchantment emphasises the playfulness inherent in fantastic cinemas, which serves as a means for audiences to find re-enchantment in a modern, disenchanted world. Finally, the chapter threads the individual key points that the separate chapters articulate into a larger theoretical framework in order for readers to understand the key appeals that contemporary Chinese films make when they deploy the fantastic in newly reconfigured ways.Less
This introductory chapter employs the theoretical concept of Sino-enchantment to explore the cultural, political and ideological complexities, contradictions and complicities of contemporary Chinese fantastic films. The chapter briefly maps out the history of the fantastic in Chinese cinemas and locates the contemporary resurgence of the fantastic in that historical timeline. The theoretical exploration of Sino-enchantment emphasises the playfulness inherent in fantastic cinemas, which serves as a means for audiences to find re-enchantment in a modern, disenchanted world. Finally, the chapter threads the individual key points that the separate chapters articulate into a larger theoretical framework in order for readers to understand the key appeals that contemporary Chinese films make when they deploy the fantastic in newly reconfigured ways.
Li Yang
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.003.0004
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter identifies the fantastic as a crucial element that makes Zhang Yimou’s Hero (2002) the first successful locally grown blockbuster in China. In addition to a high budget and all-star ...
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This chapter identifies the fantastic as a crucial element that makes Zhang Yimou’s Hero (2002) the first successful locally grown blockbuster in China. In addition to a high budget and all-star cast, Hero distinguished itself from many previous failed blockbuster attempts though a “fantastic” makeover that turned a household historical tale into an enthralling viewing experience featuring mythicised narrative and spectacular visuals. The fantastic energy, unleashed by the adoption of the beloved martial arts film genre, helped to find the optimal aesthetic solution to the imported blockbuster financial model and to land the film at the balance point between art and commerce. The result was a stylistically unique, yet crowd-pleasing, local blockbuster that channelled the wonderous exhibitionist impulse of early cinema and ushered Chinese commercial cinema into a new era.Less
This chapter identifies the fantastic as a crucial element that makes Zhang Yimou’s Hero (2002) the first successful locally grown blockbuster in China. In addition to a high budget and all-star cast, Hero distinguished itself from many previous failed blockbuster attempts though a “fantastic” makeover that turned a household historical tale into an enthralling viewing experience featuring mythicised narrative and spectacular visuals. The fantastic energy, unleashed by the adoption of the beloved martial arts film genre, helped to find the optimal aesthetic solution to the imported blockbuster financial model and to land the film at the balance point between art and commerce. The result was a stylistically unique, yet crowd-pleasing, local blockbuster that channelled the wonderous exhibitionist impulse of early cinema and ushered Chinese commercial cinema into a new era.
Andrew Stuckey
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.003.0005
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The acclaimed Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s 2015 film, The Assassin, is adapted from a Tang Dynasty tale that is one of the first instances in Chinese literature to describe a swordswoman. If ...
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The acclaimed Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s 2015 film, The Assassin, is adapted from a Tang Dynasty tale that is one of the first instances in Chinese literature to describe a swordswoman. If for films such as A Touch of Zen or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon the ethical dilemmas particular to a woman in the underworld of martial arts rivers and lakes are navigated by means of the visual spectacle of bodies in flight and in fight, Hou’s heroine, Nie Yinniang, is quite different. She emerges victorious over her enemies, but they are not vanquished. She maintains her own moral standards but retreats into seclusion by the end of the film. Likewise, Hou’s camera is often at such a distance that fighting sequences are as much obscured as revealed in the film. Thus, Hou’s famed style of exceedingly slow narrative presentation comes into fruitful tension with the generic conventions emphasising the fantastic elements of martial arts film. This chapter examines the reduced status of these fantastic features of the film, the way that Hou’s style naturalises and, indeed, construes them as realistic components of the narrative, and how these seemingly oppositional tactics come together to inform Nie Yinniang’s moral stance.Less
The acclaimed Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s 2015 film, The Assassin, is adapted from a Tang Dynasty tale that is one of the first instances in Chinese literature to describe a swordswoman. If for films such as A Touch of Zen or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon the ethical dilemmas particular to a woman in the underworld of martial arts rivers and lakes are navigated by means of the visual spectacle of bodies in flight and in fight, Hou’s heroine, Nie Yinniang, is quite different. She emerges victorious over her enemies, but they are not vanquished. She maintains her own moral standards but retreats into seclusion by the end of the film. Likewise, Hou’s camera is often at such a distance that fighting sequences are as much obscured as revealed in the film. Thus, Hou’s famed style of exceedingly slow narrative presentation comes into fruitful tension with the generic conventions emphasising the fantastic elements of martial arts film. This chapter examines the reduced status of these fantastic features of the film, the way that Hou’s style naturalises and, indeed, construes them as realistic components of the narrative, and how these seemingly oppositional tactics come together to inform Nie Yinniang’s moral stance.
Shi-Yan Chao
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.003.0006
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter uses Hong Kong commercial filmmaker Ho Meng-hua and his fantastic work to address three main lines of inquiry: the articulations of the fantastic mode across different genres, the kinds ...
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This chapter uses Hong Kong commercial filmmaker Ho Meng-hua and his fantastic work to address three main lines of inquiry: the articulations of the fantastic mode across different genres, the kinds of mise-en-scène of desire facilitated by the public forms of generic conventions, and the sorts of preferred subject positions animated by different kinds of mise-en-scène of desire in question. Along with the particular manoeuvre of the fantastic mode across three key genres (fantasy adventure, martial arts and horror genres), coupled with a changing formulation of the fantastic’s double appeal to what the author terms ‘fantastic impossibility’ and ‘spectacular probability’, this chapter comes to the conclusion that Ho Meng-hua’s career at Shaws studio during the 1960s and 1970s reflected the way the Hong Kong people negotiated their distinct subjectivity in a transnational framework, which is the socio-political significance of the fantastic mode in its Hong Kong articulation.Less
This chapter uses Hong Kong commercial filmmaker Ho Meng-hua and his fantastic work to address three main lines of inquiry: the articulations of the fantastic mode across different genres, the kinds of mise-en-scène of desire facilitated by the public forms of generic conventions, and the sorts of preferred subject positions animated by different kinds of mise-en-scène of desire in question. Along with the particular manoeuvre of the fantastic mode across three key genres (fantasy adventure, martial arts and horror genres), coupled with a changing formulation of the fantastic’s double appeal to what the author terms ‘fantastic impossibility’ and ‘spectacular probability’, this chapter comes to the conclusion that Ho Meng-hua’s career at Shaws studio during the 1960s and 1970s reflected the way the Hong Kong people negotiated their distinct subjectivity in a transnational framework, which is the socio-political significance of the fantastic mode in its Hong Kong articulation.
Yiman Wang
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.003.0010
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter studies two recent Chinese co-productions, Born in China (2016) and Wolf Totem (2015), which foreground the construction of the indexical and the fantastic wildlife in the very process ...
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This chapter studies two recent Chinese co-productions, Born in China (2016) and Wolf Totem (2015), which foreground the construction of the indexical and the fantastic wildlife in the very process of renegotiating the parameters of Chinese cinema. Navigating multilayered boundaries between ethnicities, species, and media industries, I analyse how the two films construct and address the tension between and intertwinement of the indexical and the fantastic wildlife. I describe the films’ de-anthropocentric impulse, articulated through technological mediation, as almost wild, but not quite. More specifically, I argue that Wolf Totem features ‘cultivated wildness’, while Born in China depends on ‘intercepted wildness’. Both bespeak fantastic ecocinematic consciousness without carrying it to full fruition.Less
This chapter studies two recent Chinese co-productions, Born in China (2016) and Wolf Totem (2015), which foreground the construction of the indexical and the fantastic wildlife in the very process of renegotiating the parameters of Chinese cinema. Navigating multilayered boundaries between ethnicities, species, and media industries, I analyse how the two films construct and address the tension between and intertwinement of the indexical and the fantastic wildlife. I describe the films’ de-anthropocentric impulse, articulated through technological mediation, as almost wild, but not quite. More specifically, I argue that Wolf Totem features ‘cultivated wildness’, while Born in China depends on ‘intercepted wildness’. Both bespeak fantastic ecocinematic consciousness without carrying it to full fruition.
Kenneth Chan and Andrew Stuckey
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9781474460842
- eISBN:
- 9781399501644
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474460842.003.0013
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
In the coda that concludes this volume, the book’s editors confront COVID-19 as a global phenomenon that forces into view cultural anxieties about critical work on fantastic Chinese cinema. The key ...
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In the coda that concludes this volume, the book’s editors confront COVID-19 as a global phenomenon that forces into view cultural anxieties about critical work on fantastic Chinese cinema. The key question the pandemic raises is not just the significance of studying the fantastic as a cinematic form but also how one’s understanding of the fantastic, especially as seen through the theory of Sino-enchantment, can help reconceptualize the understanding of life on this shared planet, as one is ‘re-enchanted anew’ toward the hope of better days to come.Less
In the coda that concludes this volume, the book’s editors confront COVID-19 as a global phenomenon that forces into view cultural anxieties about critical work on fantastic Chinese cinema. The key question the pandemic raises is not just the significance of studying the fantastic as a cinematic form but also how one’s understanding of the fantastic, especially as seen through the theory of Sino-enchantment, can help reconceptualize the understanding of life on this shared planet, as one is ‘re-enchanted anew’ toward the hope of better days to come.
Brett M. Rogers and Benjamin Eldon Stevens (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- February 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780190610050
- eISBN:
- 9780190610081
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190610050.001.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval, Poetry and Poets: Classical, Early, and Medieval
Classical Traditions in Modern Fantasy is the first collection of essays in English focusing on how fantasy draws deeply on ancient Greek and Roman myth, philosophy, literature, history, art, and ...
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Classical Traditions in Modern Fantasy is the first collection of essays in English focusing on how fantasy draws deeply on ancient Greek and Roman myth, philosophy, literature, history, art, and cult practice. Presenting 15 all-new essays intended for both scholars and other readers of fantasy, this volume explores many of the most significant examples of the modern genre—including the works of H. P. Lovecraft, J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia, J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, George R. R. Martin’s Game of Thrones series, and more—in relation to important ancient texts such as Aeschylus’ Oresteia, Aristotle’s Poetics, Virgil’s Aeneid, and Apuleius’ The Golden Ass. These varied studies raise fascinating questions about genre, literary and artistic histories, and the suspension of disbelief required not only of readers of fantasy but also of students of antiquity. Ranging from harpies to hobbits, from Cyclopes to Cthulhu, the comparative study of Classics and fantasy reveals deep similarities between ancient and modern ways of imagining the world. Although antiquity and the present day differ in many ways, at its base, ancient literature resonates deeply with modern fantasy's image of worlds in flux and bodies in motion.Less
Classical Traditions in Modern Fantasy is the first collection of essays in English focusing on how fantasy draws deeply on ancient Greek and Roman myth, philosophy, literature, history, art, and cult practice. Presenting 15 all-new essays intended for both scholars and other readers of fantasy, this volume explores many of the most significant examples of the modern genre—including the works of H. P. Lovecraft, J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia, J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, George R. R. Martin’s Game of Thrones series, and more—in relation to important ancient texts such as Aeschylus’ Oresteia, Aristotle’s Poetics, Virgil’s Aeneid, and Apuleius’ The Golden Ass. These varied studies raise fascinating questions about genre, literary and artistic histories, and the suspension of disbelief required not only of readers of fantasy but also of students of antiquity. Ranging from harpies to hobbits, from Cyclopes to Cthulhu, the comparative study of Classics and fantasy reveals deep similarities between ancient and modern ways of imagining the world. Although antiquity and the present day differ in many ways, at its base, ancient literature resonates deeply with modern fantasy's image of worlds in flux and bodies in motion.
Stephen Teo
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622098152
- eISBN:
- 9789882207110
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622098152.003.0006
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter focuses on the final Zen climax and its psychic inferences. In the aftermath of the Battle of the Haunted Mansion, the film moves on to its fantastic-marvelous phase. The final section ...
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This chapter focuses on the final Zen climax and its psychic inferences. In the aftermath of the Battle of the Haunted Mansion, the film moves on to its fantastic-marvelous phase. The final section of the film goes on to show Yang Huizhen's fulfillment of her other mission — to continue the Gu family line by giving birth to Gu's baby before she can finally withdraw from the world to achieve transcendence. However, just before the film reaches its Zen finale, she is recalled into action in the final climactic battle scenes, suggesting that her xia nü role, pre-given her by the cosmic spider, is unfinished. The Zen subject is an artistic paradox that befits the Jungian idea of wholeness. The film is a carefully designed work of art. It is a sentient art object that comes from the singular mind of King Hu.Less
This chapter focuses on the final Zen climax and its psychic inferences. In the aftermath of the Battle of the Haunted Mansion, the film moves on to its fantastic-marvelous phase. The final section of the film goes on to show Yang Huizhen's fulfillment of her other mission — to continue the Gu family line by giving birth to Gu's baby before she can finally withdraw from the world to achieve transcendence. However, just before the film reaches its Zen finale, she is recalled into action in the final climactic battle scenes, suggesting that her xia nü role, pre-given her by the cosmic spider, is unfinished. The Zen subject is an artistic paradox that befits the Jungian idea of wholeness. The film is a carefully designed work of art. It is a sentient art object that comes from the singular mind of King Hu.
