Australia and Asia on Screen

Australia and Asia on Screen

Objectives On successful completion of this Module you should be able to: Discuss two feature films: ‘The Year of Living Dangerously’ and ‘Once Upon a Time in China II’ Discuss what insights these films gave you into Asian history, culture and values

Overview of today’s work • Today’s session will be a mixture of lecture, discussion and viewing • We will discuss briefly the idea of learning from film, and then take each film in turn

Nothing On…. It is surprising that despite Australia’s long association with Asian countries, there have been relatively few featurefilms produced which focus on Australia-Asia relations. The feature films that I have identified are:

Nothing On…. • Far East 1982 • The Year of Living Dangerously 1982 • Echoes of Paradise 1987 • Blood Oath 1990 • The Good Woman of Bangkok 1992 • Turtle Beach 1992 • Traps 1994 • The Man from Hong Kong

Nothing On…. • There have been a few television series, most notably the recent Changi 2001. Earlier series included: • Embassy • Bangkok Hilton (mini series) • Cowra Breakout (mini series) • Documentaries • Green Tea and Cherry Ripe • Bali Tryptich

Is this lack odd? • What do you think might explain the lack of Australian films about Asia?

The Year of Living Dangerously (Directed by Peter Weir, 1982)

The Australians Journalists Outsiders Driven by desire The Indonesians Activists Politicians Undercover agents The Characters …

The Wayang metaphor Shadows and action, shadowy action • What is the metaphor saying?

The wayang metaphor • Ideas of play • Ideas of the ‘drama of life’ • Ideas of master manipulators • Ideas of illusion, fiction • Ideas of cultural distance, mystery • Ideas of the indeterminate new nation • Idea of the ‘Otherness’ of Indonesia

The wayang metaphor • West and East • Orientalist trope

Guy? Billy? Who achieves what?

Orientalism • Orientalism is a ‘knitted together’ system of idioms which pervade description and discussion of the orient or ‘The East’ which is totalised. So we get idioms of oriental character, oriental despotism, oriental sensuality. The orient was aberrant in its mentality, it had habits of inaccuracy, it was ‘backward’, it was sensual, feminine. These idioms became the historical ground for intervention in The East with a goal of making ‘them’ more like ‘us’. This position or tendency is based on an assumption of Western superiority. The West’s ‘Others’ are primitive, exotic, mysterious. It is as if to say ‘We are like this …., they are like that ….’.

Orientalism – the experts • ‘Every person, however slightly he may be acquainted with the affairs of our time, sees clearly the actual inferiority of Mohammedan countries’, and again • ‘All those who have been in the East, or in Africa, are struck by the way in which the mind of the true believer is fatally limited, by the species of iron circle that surrounds his head, rendering it absolutely closed to knowledge’ • Ernest Renan 1823-92

Once Upon a Time in China Part II Characters: • Master Wong Fei-hung • Aunt Yee • Leung Foon • Dr Sun Yat Sen • White Lotus sect

The Director Tsui Hark Born 1951 in Vietnam Educated in HK and the USA Returned to HK in 1971 Founded The Film Workshop in 1984

The filmic influences on Once Upon a Time… • The Hong Kong kung fu series about Wong Fei-hung played by Kwan Tak hing in the ’50s and 60s • The Bruce Lee action films

The filmic influences on Once Upon a Time… • The 1968 ‘spaghetti Western’ of Sergio Leone ‘Once Upon a Time in the West’ • Ideas of progress, and what represents progress in a China facing the intrusion of foreign technology and foreign traders is an important issue in Tsui’s film.

China and Foreign Powers • Portuguese arrived in Canton 1517, later set themselves up in Macau in mid 1500s • The British shot their way in to Canton in 1637 • In 1635 the Emperor opened all ports to foreign trade • 1644 Manchus conquered China • In 1715 the British East India Company set up in Canton

China and the ‘unequal treaties’ The China represented in Tsui Hark’s Once Upon a Time in China Part II (OUTCII) is China in 1895, the year China signed a treaty handing over Taiwan to Japan (the Shimonoseki Treaty). In 1895 China had been pressured into a series of so-called ‘unequal treaties’, treaties signed at gunpoint. The national, or imperial Chinese territory had been crowded by Western forces all bent on commercial exploitation and trade. The ports on the Eastern coast had been occupied by Western nations, and Western built railways penetrated the hinterland. China had been humbled by Western technology, and in 1895, by a Westernised Japan.

The China-Foreign Powers Clash A clash over Trading values/ ethics Introduction of Christian beliefs Perceptions of cultural superiority

The Opium Wars • In the 1800s, Britain began to trade opium from its Indian colonies into China. By 1839, Britain imported about 4m pounds of opium into China as a barter trade.

Opium Chaos • This devastating trade erupted into the Anglo-Chinese War or the Opium War which was really a series of battles from 1839-42. The wars ended in 1842 with the Treaty of Nanking which ceded HK to the British as a Crown Colony, and opened up Amoy and Canton, Foochow, Ningpo and Shanghai to foreign trade. The Treaty of Nanking is regarded as the first of the so-called ‘unequal treaties’.

The Taiping rebellion 1850-64 Hung Hsui-chuan – a Bible inspired visionary rebel: Anti Manchu Anti Confucius 5m lives lost A failure

Local resistance in the late 1800s The unequal treaties The Opium wars The Taiping rebellion These events set the scene for violent resistance to foreigners and foreign culture Resistance was complex: complete rejection, acceptance but on Chinese terms

The fights in Canton • White Lotus • British troops • Chinese provincial troops • Foreigners • Wong fei-hung

Objectives - review • Can you now discuss the two feature films and use scenes from the films and characters to comment on aspects of Asian history, culture and values?

Australia and Asia on Screen