The Occurrence of Cross-Media and Cross-Cultural Anxiety: Two Stars in the Milky Way from the Perspective of Meta Film
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Bo Cheng
Bo Cheng is the deputy dean of Shanghai Film Academy, Shanghai University. He is a professor and a PHD supervisor. He is a member of the Humanities Committee and the Teaching Committee of the Academic Committee of Shanghai University, and the leader of the Master of Fine Arts in Film and Television Production (MFA). He has published books, such as
Avant-garde and Its Context: Research on Exploration Strategy of China Contemporary Films andA Journey of Western Aesthetics and so on. Moreover, he has published more than a hundred academic papers, hundreds of thousands of words of novels and poems, and has planned and created many TV dramas, movies, web series, and documentaries.
Abstract
The 1920s was a period of exploration for the development and innovation of Chinese films, providing a direction for the localization of Chinese film creation and the reflexive thinking of film culture. Additionally, it paved the way for films that were created with a spontaneous “meta film” consciousness, such as Two Stars in the Milky Way (Yinhan shuangxing, 1932) and The Romance on the Screen (Yinmu yanshi, 1931), which appeared in the early 1930s. Released in 1931, The Romance on the Screen has been endowed with important historical value. Notably, Two Stars in the Milky Way was created earlier than The Romance on the Screen; understood as a “meta film,” the exploration of its media characteristics, narrative structure, audio-visual language, and national consciousness deserves further attention, in relation to the process of film’s change from silence to sound. From the perspective of the social perspective of the time, the context of the early film industry, and the meta film consciousness of the film workers, it is possible that Two Stars in the Milky Way may be the first “meta film” in the history of Chinese film. Moreover, it is also an expression of the value of observing cross-media and the cross-cultural anxiety of the early Chinese film.
About the author
Bo Cheng is the deputy dean of Shanghai Film Academy, Shanghai University. He is a professor and a PHD supervisor. He is a member of the Humanities Committee and the Teaching Committee of the Academic Committee of Shanghai University, and the leader of the Master of Fine Arts in Film and Television Production (MFA). He has published books, such as Avant-garde and Its Context: Research on Exploration Strategy of China Contemporary Films and A Journey of Western Aesthetics and so on. Moreover, he has published more than a hundred academic papers, hundreds of thousands of words of novels and poems, and has planned and created many TV dramas, movies, web series, and documentaries.
References
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Special Section: Women, City and Early Chinese Cinema; guest edited by Chen Jin
- Introduction to the Special Section: Women, City and Early Chinese Cinema
- Staging Shanghai in Love and Duty 戀愛與義務 (1923, 1931)
- Revisiting the Stardom of Yang Naimei: The Typecast, the Modern Girl, and the Femme Fatale
- Practicing Runaway: What Happened to Pu Shunqing in the Early Chinese Film Industry?
- To Marry or To Write?—Sheng Qinxian and Her (Screen) Writing in 1940s Shanghai
- Other Research Articles
- The Establishment of Chinese Film Industry Studies and the Correction of Film Industrialization – Review and Prospect of the Twenty Years of Film Industrialization Reform
- The Role of Association: New Thinking on “Exposition, Comparison, Association” in Films
- The Occurrence of Cross-Media and Cross-Cultural Anxiety: Two Stars in the Milky Way from the Perspective of Meta Film
- The Application and Innovation of the Stylized Performance of Traditional Chinese Theater in the Animated Film New Sanchakou
- Film Review
- Never Say Never: Reproduction of Intergenerational Will and Return of Ideal—Interview with Wang Baoqiang
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Special Section: Women, City and Early Chinese Cinema; guest edited by Chen Jin
- Introduction to the Special Section: Women, City and Early Chinese Cinema
- Staging Shanghai in Love and Duty 戀愛與義務 (1923, 1931)
- Revisiting the Stardom of Yang Naimei: The Typecast, the Modern Girl, and the Femme Fatale
- Practicing Runaway: What Happened to Pu Shunqing in the Early Chinese Film Industry?
- To Marry or To Write?—Sheng Qinxian and Her (Screen) Writing in 1940s Shanghai
- Other Research Articles
- The Establishment of Chinese Film Industry Studies and the Correction of Film Industrialization – Review and Prospect of the Twenty Years of Film Industrialization Reform
- The Role of Association: New Thinking on “Exposition, Comparison, Association” in Films
- The Occurrence of Cross-Media and Cross-Cultural Anxiety: Two Stars in the Milky Way from the Perspective of Meta Film
- The Application and Innovation of the Stylized Performance of Traditional Chinese Theater in the Animated Film New Sanchakou
- Film Review
- Never Say Never: Reproduction of Intergenerational Will and Return of Ideal—Interview with Wang Baoqiang
