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Landscape and Memory: Homeland Narratives and Space Production of New Directors

  • Guowei He

    Guowei He is a lecturer of the School of Design and Fashion, Zhejiang University of Science & Technology.

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Published/Copyright: May 23, 2025
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Abstract

Since 2014, a typical phenomenon emerged and still survives in the film creations of new directors: return to the homeland. This is emphatically reflected in various aspects such as the spatial production and modes of expression as modernity. Firstly, new directors use memory and landscape to imagine and create their homeland in mainly four forms: “temporal rhetoric,” “childhood perspective,” “humorous atmosphere,” and “sense of surrealism,” endowing their films with a unique character. Secondly, as a creative method, it has a strong influence on the film production of new directors. Thirdly, new directors use their homeland to construct a “spatial system” and “spirit of place,” as a way of completing the reflective expression of “personal history” and “social history.”


Corresponding author: Guowei He, School of Design and Fashion, Zhejiang University of Science & Technology, Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, P. R. China, E-mail:
Translated by: Xinze Liu, Communication University of China, Beijing, P. R. China, E-mail: 202410050302083@mails.cuc.edu.cn

About the author

Guowei He

Guowei He is a lecturer of the School of Design and Fashion, Zhejiang University of Science & Technology.

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Postscript

The original Chinese article entitled 风景与记忆: 新导演的原乡叙事与空间记忆 was published in Dangdai Dianying 当代电影 (Contemporary Cinema) 2024(11): 27–34Search in Google Scholar

Received: 2025-02-27
Accepted: 2025-03-19
Published Online: 2025-05-23
Published in Print: 2025-04-28

© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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