The Surreal Realist Cinema of Jia Zhangke
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The Surreal Realist Cinema of Jia Zhangke Thomas Moran - A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master’s of Philosophy The University of Adelaide 28th of February 2018 1 Abstract Surreal Realism in the Cinema of Jia Zhangke Through a close investigation of three recent films by Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke (1970- ), namely The World (2004), Still Life (2006) and A Touch of Sin (2013), the thesis argues that a new form of cinema that can be described as ‘surreal realism’ has emerged in the director’s attempt to capture the ultra-rapid transformations (zhuanxing) taking place in post-socialist China, specifically in the 21st century. Jia’s films historicise the present by visualising the varying modes of circulation in contemporary China, including the movement of bodies, the abstract circulation of value and the movements of desire. I suggest that Jia’s historicisation of the present not only captures historical transformation but also uses such transformation as an impetus for cinematic invention. I further argue that the success of his work, including its international reception, is due to this commitment to the formal evolution of the medium of cinema. That in turn is premised on an engagement with a wide variety of other aesthetic forms that impacts upon the way Jia’s films are conceived, shot and structured, most significantly architecture, painting and the internet. This process of incorporation involves working against these other mediums while simultaneously drawing on them to generate a new cinematic method. The result is what I call a surreal realism that is able to reveal the present as a complex interaction of historically laden political and aesthetic forces. The first chapter is a case study of The World which focuses on its relationship to architecture, showing how the film engages with the tourist architecture of the theme park and the metropolis and how this architecture is navigated by those working inside of it. The second chapter, a case study of Still Life, draws out the film’s engagement with painting, arguing that the film investigates the legacy of Socialist Realist painting as an earlier means of historicising the present, tapping into those paintings’ utopian promise of an unrealised future. The third and final case study explores A Touch of Sin in relation to the internet and the social network news feed, showing how the film interrogates the circulation of narratives of violence online, linking this violence to economic circulation more generally to create a revised conception of the violence of history. Jia’s work has often been understood through a narrowly sociological paradigm, in which his films are used as a means of making statements about social transformation in China. These approaches rarely engage in a sustained investigation of the formal characteristics of Jia’s work, focusing chiefly on their subject matter. While not denying the sociological implications of Jia’s work, I seek to develop an alternative approach to the relationship between aesthetics and politics and to deepen the understanding of Jia’s films as works of art. I contextualise Jia’s work in relation to world cinema and position him within a wider network of directors and cinematic methods, arguing for his significance at the forefront of the evolution of cinema today. 4 Thesis Declaration I certify that this work contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in my name, in any university or other tertiary institution and, to the best of my knowledge and belief, contains no material previously published or written by another person, except where due reference has been made in the text. In addition, I certify that no part of this work will, in the future, be used in a submission in my name, for any other degree or diploma in any university or other tertiary institution without the prior approval of the University of Adelaide and where applicable, any partner institution responsible for the joint-award of this degree. I give permission for the digital version of my thesis to be made available on the web, via the University’s digital research repository, the Library Search and also through web search engines, unless permission has been granted by the University to restrict access for a period of time. I acknowledge the support I have received for my research through the provision of an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship. Thomas Francis Moran 5 Contents Acknowledgements 1 Introduction 2 Chapter One - The World (2004) 14 Chapter Two - Still Life (2006) 28 Chapter Three - A Touch of Sin (2013) 47 Conclusion 62 Appendix - Chapter One 69 Appendix - Chapter Two 76 Appendix - Chapter Three 84 Works Cited 95 6 Acknowledgements I would like to thank my supervisors, Professor Nicholas Jose and Professor Claire Roberts for their guidance, support and patience in the realisation of this thesis. I must also thank my mother, Venice, who continues to inspire me to think and to laugh in the face of what appear to be insurmountable obstacles. I thank also my father, Brendan, for his kindness, his intelligence and his quiet grace. And to all those I have spoken to about the cinema and aesthetics in the past two years, who I have watched films with and talked with till dawn. In particular I thank Stuart, without his friendship and conversation this work may never have been completed. And to my other closest companions David, Nicky and Yianna who have all shared the burden and the pleasures of writing this thesis with me. 1 Introduction Prologue This thesis argues that the work of Chinese director Jia Zhangke (1970 - ) is crucial to the evolution of the cinematic medium in the 21st century. I will argue that Jia’s cinema evolves the medium through three interrelated aesthetic strategies. Firstly, Jia incorporates diverse aesthetic forms into his films, with a particular focus on architecture, painting and the internet. Secondly, Jia visualises the networks of circulation operating in the world system of late capitalism. Thirdly, Jia develops a stylistic strategy I have termed surreal realism, which draws inspiration from the hyper-rapid transformations that have taken place in post- socialist China. I will demonstrate Jia’s contribution to the aesthetic evolution of cinema through three case studies. Each chapter will focus on one of Jia’s films following the chronological order of their release. The films are The World (2004), Still Life (2006) and A Touch of Sin (2013). Each chapter will demonstrate the relationship between the film and another aesthetic form. World will be discussed in relation to architecture, Still Life in relation to painting and Sin in relation to the internet. These engagements with other aesthetic forms lead to fundamental transformations in Jia’s cinematic form My approach to Jia’s work differs from the existing scholarship on his work in a number of ways. Firstly, it eschews the narrowly sociological framework which has dominated academic engagement with Jia’s films. These studies approach the films as reflections of social changes taking place in China. Therefore the formal character of Jia’s work is lost, with a narrow focus on the subject matter or narrative. Instead, my study focuses on the aesthetic and formal elements in Jia’s work. Secondly, this study seeks to understand Jia in an international context. Many of the aforementioned sociological approaches focus on Jia’s films as explicitly Chinese. Instead I will emphasise the international character of Jia’s work and of cinema in general. Cinema is part of the international network of capital and thus reflects the international networks of circulation. Jia’s work therefore must be understood in relation to both the history of cinema which has preceded him and the work of his contemporaries around the world. Only through this approach can we truly understand Jia’s work and appreciate the manner in which it contributes to the evolution of cinematic form. For Jia, cinema is the only means of rendering the increasingly strange reality of life in China in the 21st century, a means which continues to mutate and transform and whose malleability is entwined with the violent processes which it draws on for its aesthetic power. I Biography and Production Jia was born in the rural town of Fenyang in Shanxi province, China in 1970. These two biographical details, his place of birth and date of birth, are central to the interpretation of his films. They have generated a minor mythos around his character which has become difficult to separate from his work. This is explored in the documentary entitled A Man From Fenyang (2014) in which Jia is filmed returning to his hometown, itself a reference to his second film, Pickpocket (1997), in which a character returns home to Shanxi from Beijing. His year of birth has marked him as a member of the Sixth Generation of Chinese filmmakers, who grew up during the period of Deng Xiaoping’s economic liberalisation and whose work has been understood to track the transformations of post-socialist China. His place of birth has further singled out his work within this generation of filmmakers because, unlike many of his contemporaries, his early films focused on the provinces, the places left behind by the economic boom which followed the liberalisation.1 Shanxi is located in North China and 1 The urban character of the Sixth Generation’s films is explored by Zhang Zhen in her introduction to the edited collection The Urban Generation (2007) which engages with the work of the Sixth Generation. She writes ‘The historicity of this particular “new” or contemporary urban cinema is precisely anchored in the unprecedented large-scale urbanisation and globalisation of China on the threshold of a new century.’(Zhang Zhen 2) 2 has a lower GDP than the more wealthy Eastern provinces.