Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- A Note on Romanization
- 1 Introduction: #MeToo and the Visual Politics of Transnational Chinese Cinema
- 2 The Look and the Stare: Looked Over and Overlooked in The Truth About Beauty (2014), My Way (2012), and Unfinished (2013)
- 3 The Leer and the Glare: Voyeurism and State Surveillance in Hooligan Sparrow (2016) and Angels Wear White (2017)
- 4 A Glimpse of the Glance: Women Scrutinize Men in Female Directors (2012) and Girls Always Happy (2018)
- 5 The Queer Gaze across the Gay-Straight Generational Divide: Small Talk (2016) and A Dog Barking at the Moon (2019)
- 6 The Alienated Gaze and the Activist Eye: Gender, Class, and Politics in Lotus (2012) and Outcry and Whisper (2020)
- 7 Oppositional Optics: The View from Hong Kong
- 8 From Activism to Exile: Our Youth in Taiwan (2018) and To Singapore, with Love (2013)
- 9 Viral Visions: The Pandemic Archive in Miasma, Plants, Export Paintings (2017) and Many Undulating Things (2019)
- 10 Conclusion: The View from the Chinese Diaspora in The Farewell (2019)
- Bilingual Filmography
- Bibliography
- Index
4 - A Glimpse of the Glance: Women Scrutinize Men in Female Directors (2012) and Girls Always Happy (2018)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 February 2024
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- A Note on Romanization
- 1 Introduction: #MeToo and the Visual Politics of Transnational Chinese Cinema
- 2 The Look and the Stare: Looked Over and Overlooked in The Truth About Beauty (2014), My Way (2012), and Unfinished (2013)
- 3 The Leer and the Glare: Voyeurism and State Surveillance in Hooligan Sparrow (2016) and Angels Wear White (2017)
- 4 A Glimpse of the Glance: Women Scrutinize Men in Female Directors (2012) and Girls Always Happy (2018)
- 5 The Queer Gaze across the Gay-Straight Generational Divide: Small Talk (2016) and A Dog Barking at the Moon (2019)
- 6 The Alienated Gaze and the Activist Eye: Gender, Class, and Politics in Lotus (2012) and Outcry and Whisper (2020)
- 7 Oppositional Optics: The View from Hong Kong
- 8 From Activism to Exile: Our Youth in Taiwan (2018) and To Singapore, with Love (2013)
- 9 Viral Visions: The Pandemic Archive in Miasma, Plants, Export Paintings (2017) and Many Undulating Things (2019)
- 10 Conclusion: The View from the Chinese Diaspora in The Farewell (2019)
- Bilingual Filmography
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Abstract: Even before allegations against Harvey Weinstein roiled the global film industry, accusations of sexual misconduct at the Beijing Film Academy came to light in May of 2017. With the world of film education and Beijing’s creative industries as a backdrop, this chapter explores the semi-autobiographical work of independent female filmmaker Yang Mingming. A graduate of the National Academy of Chinese Theater Arts, Yang has made two films loosely based on her experiences as an aspiring filmmaker in Beijing, the featurette Female Directors (2012) and the fulllength Girls Always Happy (2018). This chapter zeroes in on the ways Yang interrogates the gendered politics of the camera gaze as she reflects on the contemporary Beijing filmmaking scene.
Keywords: Film education; male glance; woman’s film; Cinema of Precarity; Medusan humor
In addition to revealing the prevalence of sexual misconduct in the film industry, #MeToo uncovered corollary matters involving the ubiquity of biased attitudes toward women in virtually every aspect of society. With notable advances made by feminists over the years, some grew complacent and felt confident that women in the twenty-first century had already achieved equality. The online visibility and sheer volume of women who responded to the #MeToo movement, however, disabused many of the notion that women no longer faced gender-based violence, harassment, and various other forms of unequal treatment. Beyond rape and assault as routine for women working in the motion picture industry, #MeToo encouraged a renewed interest in onscreen portrayals of women. In “The Visual Language of Oppression,” film educator Nina Menkes links onscreen portrayals of women to male control of the industry as well as a maledominated production culture. For Menkes, #MeToo connects the various ways women suffer on both sides of the camera with sexist assumptions she encounters in the classroom:
Over my many years teaching film, both at USC’s School of Cinematic Arts and currently at California Institute of the Arts, I have watched many female film students – and of course, the male students – reproduce the same kind of images they have been seeing (why wouldn’t they?) without even being aware that they are doing so.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2023