Archives: January 2017

The Truth of a Lie

True or False: Mermaids have been proven to exist.

True, if you consider Discovery Channel’s  Mermaids: The Body Found  and Mermaids: The New Evidence.
False, if you read the post-script at the credits saying that it’s science fiction based on scientific possibilities and theories.


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I remember watching Mermaids on TV because my mother loved animal documentaries, and it just so happened to be on, so I watched it. I remember it being a really big thing because all of a sudden, mermaids exist!! They aren’t just fantasy and they’re real! Oh my goodness!


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Reading the articles assigned for this week reminded me of the mockumentary, and the fact that it generated Discovery Channel’s highest viewership ratings since it’s creation still astonishes me. The reputation of the Discovery Channel as a documentary channel (at least in my perception of it) caused the world to jump in on the hoax, believing in the existence of mermaids even when it was completely made up. The form of the story, in this case a documentary, had a huge impact on its reception and believability. With the production of Mermaids, Discovery Channel used the idea that documentaries are factual and grounded in reality to successfully draw an audience. The seemingly opposing form of the story and the content of the story caused an uproar in the online communities that have watched the film. The effects of this use (or misuse) of form and media generated discussions surrounding the question of viewer and filmmaker responsibility, a question we kind of touched upon in class. Is it the filmmaker’s responsibility to create content that is true, factual, accurate, and believable? Or is it the viewer’s responsibility to fact-check and make sure the content they are consuming stems and originates from credible sources? Where does the responsibility fall? The tensions between a formally represent “documentary” and the expectations of a documentary can be highlighted in a quotation found in our Winston reading Claiming the Real, where Discovery is essentially “grounding the documentary idea in reception rather than in representation” being “exactly the way to preserve its validity” (253).

The responsibility argument reminds me a lot of the “trigger warnings” that have been a prevalent in social media as of late. The idea of “trigger warnings” suggest that it is the creator’s responsibility signpost their content to protect others from viewing it. Is this the solution though? Is it not a kind of censorship? I ask a lot of questions in these blog posts that I don’t know the answer to. (:

Because Chinese Movies Live in Fantasies

So I was scrolling through twitter, like I usually do, and an ad for an upcoming movie shows up on my feed. The title of the movie is called The Great Wall, starring Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal, Jing Tian, Willem Dafoe, Lu Han, and Andy Lau.

… Hello, Matt Damon! What are you doing in Song Dynasty China? Do you need to be rescued again? Also, Oberyn Martell is wielding an axe!

In all honesty though, I didn’t know what to feel when I saw this. After the representations chat in class, this trailer just rubbed me the wrong way. I didn’t even finish the whole trailer, actually, because I just thought “oh. Another film about a white guy in China that probably saves the world blah blah blah.”
Then I started to think about it. Am I offended?


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Maybe.

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So I watched the whole trailer, and it’s a fantasy movie about monsters on the other side of the Great Wall. Okay, sure. But it still doesn’t satisfy me. Why not, you ask? It’s a fantasy movie, which means everything is pretty much made up anyway, but I’m still not convinced. Even if Andy Lau is in it. Even if Zhang Yimou directed it. Because I feel like Chinese movies have been doing this kind of thing for ages already. Take Painted Skin for example, or A Chinese Ghost Story (omg. translations. why. The Chinese title 倩女幽魂  literally means beautiful girl ghost; if I had to translate the title it would probably be something like The Ephemeral Beauty). These movies are all historical fiction taking place in some ancient Chinese Dynasty, which to be fair, is pretty much the premise of The Great Wall. Perhaps I’m just desentisized to these now, because there have been so many in Chinese cinema and film that I really don’t care for another one, starring a white guy no less.

The question of representation and the insider/outsider status creates space for these types of discussion. Am I offended because an outsider is seemingly infiltrating into my supposed “insider” culture? The 3 out of 5 main cast and the director are Chinese, is this enough of a “representation” of culture? I don’t know. Also, question about subtitles or I guess movies in general: Hong Kong watches English films with subtitles all the time, because it’s “main stream”. What does it take for a foreign film to be shown in theatres here, in North America, or in any English speaking country, without being dubbed over? Do people here read subtitles?

the moral obligation of my human existence

Hello #ACAM350! In continuing the discussion about identity, though I don’t really call myself an Asian Canadian, I am… Let me explain. I was born in Canada then packed on a plane at 3 months old to be raised in Hong Kong. Hong Kong is not China. I have a Canadian passport. I also have a Hong Kong passport. Technically, yes, I’m a Chinese-Canadian, but:  Canadian identity  <<  Hong Kong identity. Complicated, as identity tends to be.

I feel like identity is something that’s fluid, as with all the facets that make up one identity, and that’s why it’s so hard to pinpoint. Anyway, that’s a little intro to me. Moving on!

While reading Voices Rising, I was intrigued by Tanaka’s idea of a moral obligation to community and that “the end of all art should be to bring about an understanding of the community’s being in the world”, while pitting it against the idea of “the artist in Western society” (Li 20). The two opposing concepts of individuality versus community is one that highlights the fundamental differences in Western societies and East Asian societies (cue epic music).

Confucian philosophy and ideologies shape community orient East Asian societies––a way of thinking that resurfaces as “moral obligation to community” in Tanaka’s argument. The difference between his proclamations and the “artist in Western society” then, becomes more than a simple opposition of perspective, but one rooted in the distinction of the differences in cultural perspectives. The argument to “develop a community consciousness” is invariably tied to the idea of an East Asian identity and culture, whether that is Japanese/Korean/Chinese (20).

Going back to the idea of an Asian Canadian identity, how do we reconcile the clashes in ideologies and cultures that make up who we are? What about the idea of “reconstructing” identities, where we unlearn cultural teachings and biases to create a new meaning for being Asian Canadian? I don’t know where I’m going with this but maybe I will at the end of this course (: