East Asia News & Politics Thread: China, South Korea, Japan...

A flood? Why is it inevitable?

This claim seems overly melodramatic.

Even if it's true, it's not like Hollywood is the only movie industry in the world. No one's forced to watch Hollywood.

edited 26th May '15 6:30:44 PM by editerguy

Chinese nationalist films tend to fail dismally outside their target audience. The most recent high-profile attempt was the melodrama The Flowers of War, which did not do well outside of China.

And, yes, nationalist. If the CCP tried to push "Communist" ideals in its films it'd be laughed out of the theatre; rally-round-the-flag patriotism still works.

Probably because PRC's foundations are so weak and unappealing if they were actually examined on film.

The saddest fact about China's influence upon Hollywood to me is that its effectively smothered the chances of seeing any Korean War film that is not produced in South Korea and portrays UN and Chinese troops fighting on screen without a nationalist undertone favoring the latter.

Also no biopics of the Dali Lama, absolutely nothing negative about Mao, and never ever bring up Tienamen Square.

Heh, given that there were already little to none of those things coming from Hollywood anyway, China clamping down on them might inspire rebellious creators to actually go and make them :)

edited 27th May '15 7:24:32 AM by betaalpha

Nah, people only do that for "the west." In spite of it's power I know many people who view China as an underdog bullied by mean ol Murica, and thus look the other way towards it's human rights abuses.

Yes but such people are idiots and IR hipsters, so they can be safely ignored and assumed to not represent the majority of folks.

True, but the film industry is infested with their lot.

IR hipsters aren't like normal hipsters, I've met normal hipsters, they're fine, IR hipsters are useful idiots to despotic regimes. They're the likes of George Galloway and some of the idiots in my IR classes, not people with actual influence.

There's nothing new about Hollywood avoiding potentially audience-alienating subjects. If they now consider Chinese audiences as well as American, is that really a big deal?

They're out to maximise profits like always, what's new?

edited 27th May '15 6:26:15 PM by editerguy

Well, the remake of Red Dawn transposed the role of the invaders from the Chinese to the North Koreans, so, there is some big deal in terms of respecting a very profitable and potential market like the Chinese market.

Yes, it's all about the Money, Dear Boy.

edited 27th May '15 6:27:18 PM by Quag15

The Last Airbender went through some pretty noticeable changes, but unlike Red Dawn that was for a Western audience. I guess that's what I mean, what would they do to win over Chinese audiences that they wouldn't do to win over Western audiences? It seems all the same to me.

Looking at it from the other side, if a market like China can give the industry a huge boost, why not try to capitalise on it? Perhaps Hollywood's loss will be the gain of another cinema culture, say South Korea's film industry tackling the topics Hollywood won't. Just because Hollywood's not doing it, doesn't mean no one will.

Yeah, but for all that it borrowed extensively from assorted Asian traditions was originally created in the West as well. And while there were always going to be issues condensing a twenty episode season down into a move, most of it falls of Shaymalan's shoulders for being a sucky director rather than actual cultural concerns.

Maybe a simpler example is all the British characters who spontaneously became American when Hollywood made a movie adaptation, e.g. the adaptation of The Dark Is Rising.

Now Hollywood has a lucrative Chinese audience in mind too, they'll make changes based on that... but so what? What does that change about Hollywood's approach really?

China cracks down on cleavage at cosplay convention

Sacrilege!

I'm chuckling at how the various forms of media being celebrated are unanimously Japanese in origin. A People's Daily columnist could certainly paint it as Western-induced Japanese decadence polluting the once morally pure and high Han Chinese society and culture.

It certainly amuses me, since the most egregious abusers of Lady Not-Appearing-in-This-Game in my experience have all been Chinese free-to-play games.

And then there's the issue of their booth babes... until very recently (as well) that is

edited 29th May '15 7:57:08 AM by Krieger22

The virtues of the Chinese system, how to improve them, and how Democracy is not necessary to hold a government accountable. The article sounds reasonable, but what do you guys think?

The article sited democratic progresses in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Doesn't that alone show that Chinese "political meritocracy" won't stop democracy?

The real problem is that the Chinese political system isn't "meritocratic" (and it seems to be a common theme to assume that "meritocracy" and "democracy" are fundamentally opposed: experience tells us democracy is one of the best ways to safeguard meritocracy.) It's heavily authoritarian and autocratic, with a lot of corruption to grease the wheels, and that's the main factor the author isn't accounting for.

That, and the fact that asking an authoritarian system to police itself without external oversight (independent judiciaries, a free press) rarely ever works. Too many elites with too many dirty secrets.

I think most people assume that Democratically elected politicians only got elected by pandering to the voters baser instincts, i.e throwing out the immigrants or giving them more welfare.

China was cracking down on funeral strippers not too long ago.

... Funeral strippers?! What... How... Why...?

Here:

Yeah...

edited 29th May '15 2:32:53 PM by Quag15