1st Edition

East Asian-German Cinema The Transnational Screen, 1919 to the Present

Edited By Joanne Miyang Cho Copyright 2022
    324 Pages 28 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    324 Pages 28 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    This is the first edited volume dedicated to the study of East Asian-German cinema. Its coverage ranges from 1919 to the present, a period which has witnessed an unprecedented degree of global entanglement between Germany and East Asia. In analyzing this hybrid cinema, this volume employs a transnational approach, which highlights the nations’ cinematic encounters and entanglements. It reveals both German perceptions of East Asia and East Asian perceptions of Germany, through analysis of works by both German directors and East Asian/East Asian-German directors. It is hoped that this volume will not only accelerate cross-cultural exchange, but also provide a wider perspective that helps film scholars to see the broader contexts in which these films are produced. It introduces multiple compelling topics, not just immigration, multiculturalism, and exile, but also Japonisme, children’s literature, musical modernity, media hybridity, gender representation, urban space, Cold War divisions, and national identity. It addresses several genres—feature films, essay films, and documentary films. Lastly, by embracing three East Asian cinemas in one volume, this volume serves as an excellent introduction for German cinema students and scholars. It will appeal to international and interdisciplinary audiences, as its contributors represent multiple disciplines and four world regions.

    1. German Cinema, German Hybrid Cinema, and Organization

    Joanne Miyang Cho

    Part 1: Film Adaptations and Representations of the German-East Asian Relationship, 1919–1945

    2. Implicating Buddhism in Madame Butterfly’s Tragedy: Japonisme and Japan-Bashing in Fritz Lang’s Harakiri (1919)

    Qinna Shen

    3. The Familiar Unfamiliar: Japan in Interwar German Feature Films

    Ricky W. Law

    4. A Loving Family (Ai no ikka, 1941). The Transcultural Film Adaptation of a Classic German Children’s Book in Wartime Japan

    Harald Salomon

    5. Documentaries about Jewish Exiles in Shanghai: Witness Testimony and Cross-Cultural Public Memory Formation

    Birgit Maier-Katkin

    Part 2: Representations of Gender in the 1950s and 1960s: Asian Femininity and Idealized Masculinity

    6. A Façade of Solidarity: East Germany’s Attempted Dialogue with China in The Compass Rose (Die Windrose, 1957)

    Qingyang Zhou

    7. The World(s) of Anna Suh: Race, Migration, and Ornamentalism in Bis zum Ende aller Tage (Until the End of Days, 1961)

    Zach Ramon Fitzpatrick

    8. Idealized Masculinity, National Identity, and the Other: The James Bond Archetype in German and Japanese Spy Fiction

    Aaron D. Horton

    Part 3: Cultural Globalization and the Persistence of the Popular Since the 1970s

    9. China’s Encounter with Mozart in Two Films: From Musical Modernity to Cultural Globalization

    Jinsong Chen

    10. The Persistence of the Popular: The Cinemas of National Division in Germany and Korea

    Steve Choe

    Part 4: East Asian-German Entanglements Since the 1980s

    11. Temporal Structures & Rhythms in Wenders’ Tokyo-Ga (1985) and Ottinger’s The Korean Wedding Chest (2009)

    Shambhavi Prakash

    12. My Own Private Tokyo: The Japan Features of Doris Dörrie

    Bruce Williams

    13. Claiming Cultural Citizenship: East Asian-German Presence on YouTube and Public Television’s www.funk.net

    Sabine von Dirke

    Biography

    Joanne Miyang Cho is Professor of History at William Paterson University.