Genre filmmaking was on the rise in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) at least since the 1980s, when a positive attitude towards commercial films took root in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. This chapter investigates the film-genre tradition in PRC cinema of the 1980s, which was arguably prompted by the unexpected success of three movies distributed in 1980, the martial arts film The Mysterious Buddha (Shenmi de dafu, Zhang Huaxun), the thriller Murder in 405 (405 Mousha an, Shen Yaoting), and the melodrama Romance on Lushan Mountain (Lushan lian, Huang Zumo). Proceeding in parallel to the rise of the Fifth Generation, and obscured by their international success, which claimed the central stage in the critical discourse, these films laid a foundation for a commercial and genre undercurrent in Chinese mainstream cinema that continued in the following decades.
A New Inception: Reintroducing Film Genres in 1980s People’s Republic of China Cinema, 2025.
A New Inception: Reintroducing Film Genres in 1980s People’s Republic of China Cinema
Stefano Locati
2025-01-01
Abstract
Genre filmmaking was on the rise in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) at least since the 1980s, when a positive attitude towards commercial films took root in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. This chapter investigates the film-genre tradition in PRC cinema of the 1980s, which was arguably prompted by the unexpected success of three movies distributed in 1980, the martial arts film The Mysterious Buddha (Shenmi de dafu, Zhang Huaxun), the thriller Murder in 405 (405 Mousha an, Shen Yaoting), and the melodrama Romance on Lushan Mountain (Lushan lian, Huang Zumo). Proceeding in parallel to the rise of the Fifth Generation, and obscured by their international success, which claimed the central stage in the critical discourse, these films laid a foundation for a commercial and genre undercurrent in Chinese mainstream cinema that continued in the following decades.
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Descrizione: Stefano Locati, "A New Inception: Reintroducing Film Genres in 1980s People’s Republic of China Cinema", in Lin Feng (a cura di), Film History and Screen Culture in and beyond Greater China, London-New York, Routledge 2025, pp. 143-165.
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