This book examines animated propaganda produced in mainland China from the 1940s to the 1970s. The analyses of four puppet films demonstrate how animation and Maoist doctrine became tightly but dynamically entangled.
The book firstly contextualizes the production conditions and ideological contents of The Emperor’s Dream (1947), the first puppet film made at the Northeast Film Studio in Changchun. It then examines the artistic, intellectual, and ideological backbone of the puppet film Wanderings of Sanmao (1958). The book presents the means and methods applied in puppet animation filmmaking that complied with the ideological principles established by the radical supporters of Mao Zedong in the first half of the 1960s, discussing Rooster Crows at Midnight (1964). The final chapter discusses The Little 8th Route Army (1973), created by You Lei in the midst of the Cultural Revolution.
This book will be of great interest to those in the fields of animation studies, film studies, political science, Chinese area studies, and Chinese philology.
Author(s): Olga Bobrowska
Series: CRC Press Focus Animation Series
Publisher: CRC Press
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 196
City: Boca Raton
Cover
Half Title
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Visions of History in Contemporary Chinese Animation
Initial Premises
Maoist China’s Cultural History: A Brief Overview
Observing Chinese Animation from the Distance
English-Language Narratives of Chinese Animation History14
Minzu Style: a Condensed View
The Founding Myth
Notes
References
Part I Echoes of the National Salvation Movement, 1940s–1950s
Chapter 1.1 Denouncing Chiang Kai-shek: The Emperor’s Dream by Chen Bo’er
1.1.1 Unlikely Pioneers
1.1.2 Hopeless Dreams of the Bygone Era
1.1.3 ‘Convenient Truths’ at the Stage of New Democracy
Notes
References
Chapter 1.2 Unity in Resistance: Wanderings of Sanmao by Zhang Chaoqun
1.2.1 Sanmao’s Story
1.2.2 Animated Variant of Fictional Realism
1.2.3 Transcultural Perspective on Chinese Animation’s Roots
1.2.4 Visual Language of the National Salvation Movement
1.2.5 Searching for Unity, Finding Nostalgia
Notes
References
Part II Calls of the Continuous Revolution, 1960s–1970s: Films of You Lei
Chapter 2.1 “To Live is to Serve the People”: Rooster Crows at Midnight
2.1.1 The Revisionists and the Radicals
2.1.2 You Lei: A Dogmatic Animator
2.1.3 Constructing History
2.1.4 Ideological Expressiveness: Images-Ideas
2.1.5 Revolutionary Pedagogics
2.1.6 Rooster Crows at Midnight Revisited
Notes
References
Chapter 2.2 “Bombard the Headquarters”: The Little 8th Route Army
2.2.1 Ideology and Arts of the Cultural Revolution
2.2.2 SAFS during the Cultural Revolution Period
2.2.3 The Little 8th Route Army: A Twofold Plotline
2.2.4 The Concept of Model Art
2.2.5 The (In)Animated Device of Ideological Emphasis
2.2.6 Ideological Emphasis Deprived of Emotions
2.2.7 The ‘Three Prominences’ Principle in You Lei’s Vocabulary
2.2.8 Red Guards: The Ruthless Heroes of the Revolution
Notes
References
Final Notes
Glossary
Index
