Sociology Study ISSN 2159‐5526  June 2012, Volume 2, Number 6, 437‐444

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A Study on Representations of Youth in    Chinese (Mainland) Youth Cinema  Changsong Wanga, Yiming Chenb, Rohani Hashima    Abstract  This study’s objective is to thoroughly analyze representations of teenage sexuality portrayed in two Chinese youths’ films,  which represent social, cultural, and historical diversities in Mainland China, as well, to unfold some particular natures and  trends of Chinese youth cinema in the context of globalization and internationalization. Content analysis and methodology of  narrative explore the ideological nature of representations of youth as well as the interpretation of trends in Chinese youth  cinema.  This  study  argues  the  particular  manners  of  representations  of  Chinese  youth  in  the  youths’  films  produced  in  Mainland  China,  through  distinct  elements  such  as  film  properties,  film  discourse,  and  acting  on  set.  It  will  explain  how  functional  and  social  category  diversity,  cultural  diversity,  and  historical  diversity  derive  the  actuality  in  Chinese  communities, and center on a series of sex‐based issues that revel correlations between Chinese youths’ ideology, psychology,  and social construction. Including a discussion of technical factors, it defines the specific natures of Chinese youth cinema in  the region based on fixed parameters of culture or ancestry that convey rhetorical messages to discover the characteristics of  genre film so that the interpretation of the term “peers groups” represents the values and beliefs in modern Chinese society,  thus presenting the exchange approaches which construct and validate the relationship among society, global film industry,  young audience and film content.  Keywords  Chinese youth, youth cinema, sexual representations, youth socialisation, People’s Republic of China     

Young generations in Mainland China have been following trends from the United States, Japan, and South Korea since childhood. A typical example is the American youth film series Twilight (directed by Catherine Hardwicke in 2008), The Twilight Saga: New Moon (directed by Chris Weitz in 2009), and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (directed by David Slade in 2010) that are pursued by the young generations in China’s cinemas. Those young audiences prefer treating themselves to a “film night” in the vampire-themed fantasy romance to watching domestic Zhiqing-themed (Zhiqing means rusticated youth of China) films, and of course, those young cinema viewers may feast their eyes on different genre

films which in the meantime transfer a lot of diversity and as well as, the philosophical text for cinema itself. Although it is not the key problem to be solved in this study, it has inspired the authors to reconsider the representations of Chinese youth portrayed in contemporary Chinese-language youth cinema. Definitely, distinct social background and discrepant

aUniversiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia 

bJinan University, China    Correspondent Author:  Changsong  Wang,  School  of  Communication,  Universiti  Sains Malaysia, 11800, Penang, Malaysia  E‐mail: [email protected] 

438 education principles influence the understanding toward certain issues which are shared within the same communications, for example, campus sex is also involved in Chinese directors’ scripts, but it is hardly to see any similar college sex culture narrated in American Pie (directed by Paul Weitz and Chris Weitz in 1999). The authors would like to say that, the representations of Chinese youth embodied in Chinese youth cinema are able to reveal social, cultural and historical diversities on this continent and as well, to unfold some particular natures and trends of Chinese youth cinema in the context of globalization and internationalization. However, the definition of youth within cultural framework in Mainland China is in some sense complicated to explain. There are two Chinese terms—Qing Nian and Qing Chun—which both act in parallel to the meaning of youth in English. Nonetheless, it is assuredly existent that there is a difference between the two terms used in Chinese cinema. Firstly, the term Qing Nian in linguistics means a specific sort of human community that ranges between juvenile and middle age. To some extent, it defines the parameters, such as the filmic conventions of the film Tong Nian Wang Shi/The Time to Live and the Time to Die (directed by Hsiao-hsien Hou in 1986), which affect the viewers and encourage them to response how the filmmaker wants them to response to the issue of “wet dream” that the filmmaker is discussing, and definitely this event depicted in the film is linked to the natures of Qing Nian. Let us look at the other term Qing Chun. The Chinese characters—Qing and Chun—have conveyed that youth is not a time of life but a state of mind, which fully embrace the implications of “green” and “spring” in Chinese culture respectively. Basically, the concept of “youth” within this study is much closer to the sense of Qing Chun. Generally speaking, youth films produced in China functions as a particular representation of Chinese ideology. It outlines how, in China, the category of youth historically functions as a

Sociology  Study  2(6)  significant site of ideological inscription which shows their struggles toward idealized future, for instance, Zhiqing’s struggle in rural and remote areas during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution era, and the post-1980s’ endeavor in modern China. Again, how to define contemporary Chinese youth cinema? First of all, the genre—youth film as the main focus. It cannot be easily understood as the one that young people should watch or the one that they want to watch. In cinema viewers’ eyes, first love, rebellion, alienation, conflict with parents, coming of age, and teen angst are the typical plots which are based on the particular natures of young people. Indeed, the facts show that these elements are really shown in certain youth films. Christian Exner considered that it could be roughly sorted into three basic categories. First of all there are the so-called “coming-of-age” films which have been strongly represented for years; the second category… consists of productions about subjects which—according to educationalists and others—provide young people with food for thought; the third category consists of films that young people themselves have elevated to cult status…1

These categories to some extent represent the typical situations of youth cinema in western countries, which involve external dependency, but in comparison to Chinese culture and Chinese cinema, the authors sort Chinese youth cinema into another three major categories. Basically, first of all it is the so-called mainstream youth film that concentrates mainstream-theme educational issues and is commonly inserted aspiration education; the second category consists of films which retrospect to a period in one’s youth and provide Chinese young generations with a space for reflection. The third category is coming-of-age films that portray “rite of passage” themes involving young and adolescent characters, and the plots of this category involve affection, rebellion, teenage angst, parent-offspring conflict as

Wang et al.  well as alienation in Chinese societies.

LIFE COURSE PERSPECTIVE: A  CHALLENGE FOR YOUTH  Conceptually, the life course is a progression through time. In particular, it refers to the approach for analyzing individual lives with historical, socio-economic, and cultural contexts. Social and their cultural systems provide rough scripts and casts of characters whose interactions influence the development and behavior of the other players in the drama of life. Apparently, the discussions of society and culture of adolescence and youth will largely explain the distinctive social forms and norms. Adolescence not only can be considered as a biological stage but also means a period of major social transition in one’s life. Adolescence in Western society is a time of self-exploration and self-expression, yet “it is also a period when social and cultural influences play a major role in shaping the person to be” (Clausen 1986). Chinese societies and cultures present different types of principles and settings of behaviors compared to the Western society, for instance, some of the selected subjects centered on the settings of school are characterized with clique formation and social status in Chinese societies. Lai Xiao Zi/Walking on the Wild Side (directed by Han Jie in 2006) attempts to truly visualize young rebels’ overwhelming ignorance. This film set in a coal mining area of China’s Shanxi province and, in other words, the environment in which the three young rebels’ story develops seems to be uncultured. Accordingly, the lifestyle of the young gang is presented as a futureless setting in the impoverished town, but their young hearts fly restless without any behavior boundaries. Firstly, although it won Tiger Award at International Film Festival Rotterdam 2006, it is not a good youth film as none outstanding cinematic talent can be seen. Nonetheless, this film embodies and

439 illustrates social problems, youth ideology and social deformity, which certainly will raise diverse arguments. The main role is named Xi Ping who is the real character this film based on, and on the other hand, the director’s altered ego is linked to authenticity in film. According to the director, the idea blending his own childhood memories and the real case represent a semi-autobiographical narrative. On top of that, the amateurish acting to some extent leaded to the emergence of realism in contradistinction to its aesthetic attraction. However, it apparently is not a very new film approach. Bai Peijiang, acting as the leading role, is one of amateur actors in this film, and in the meantime the way that some actors act will surely reflect the maturity of their acting. Similarly, Zhang Yimou’s “Yi Ge Bu Neng Shao/Not One less” (1999) blurring the boundaries between drama and reality adopted neo-realist style and brought comprehensive ideas to Chinese cinema as early as 1990s, moreover, in some sense conveyed the reality of ignorance and backwardness through his prosperous aesthetic representations. On the contrary, Walking on the Wild Side exaggerates social evils. It is totally different from Zhang’s film, but strongly represents Jia Zhangke’s preference as he is executive producer of this film. And, comparing to an overseas youth film—Trainspotting (directed by Danny Boyle in 1996) flooding with foul language, sex and violence—its manners of representations seem like an unsuccessful imitation. This film tells a story of three young rebels in the early 1990s experimenting with their own particular freedom but accidently committing the unpardonable sin. Ignorantly thought that they had committed manslaughter unwillingly lead their life as fugitives, but each one of the three rebels had their own sets of minds. Xi Ping accidently shotted his peer Liu Liu, and after several months he returned hometown to surrender himself to the police but he was informed there is no any homicide case in the region. Reviewing of Walking on the Wild Side in the film

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Table 1. Binary Oppositions in the Film Walking on the Wild Side (2006)    1  2  3  4  5  6 

Binary opposition  Loneliness verses social life  Life verses death  Adolescence verses adulthood  Brutal world of teenagers verses consciousness  Richness verses grassroots  Home life verses fighting in street 

narrative, various binary oppositions may come out which develop the arguments concerned on ideology and as well as identify those established central message. A list of the oppositions which severs to structure the narrative in this film is presented in Table 1. Throughout the realistically told story there is always “conflict”. The binary oppositions are referred to represent the different types of contradictions that those young rebels undergo physically and mentally. Furthermore, the representations of those Chinese youngsters in the film are indicated as negative, for reflecting the truths involved unreliable youths’ psychic bonds, as well as insufficient guide to life and death. First of all, let us look at those youths’ psychic bonds. A psychic bond seems like an umbilical cord between two people which sends and receives information, and the typical example is the attunement between mother and child as having similar genes, backgrounds, habits and so on. For the majority of adolescents, it is common that their close ties tend to be confined to their peers. And also, obviously the emotional supports and satisfactions from their family play a subtle role in the relationships. Clausen (1986) stated that early adolescence participation with the family in its leisure activities tended to drop off even when there were no serious tensions. In this film, Xi Ping is the core character who is having an affair with the wife of a neighbor, and on the contrary not closes to his family at all. The set-up tends to reveal this figure’s rebellious personality, for instance, the scene at their broken house he speaks

crustily with his mom, and the scene in which he makes love with the neighbor’s wife regardless of her crying infant, being indulging in sex at random. The way that he does flirtation tells his sexual experience, but the representation of adolescent is also indicated at resolution of the film where he cries in the arms of the neighbor’s wife, like an infant, after he wakes up on nightmare. As an adolescent, he yearns for care and enlightening from his family, especially the father, but his mom’s endless complaints disappoint him, and on the contrary, the neighbor’s wife acts a particular role as the harbor of his soul, so he accommodates himself at the widow’s home which actually is beside his own house. Before it, he attempted to meet his father at another mining region, but he missed the chance to talk over the solution with him. The psychic bond obviously lies neither between peers as they betray each other during the fleeing from the crime scene, nor between his materfamilias as few connections embodied in the script. The peers in the film actually represent different social categories, such as Liu Liu-figure represented richness, and Xi Ping-figure represented grassroots. Several highlighted scenes indicate that a contradiction between the two social categories results in tragedy and legal troubles, for example, Liu Liu was not willing to lend money to Xi Ping in gambling, fighting each other, and Liu Liu shouted—“you still owe me that you never paid, always me paid for food and drinks”—which actually embodies in texts on contempt of poor peer. In other words, the contradiction between them exerts a subtle

Wang et al.  influence on their weak psychic bonds. Moreover, the authors will underline the considerations of life and death manifested in the film. Indeed, this film illustrates a number of scenes of youth violence, for example, Liu Liu was assaulted by a group of middle school students, Liu Liu and his two peers beat up a student in hallway outside his classroom, and Xi Ping accidently killed Liu Liu while they both intended to rob taxi driver, as well as, involved the events of coalmine mishap in this region. In the film, Liu Liu is an only son of a mine owner, but his behavior is definitely reprehensible for raping a middle school girl in his father’s lorry, and for goading his peers by treating them with food and drink to drub his so-called enemy to vent his anger. Liu Liu’s family background of dominating people had affected his behaviors, and a simple scene, in which he willfully asked for the car key from his father who was staying higher for observing his mining area, indicated the lack of proper education from parenthood. A research entitled Secret Worries and Countermeasures on Children’s Behaviors of Wealthy Families in Country Areas (Liu and Li 2003) explores the natures of children from those wealthy families in rural areas, and it highlights the representations of unaggressive intentions as well as unruly behavior. Liu Liu-figure is portrayed as a spoiled son of wealthy rural family in the film, and in the meantime, the cinematic representation of this character’s behavior alludes to a large social problem in China, such as the behavioral pattern of dominating people, also represents another social phenomenon—considerable unbalanced distribution of social resource. Shanxi Province, which the story portrays, is a typical example. The lower, or working class in some regions is survived in the domestic mining jobs from which they only earn meager wages, but, the actual job risk which these miners face seems unrelated to labour income. A report issued from China News Service (CNS) displays an egregious lack of conscience among the miner owners, and the literal

441 translation of its original title—An Investigation Into the Living Condition of Those Miners in Shanxi Province: Money Is More Important Than Life (Zhang and Qing 2006)—states the terrible living environment, high intensity forced labour jobs, and non-medical care lead the miners to an improper manner of looking at life, and on the other hand, it influences their offspring’s cognition and behavior in terms of life and death. And, of course, those miner owners’ so-called business strategies implied their disrespect toward life. Liu Liu’s acts portrayed in this film has clearly shown and supported the authors’ earlier statement. On top of that, due to inadequate community guide resources for those youths, they lost conscience toward the purpose of life and idled away their time. The “Counter-Strike” game involved in this film, which is an online “killing” match numerous students addicted to, is those youngsters’ interests. And, the way the head master dealing with school violence also indicates that, in this region, the incompetent person qualified to teach is unable to guide students. Both incidents are referred to slightly, but apparently suggest causes for this type of considerations in terms of personal values of life.

MORAL DEVELOPMENT: SHY LOVE IN  RELATIONSHIP  The authors believe that, most of us try to be a “good boy” or “good girl” in our childhood that eventually gives impacts on our adult life. Their own experiences told that, actually, they were receptive and curious toward the society and subsequently, they gained favor from their older generations as they judged the morality of their action by evaluating its consequences in terms of a boy’s relationships which might embrace respect, gratitude, honesty and so on; the authors did treat them as the authors would like them to treat themself and the morality of the authors’ actions matched their views and expectations as well. In

442 academic circles, the form of moral that the authors referred here was classified by psychologists, as belonging to one of six distinct stages. Lawrence Kohlberg’s six moral stages—stages of moral judgment—are distributed in pairs across three levels of development: pre-conventional, conventional, and post-conventional. In the analysis of this film—Shan Zha Shu Zhi Lian/Under the Hawthorn Tree (directed by Zhang Yimou in 2010), the core character—Jing Qiu (played by Dongyu Zhou)—represents an individual at “the third stage”, which typically reaches during high school and has differentiated “right” from her experiences. However, “right” and “wrong” are determined by what her parent, the community, or any other moral authority deem that a “good girl” should be. Moreover, this film, definitely, portrays particular social effects by Cultural Revolution in China. Shan Zha Shu Zhi Lian/Under the Hawthorn Tree portrays a high school girl’s first love during Culture Revolution of the 1970s which is two decades earlier than the story of Walking on the Wild Side Set in a small village in Yichang city of Hubei Province, the story explores the romance spark between an “educated youth” named Jin Qiu and a young prospector nicknamed Lao San (literally translation: old three). The “pure love” depicted in this film, on the surface, highlights the precious emotional affairs in the past time, but alludes to lack of respect and responsibility toward oneself and their partners in relationships among today’s youths, especially negative sexual attitude, sexual knowledge and also includes casual sexual behavior. Jin Qiu-figure in the film is one of the “educated youth” send to be “re-educated” through contribution to distinct works in the countryside. The specific term—“educated youth”—implies their assigned missions as being rusticated and, as well as, ethical behavior they should behave since they are “educated”, which is as a matter of fact based on morals. This paragraph obviously does not aim to be a comprehensive guide to the

Sociology  Study  2(6)  issues of “educated youth” during Cultural Revolution. However, the portrayal of this “educated youth”, in particular, is much like an inverse object which means this character embodies and expresses moral differentiated from today’s youth in China. Jin Qiu’s unique understanding toward sex is referred to in a scene, which represents the naive and innocent mind: Jing Qiu actually has no idea about the way to get pregnant until her reckoning is considered as “nothing” by her friend who has an abortion in the hospital; Jin Qiu deemed to get pregnant once “a man and a woman laying together”. If her statement is enquired among today’s middle school students, it is insignificantly laughable absurdity. Survey Shows More Than 30% Middle School Students Have Sexual Knowledge (Jia and Li 2010) reported 33.4% surveyed middle school youth in Beijing city had sexual knowledge and in addition, dirty joke effected 70.3% students. Obviously, in this country, “dirty joke” has become a typical approach to make emotionally immature students aware of sexual knowledge. Of course, Jin Qiu’s naive consideration of sex and “pregnant” is related to “woman’s virtue” (Crittenden 1990) by the film-maker, and in the meantime, surely these scenes not only simply represent Chinese women’s moral consciousness during Cultural Revolution but also indicate sources of these moral behavior embodied in Jin Qiu-figure. A combination of rational and affective sources is illustrated in a set of dialogues in the film. The three most prominent rational sources—“moral values, prudential considerations, and ego-protection techniques” (Thomas 1997)—are drawn, in the film, between past social events and the youths’ behavior in the present day (see Table 2).

PERSPECTIVE OF GENRE FILM: NATURES  OF CHINESE YOUTH CINEMA  Walking on the Wild Side and Under the Hawthorn Tree strongly represent 6th and 5th generations

Wang et al. 

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Table 2. Example Scenes of the Film Under the Hawthorn Tree (2010)    Examples in this film 

Rational source 

Contrasting  to  youths’  behavior  in  the  present day 

Jing Qiu spends an overnight with Lao San  at nurses’ hostel, and only  Jing Qiu sleeps  on the bed, Lao San, but, looks at her only.  China  Youths’  Personality  Health  Research  Lao  San:  “Go  to  sleep.  I’ll  be  here  with  Moral  values  are  convictions  a  Project  20102  indicates  more  than  90%  person  holds  about  good  and  bad  you”.  surveyed  students  no  objection  toward  Jing  Qiu:  “I  don’t  want  you  over  there.  I  ways to act in moral situations.  “living together”.  want you in bed with me”.  Lao San: “I could just look at you like this  for the rest of my life”. (from film subtitle)  Lao  San  silently  watches  Jing  Qiu  playing  Prudential  consideration are  beliefs  The Sexual  Behaviour  of  School  Students  in  volleyball  outside  bounding  wall  of  her  about  how  a  contemplated  action  China:  A  Brief  Report  (Minichiello  and  Bi  school,  and  Jing  Qiu  accidently  sees  him  could  influence  one’s  own  welfare,  1998) shows that out of a sample of 3,386  particularly  in  terms  of  what  other  students,  15.4%  reported  in  engaging  in  while collecting the ball.    Lao San: “I’ve been watching you playing.”  people  might  think  about  the  action  masturbation  and  5.46%  had  a  sexual  Jing  Qiu:  “Don’t  let  my  teacher  see  you  and  what  undesirable  social  intercourse  relationship  with  the  opposite  consequences could thus result.  here”. (from film subtitle)  sex four weeks prior to the survey.    New­Gen  Workers  in  India  &  China:  Lao  San  works  overtime  with  his  unit,  earning  time  off  to  see  Jing  Qiu  Secretly.  Reshaping  Their  Workplaces  &  the  World3 Jing Qiu and Lao San have a date at a hut.  An  ego‐protection  consists  of  reports  that  compared  to  previous  For warming her, Lao San covers her with  excusing  oneself  for  what  might  generations  they  (today’s  Chinese  new  appear  to  be  a  violation  of  a  moral  generations)  are  selfish;  it  also  states  that  his dust coat.  Jing  Qiu:  “I  still  have  a  year  of  value.  they  still  retain  many  traditional  Chinese  probation…my mother won’t let me fall in  value  toward  family,  but  it  is  mixed  now  love before I’m 25”. (from film subtitle)  with the desire to fulfill one’s own dreams. 

Chinese film directors’ works, and these two films both center on youth groups in Chinese communities across different frameworks of history, but domestic youth cinema does not gain its popularity for the lack of awareness of proper understanding toward the concept of genre film—youth film. Altman (1999) stated that “genres are not only formal arrangements of textual characteristics (but) they are also social devices that use semantics and syntax to assure simultaneous satisfaction on the part of multiple users with apparently contradictory purpose, and he expresses perhaps genres can even teach us about nations”. Ironically, the use of the term “youth film” as a freestanding label designating a specific genre is not broadly accepted until 1990s in China, and a typical example is Yang Guang Can Lan De Ri Zi/In the Heat of the Sun (directed by Jian Wen in 1994) which portrays a story of a group of youngsters during Cultural Revolution and is commented by some local

film critics as a pull of Chinese cinema in the new age. Actually, whereas film reviews, as usual, include generic vocabulary as the convenient and widely understood shorthand such as “a drama”, film publicity seldom employs generic terms as such; and in other words, indirect references to genre are regularly used, but they indeed evoke multiple genres. Take Walking on the Wild Side for instance, the only specifically generic vocabulary is “a drama”, and even is marked with “road movie”, but it never been categorized as “youth film”. Obviously, the perspective of genre film is not simply to enrich the pleasure and meaning to be derived from individual youths’ film. Rather, it provides knowledge about current youth cinema in China and the potential tendencies. The authors have focused on the fact that genre produces a contained and controlled heterogeneity that explores and benefits the optimum potentiality of Chinese youth cinema’s

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444 resources and, in particular, the narrative system and processes these films adopted as their aesthetic and ideological basis. For example, the phrase “peer group” represents the values and beliefs in modern Chinese society, thus presenting the exchange approaches which construct and validate the relationship between society, global film market, young audience and film content; and those retrospective stories not only roughly indicate justice towards historic incidents, but also demonstrate that what we think of today’s youth ideology as well as perceived gender and social roles that shape youth.

Funding  This study was financially supported by the School of Communication, Universiti Sains Malaysia.

Notes  1. Retrieved from http://www.goethe.de/kue/flm/fmg/en 2244985.htm. 2. Retrieved from http://edu.sina.com.cn/zxx/2011-03-13/ 1410287962.shtml. 3. Retrieved from http://360steelcase.com.

References  Altman, R. 1999. Film Genre. London: BFI Publishing. Clausen, J. A. 1986. The Life Course: A Sociological Perspective. London: Prentice-Hall.

Crittenden, P. 1990. Learning to be Moral. Humanities Press International. Jia, X. H. and L. Li. 2010. “Survey Shows More Than 30% Middle School Students Have Sexual Knowledge.” Beijing Evening News, August 12, 2010. Liu, R. Q. and H. P. Li. 2003. “Secret Worries and Countermeasures on Children’s Behaviors of Wealthy Families in Country Areas.” Journal of Educational Development 2003(1):35-37. Minichiello, V. and P. Bi. 1998. “The Sexual Behaviour of School Students in China: A Brief Report.” Venereology 11(2):29-31. Retrieved (http://search.informit.com.au/ documentSummary;dn=559666592515450;res=IELHEA). Thomas, R. M. 1997. Moral Development Theories—Secular and Religious. Greenwood Press. Zhang, M. and E. Qing. 2006. “An Investigation Into the Living Condition of Those Miners in Shanxi Province: Money Is More Important Than Life.” Retrieved (http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2006-01/05/content_40 10259.htm).

Bios  Changsong Wang, Ph.D. candidate, School of Communication, Universiti Sains Malaysia; research fields: film and broadcasting, film studies, Chinese cinema, media studies, new media. Yiming Chen, lecturer, School of Journalism and Communication, Jinan University; research fields: film and visual culture, media and communication, radio and TV. Rohani Hashim, associate professor, School of Communication, Universiti Sains Malaysia; research fields: film and broadcasting, audio/radio studies, film studies, television studies, visual communication, new media, media studies, environmental journalism.