Opera Film Research Articles

Navigating the World of The Stranger (1979) After the Cultural Revolution: Unveiling Hong Kong Leftist Science Fiction Film by Bao Fang

Abstract After the Cultural Revolution, a period marked by a global retreat from radical politics and increased compromises, filmmakers in the Hong Kong leftist film industry faced financial challenges stemming from the studio’s struggles during the Cultural Revolution. Despite these difficulties, they ingeniously incorporated generic elements to captivate audiences, using popular genres as conduits for social commentary. The Stranger by Feng Huang Motion Picture company stands out, as director Bao Fang adeptly appropriated science fiction elements to adapt a real story of espionage in Hong Kong. The film signifies Bao’s transition from opera film and historical pictures to negotiating realist and science-fictional elements to convey social innuendo. Drawing inspiration from recent works by Mingwei Song and Seo-young Chu, my argument extends to explore how sci-fi serves as a mode of expression for geopolitical commentary. The film not only expresses concern over Soviet espionage and also reflects the fear over the collapse of grand narratives such as Enlightenment and Revolution.

‘You Want Drama? Go to the Opera!’

This article addresses the role played by opera in fiction film by drawing attention to the action film Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (Christopher McQuarrie, 2015). Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot (1926) is treated here in a way that makes it appear as something more than a diegetic background and energy reinforcement for action scenes. By taking into consideration Daniel Yacavone’s (2012; 2014) view of film as a combination of a construction and a known world, I argue that the use of opera displays a stretching of the boundaries between fiction and real life, which in turn has implications for how the film can be regarded as an opera–film encounter. The film makes the opera emerge as significant in its own right through an intricate interaction between fictional denotation and engagement with the lived reality of the film viewer. Ultimately, I suggest that Rogue Nation provides an opportunity not only to reconsider a common way of approaching intersections between opera and fiction film, but also to extend and refine Yacavone’s theory.

What Noise Does a Psychotic Door Listen To? Information, Intermediality, and Guo Baochang's Peking Opera Film Dream of the Bridal Chamber

The Chinese opera film criticism of the late 1950s coincided with the introduction of cybernetics to China. Echoing cybernetics’ emphasis on the homeostasis of an artificial or living machine archived by filtering noise from information in the environment, film critics aimed no less at maintaining the steady states of Chinese culture (epitomized by traditional opera) when taking on the treacherous milieu called modernization (in the form of cinema). The whole problematic of opera films—in which one is forced to choose filtering out formulaic operatic gestures or realistic cinematic mise-en-scène as noise to maintain a self-cohesive cultural system—follows from the mistake of essentializing media specificities as prior to the contingent encounter among different mediums. However, an alternative approach lies in treating noise not as interference that must be eliminated but as surplus information that introduces system errors, triggers phase shifts, and brings about random changes for genuine self-organization, allowing us to confront control with the noise in its own channels. A revamping of cybernetics in this regard opens up new possibilities of understanding opera films through the peculiar prism of Guo Baochang's 2005 opera film Chungui meng 春閨夢 (Dream of the Bridal Chamber). And that prism particularly takes the form of a series of moon gates (yueliang men 月亮門), an architectural trope invoked throughout the film signifying the cybernetic circuit of gateways that at once exerts control over and yet is disturbed and reshaped by the noisy signals arising from the mutual interferences among opera, film, and, ultimately, television.

Transmediation, Transgression and Popularization: A Study of the Cantonese Opera Film White Snake

The preservation of declining xiqu heritage through remediation and transmediation has often been ineffective in attracting a wider audience. The Cantonese opera film White Snake (2021), with its unusual utilization of computer-generated technology and transgressive combination of various media, offers a fresh approach to popularizing xiqu among younger audiences. To overcome aesthetic differences between cinema and xiqu, the film transforms medium specificities and transmedial potentials of Song landscape paintings and martial-arts film, adapting them to a new scenic and choreographic setting. By altering the original play’s sensory and semiotic modalities, White Snake’s transmedia aspects blaze a new trail for popularizing xiqu heritage for a new generation.

The Digital Classicism of the Cantonese Opera Film White Snake

This article examines the 2019 Cantonese opera film White Snake as an important case of an evolving “digital classicism,” making use of audience-based digitally produced and transmitted Chinese-language materials, among other sources. The article contextualizes the Cantonese opera film as continuing the tradition of experimenting with the White Snake theme, using the genres of local opera and opera film, and special and visual effects enabled by the newest technology. It then moves to a close reading of a series of danmu, anonymous live comments on the Cantonese opera film trailer posted on Bilibili, as important entry points for the study of audience participation in digital times. The digitally produced “ink painting–style Chinese aesthetics” of the film, its digital breakthrough as a “musical with Chinese characteristics,” as well as various forms of fan and anti-fan digital labor triggered by the film, provide further evidence on the importance of “the digital” as “processes of sense making.” The article concludes with thoughts on what difference “the digital” might be able to make in this long history of representing what has become a “classical” Chinese legend.

Aesthetic Changes of Audiovisual Language in China Opera Movies from The Legend of the White Snake to The Legend of the White Snake. Love

Background: Under the background of different times, facing the situation of great changes in public aesthetics, the purpose of this paper is to explore the use of audio-visual language that conforms to the characteristics of the times to create China drama film stories that conform to the current aesthetic characteristics.Methods: The traditional Chinese opera films "The Legend of the White Snake" and "The Legend of the White Snake. Love" with the same theme in different times in China were selected, and the differences of the same theme and the same story using different narrative methods and audio-visual expressions in different times were compared by the method of analysis and comparison.Results: With the development of the times, the aesthetic appreciation of the audio-visual language of China opera films has changed; 1) the visual promotion of popular aesthetic habits in story narration, 2) the blending of scenes with blank artistic conception, 3) the scientific and technological appeal of spiritual impact, and 4) the application of Chinese and western elements that arouse the audience's empathy.Conclusion: The research shows that the aesthetic appreciation of audio-visual language in different times plays a comprehensive role in China's opera films: accurately realizing the integrity of narrative elements, smooth emotional transmission, vivid artistic style arousing the audience's emotions and maintaining this kind of spiritual perception, inducing the audience to fully integrate into the drama stories, expanding the expression mode of opera films, exploring the specific presentation paradigm of opera films, and finally helping the promotion and popularization of traditional art in China.

Riset Hadis Berbasis Multimedia

<p>This research discusses multimedia-based hadith research in the reception study of living hadith studies in the form of film media. Muslim individuals in the current era are increasingly exploring religious teachings through social media, especially on YouTube. This phenomenon makes contemporary Muslim scholars convey religious teachings more in the form of video lectures and even package them more interestingly in the form of films that contain Islamic teaching values. Mapping multimedia-based hadith research, one of which focuses on the soap opera "Taqdir Divine Test from Allah" which attempts to portray a model of hadith mediatization packaged in the form of a religious soap opera. This article tries to explain the phenomenon of living hadith receptions presented from multimedia-based hadith research into film shows, including "Papi and Kacung, "The Santri", and "Kaya But Missqueen", the substance of which comes from the words of the Prophet Muhammad Saw. This research uses a qualitative method with direct observation in watching the soap opera film as a primary source and uses a literature study approach as a secondary source regarding topics related to this research. The results of the research show that this research was conducted to examine the trend model for multimedia-based hadith reception in soap operas in Indonesia. This research produces; First, the scenes played by soap opera actors illustrate the hadith in a concrete way so that the wider community can learn from it. Second, soap operas from films perceive hadith exegetically, aesthetically and functionally. Third, the hadith packaged in the form of a soap opera does not fully represent the reality of the hadith, but is sufficient as an alternative for the public to understand the hadith practically and can be used as a reference as a learning and moral education tool so that the positive values contained in the film can be understood by each individual with Good.</p>

The reincarnation of Tiger Mountain: Post-socializing the model opera film

This essay is about the politics of aesthetics in the cinematic making and remaking of the model opera (yangbanxi), a performative genre that was favorably engineered by Jiang Qing so as to facilitate politicized lives of Chinese masses by virtue of igniting and uniting the revolutionary fervor among peasants, workers and soldiers. Through a comparative analysis of the narrative schemas and aesthetic strategies deployed in Xie Tieli’s Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy (1970) and Tsui Hark’s The Taking of Tiger Mountain (2014), this article raises the questions of how a multiplicity of utopian visions has been reincarnated and reembodied through the contemporary remaking of the iconic model opera film. It argues that the practice of cinematic remaking in post-reform China is constituted by the underpinning logics of the politics of nostalgia and the rearticulation of geopolitical desire. Furthermore, it posits the ways that the re-imagination of national popular is enriched with and complicated by the creative impulse of regional vernacular culture and technology of global gesture.

Nonverbal Communication in the Concept of Javanese Opera Film Artistic Arrangement

The film is one of the communication media used to convey information from its creator to the audience. The film is referred to as one of the communication media. The statement that film is as its effect on the audience shows communication medium. Mainly after watching a movie, the audience will believe that the film is good or not. These events or phenomena are evidence that there is information conveyed to the audience when watching a film, whether they like or do not like it. The purpose of this study is to find a solution to the communication problem that occurs in the Javanese Opera film as a communication medium so that it can provide education, especially for film lovers, to gain insight into how to watch films like Opera Jawa. This research was carried out using qualitative research methods to obtain factual data to explain so that it was easy to deliver. After analyzing the study of nonverbal communication in the Opera Jawa film, it can be concluded that art as a form of aesthetic value and a medium of communication means communicating through beauty with a series of information packaged through visual language, making it richer and more diverse in how to communicate.

Restaging Zhu Yingtai in Early Communist China

In 1953, Shanghai Film Studio produced a Shaoxing opera film version ofThe Butterfly Loversas the first color film of the People’s Republic of China. Noted for its immense popularity in the Sinophone sphere throughout the 1950s, the film actually exemplifies a history of Shaoxing opera that is connected to urbanization and nationalism as well as women’s liberation and the cultural politics of early communist China. It is an early example of how Chinese opera and modern media technology contribute to transnational negotiations and imaginations of Chinese identities.

The Development and Aesthetic Pursuit of Opera Films in this Century (2000-2015)

This paper examined the development of opera films in regard to cultural traditions and modernization, the evolution and analysis of new aesthetic concepts, the cultural reasons for continuous development and the expansion of communication channels. Based on these analyses, this paper concluded with the call for China to continuously improve and develop of the Chinese opera films in the hope for a new “golden age.”

Black Opera, Operatic Racism and an ‘Engaged Opera Studies’

Naomi André’sBlack Opera: History, Power, Engagementis a call for recognition and inclusion. Over the course of nearly 300 pages, André covers a range of subjects, from long-forgotten concert performances, to opera, Broadway and opera film, to contemporary operatic composition and practice. As she does, she moves between the United States and South Africa – a striking way of approaching her material and a feature of the book that ought to prove highly influential. Some of the arguments she makes are new, some combine pre-existing thought and research in new ways. The most important moments, though, are when she pauses to describe her experiences or those of another black opera lover or group of black opera lovers.

Traditional Madurese Engagement Amids the Social Change of the Kangean Society

Kangean is an island that has various traditions, one of which is the engagement tradition. Today, the engagement tradition has undergone a drastic shift, due to the presence of technological media, such as television, cell phones, the internet, and the like. Television, which is basically a medium of entertainment for the wider community, however, for the kangean community, television is one of the causes of social and cultural changes. This study aims to uncover and describe the causes of these changes. This study uses data analysis. Qualitative methods are methods that aim to obtain descriptive data. The data in this study are conversations related to the causes of socio-cultural shifts, the data is transcribed into written texts. The data was collected by interviewing, selecting, describing and verification techniques. Data were analyzed by using descriptive qualitative method which is based on Siswantoro's theory. The results of this study indicate that non-educational shows on television such as soap opera films, promiscuty, blue film, tiktok, life style, speaking style and dress patterns are greatly affect the kangean community especially among teenagers. The negative affects for Kangean teenagers are on social life, lifestyle, speaking style, promiscuty, drug addicts, violating customs, traditions and culture. Therefore, policies are needed to limit the scope of globalization to which ones should be implemented and which should be rejected. This requires the role of the government of the kangean community to act through policies that are more directed at socio-cultural considerations.

The audiovisual recreation of operas filmed in theaters: An analysis of Don Giovanni by W. A. Mozart

This article analyzes select opera films produced during the 20th and 21st centuries by international opera houses in order to determine whether, when the diegesis of these films is recreated, there is also an attempt made for the films to reflect the conventions of operatic performance. We performed content analysis of the end of the first act in 29 filmed versions of the opera Don Giovanni by W.A. Mozart by evaluating 44 variables related to three categories that are central to translating the original story to the new audiovisual discourse: recreation of time and space and use of scenery. The main results reveal that in translating Don Giovanni to audiovisual media, the films continue to be influenced by the institutional conventions of operatic theater. In relying on the original performance, these films, even in the 21st century, do not exhibit full narrative autonomy. Our article proposes several ways to better adapt—from a cinematographic perspective—these scenic representations based on elements such as depth of field or scenery, without the need for greater resources than those already available to opera houses.

월극영화(越劇映畫)의 사의적 미학 탐구 -1950~1966년 중국 멜로영화를 중심으로-

월극영화(越劇映畫)는 중국 극영화의 한 유형으로 중국 사의(寫意)미학의 정수를 계승하였다. 월극 무대 공연의 사의성(寫意性)에 관한 기존 연구는 월극 미학을 중국 희곡(戲曲) 미학에 포함시켜 간단하게 고찰한 것이 대부분으로 깊이 있는 연구가 부족하였다. 월극영화의 미학에 관한 연구 상황도 월극 미학의 경우와 유사하였다. 일부 학자들은 월극영화와 월극무대를 사의 미학적 관점에서 동일한 것으로 간주하였으며, 기타 일부 학자들은 월극영화를 무대 공연의 정형을 벗어난 이질적 존재로 간주하였다. 이것은 일부 연구자들이 월극영화의 사의적 미학에 대한 본질을 정확히 이해하지 못한 것에서 비롯되었다. 월극영화는 사회적 공감과 비정한 소재를 통해 중국 강남(江南) 지역의 정원, 실내 장식 등을 배경으로 여성이 주체가 되는 가무 표현 형식으로서 부드럽고 아름다운 의경(意境)과 흥미(興味)를 바탕으로 재구성하여 강남의 생명력과 분위기를 시적으로 표현한다. 이와 같이 월극영화가 함의하고 있는 기본적 표현은 ‘부드러운 감정, 비정, 시적 정서와 개방적 정신‘이며 현대 예술 형식을 갖추고 있음을 알 수 있다. 또한, ‘마음으로 깨닫고 이해‘한다는 관람 패턴을 통해 영화의 영상 표현뿐만 아니라 영화의 주제와 내용도 이해할 수 있는 방식으로 변화됨으로써 월극영화는 인간의 감정, 정서, 정신 등을 반영하는 문화 메커니즘을 형성하였다. 1950~1960년대 촬영된 몇 편의 멜로소재 월극영화에 대해 공시적 측면과 통시적 측면에서 월극영화의 사의적 표현을 분석하였고, 월극이 영화 장르의 제작 방식을 도입해서 사의적 표현을 발전시킨 과정과 결과를 심층적으로 토론하였다.

Female warriors: a reproduction of patriarchal narrative of Hua Mulan in The Red Detachment of Women (1972)

During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the CCP officially claimed that Chinese women achieved an equal position as men, and the Confucian patriarchal family was deconstructed. This article is an ongoing exploration of Maoist gender discourse by analysing the image of female warriors in the revolutionary opera film, The Red Detachment of Women (1972) which was made and popularised during the Cultural Revolution. This article finds that Maoist gender discourse failed to deconstruct the Confucian patriarchy. The image of female warriors in the revolutionary opera films was a reproduction of the patriarchal narrative of Hua Mulan, which served an ethical symbol of loyalty and filial daughter in the discourse of Confucian patriarchy. Similar to Mulan, the masculinised image of female warriors in the revolutionary opera films cannot be identified as a feminist representation yet a cultural and ethical symbol of filial daughter that leads to women’s subordination to men’s needs.

МУЗЫКАЛЬНАЯ КОММУНИКАЦИЯ: СПОСОБЫ ВОСПРОИЗВЕДЕНИЯ И КАНАЛЫ ВОСПРИЯТИЯ МУЗЫКИ (историко-аналитический аспект)

In the article the means of musical communication and their evolution are considered in the historical and analytical aspect. There are two types of communication tools: acoustic, using the airspace as a channel for transmitting encoded information, and visual, which include stage design, allowing to perceive music as a kind of theatrical performance, and musical notation, graphically fixing all the components of the musical text. As the earliest means of nonwritten communication, the oral method is put forward, a vivid example of which is folklore, often called the musical memory of generations. Other examples of oral communication are cult music, improvisation and musical meditation. It is stated that musical writing, in particular, musical notation, and later printing tools have created conditions for overcoming spatial and temporal barriers to the spread of music. The next step is the invention of technical sound recording, which opened a new era in the development of communications. Magnetic recording of the visual series made it possible to create concert films and opera films. Even greater involvement of people in the process of musical communication was facilitated by the appearance of electronic and mechanical means of recording music. The emergence of new opportunities in the field of sound dynamics control, its timbre, influenced the development of musical thinking. A new industry of "production" has emerged with the involvement of professional musicians who own modern recording equipment and specialize in the production of "artificial" musical products. This process was accompanied by the formation of a new audience of listeners who preferred recording to live sound.

МУЗЫКАЛЬНАЯ КОММУНИКАЦИЯ: СПОСОБЫ ВОСПРОИЗВЕДЕНИЯ И КАНАЛЫ ВОСПРИЯТИЯ МУЗЫКИ (историко-аналитический аспект)

In the article the means of musical communication and their evolution are considered in the historical and analytical aspect. There are two types of communication tools: acoustic, using the airspace as a channel for transmitting encoded information, and visual, which include stage design, allowing to perceive music as a kind of theatrical performance, and musical notation, graphically fixing all the components of the musical text. As the earliest means of nonwritten communication, the oral method is put forward, a vivid example of which is folklore, often called the musical memory of generations. Other examples of oral communication are cult music, improvisation and musical meditation. It is stated that musical writing, in particular, musical notation, and later printing tools created conditions for overcoming spatial and temporal barriers to the spread of music. The next step is the invention of technical sound recording, which opened a new era in the development of communications. Magnetic recording of the visual series made it possible to create concert films and opera films. The emergence of electronic and mechanical means of music recording contributed significantly to greater involvement of people in the process of musical communication.

Contributors

Contributors

Looking Back at the (French) Opera-Film

Films focusing on music, whether musicals or biographies of singers, have had considerable success in the last decade; and opera has been increasingly incorporated into film soundtracks. But the modern opera film seems destined to be a subgenre associated with the 1980s. The majority of modern opera films from the mid-1970s through to the turn of the millennium were principally French-produced or French co-productions. This article considers the early development of the opera film and focuses on the final few opera films made in France – Boris Godounov (Andrzej Žulawski, 1989), Madame Butterfly (Frederic Mitterrand, 1995) and Tosca (Benoit Jacquot, 2001) – placing them in the context of the challenges faced by the subgenre.