In this lecture, Dr. Ming-yeh T. Rawnsley takes Taiwan New Cinema (TNC) as a turning point and first offer a broad overview of Taiwan cinema prior to the appearance of TNC in the early 1980s, including the rise and fall of the Taiwanese-language film industry (1950s–1970s), Healthy Realism (1960s), and Literary Romance and a variety of genre films (1970s). She then introduces the 1st wave (1980s) and the 2nd wave (1990s) of the TNC in order to highlight in what way Taiwan New Cinema is ‘new’. She discusses three representative filmmakers—Hou Hsiao-hsien, Edward Yang, and Tsai Ming-liang—in more detail in order to illuminate how they challenged different boundaries and broadened the cultural horizon of a society under authoritarian rule for over four decades. Finally, she focuses on Wei Te-sheng’s Cape No.7 (Haijiao qihao, 2008), which became the all-time best-selling locally produced movie in Taiwan, second only to the 1997 Hollywood blockbuster Titanic (dir. James Cameron). This film signals the arrival of Post-New Cinema in Taiwan.
Films for discussion
- (Healthy Realism) Beautiful Duckling (Yangya renjia, 1965, dir. Li Xing);
- (TNC) A Time to Live, A Time to Die (Tongnian wangshi, 1985, dir. Hou Hsiao-Hsien);
- (TNC) A Brighter Summer Day (Gulingjie shaonian sharen shijian, 1991, dir. Edward Yang);
- (Post-TNC) Cape No.7 (Haijiao qihao, 2008, dir. Wei Te-sheng) (available on Disney+).
About the speaker
Dr. Ming-yeh T. Rawnsley is a Research Associate at the Centre of Taiwan Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. She is also a Research Associate at the Institute of Sociology, Academia Sinica, Taiwan. Dr. Rawnsley was Secretary-General, European Association of Taiwan Studies (EATS, 2012–2018), and is the founding Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of Taiwan Studies (2018–present), co-sponsored by EATS and Academia Sinica. She worked as a researcher at the University of Nottingham (1999–2005) and became Head of Chinese Studies at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China (2005–2007). Before she joined SOAS in 2013 and Academia Sinica in 2018, Dr. Rawnsley researched and taught East Asian film industries at the University of Leeds (2007–2013). She has published widely in both English and Chinese on Chinese-language cinema and media and democratisation in Taiwan.
The Taiwan Matters lecture series has been funded by the Ministry of Education of Taiwan (ROC) through the Taipei Mission in Stockholm, Sweden.
Lecture recording