China on Screen: Cinema and Nation * From Tian'anmen to Times Square: Transnational China and the Chinese Diaspora on Global Screens 1989-1997

China's rise on the world stage as a political and economic power in the new millennium was more or less signaled by its rise as a cinematic power when Chen Kaige's The Yellow Earth first made a dramatic impact on global screens in 1984. The film heralded the dawn of a new cinema in the mainland spearheaded by the so-called Fifth Generation directors, including Kaige, Zhang Yimou and Tian Zhuangzhuang. Since then, the Sixth Generation directors including Jia Zhangke, Zhang Yuan, Wang Xiaoshuai and Lou Ye have consolidated and expanded on China's cinematic reputation around the world. The rise of Chinese cinema was in fact preceded by the ‘new wave’ movements in Hong Kong (in 1979) and in Taiwan (around 1982) which underlined the political complexity of ‘three Chinas’ with separate film industries, all asserting claims of being the Chinese national cinema. China on Screen and From Tian'anmen to Times...