The Phenomenon Of Creating Spectacles In Modern Chinese Films And The Buiiding Of Ethnic Identity

The thesis uses critical theory of visual culture to analyze how modern Chinesefilms create spectacles to build ethnic identity. Under the background of visual cultureturn, the writer finds that although the Chinese film directors are aware of usingspectacle to build ethnic identity in the movies, they still get some misunderstandingwhen building it, for example, they emphasize film shock effect and neglect the miningof ethnic traditional culture. So the thesis is written to rethink how to accurately buildethnic identity and try to find some way to remove some misunderstanding. Becauseaccurate building of ethnic identity is meaningful for a nation to rethink his ethnicidentity problem and diplomatically show his national image well, the thesis has somepractical significance and academic value.The thesis is divided into five chapters, and the main content of each chapter isfollowed：The introduction part mainly tells the purpose and significance of the thesis, andbriefly discusses the phenomenon of creating spectacles in Chinese films and thebuilding of ethnic identity.Chapter Two will firstly introduce the source of the “spectacle” theory, explain theconcept of “spectacle film”, and explore the formative factors of “spectacle film”. Then,this chapter will analyze the source of “identity”, and deeply discuss the concept of“ethnic identity”. In the end, the chapter will study Chinese films based on finding thesource of building ethnic identity in narrative films and spectacle films to explore therelationship between spectacle film and ethnic identity building.Chapter Three will use some specific films to discuss the phenomenon of Chinesespectacles films which includes the nationality reflection of the natural landscape, thenational spirit of the most representative martial art spectacle film and the nationalimage reflected in the disaster spectacle film, and will try to indicate that correctly using the technology means of “spectacle” can help build ethnic identity and show nationalconsciousness.Chapter Four will find out some misunderstanding which arise during the filmproduction process of some directors’ using spectacle technology means to build ethnicidentity. It is an unsuccessful building of ethnic identity that some directors blindlypursuit visual orgy and lose the thinking of national consciousness, even fall into acondition called “orientalism spectacle” in the post-colonial context to cater to thewestern movie-viewing fun. Meanwhile, the chapter will make a point that the mostimportant thing that Chinese spectacle film should learn from the western spectacle filmis how to successfully build ethnic identity but not simply imitate the skill.Chapter Five will rethink the problem of building ethnic identity in Chinesespectacle films and point out that broaden spectacle technology means will contribute tothe development of the Chinese movie industry,and to emphasize the importance ofbuilding ethnic identity in Chinese spectacle films.