Violence Aesthetics In The Contemporary Western Science Fiction Film

As early as 1990s,the film critics of Hong Kong labeled Johnwoo's film style as“Violence Aesthetics ".Since then the term " Violence Aesthetics " has entered the public's awareness,which is even more popular in the current era of Pan entertainment."Violence Aesthetics " has been widely used in various fields,and the most populated form of expression is film.The beautifying of violence and the way to treat ugliness(violence)as beauty are commonly seen in the martial arts movies,shooting movies,social films.However,the age of science and technology has given violence aesthetics some new connotations.Violence aesthetics in the Western Science fiction films not only includes the visible and sensible“visual violence ",which gives the audience the reasonable psychological release and satisfaction owing to the development of digital media technology,but also the "scientific and technological violence”used by the power exploring the extreme control of the technology in the future,which is of great theoretical and practical significance.This article can be divided into the following parts:The first chapter aims to explore the relationship between violence aesthetics and contemporary western science fiction films as well as how they are integrated with each other.First,it discusses the origin of violence aesthetics and the aesthetic application of violent factors in each developing stage.Second,it discusses the post-modern context of contemporary western science fiction films(postmodernism and the characteristics of post-modernism aesthetics),paving the way for the subsequent discussion of the main types of postmodern sci-fi films and their aesthetic features of violence.From the details,the reasons for the frequent use of violence in the science fiction films need further exploration.From the macro perspective,“scientific and technological violence”brought up in this article,which is different from the violence of boxing and shooting,is a more advanced violence.However,the advanced violence is denounced as the"rationality" by the post-humanism,and the exploration of the contradiction between rationality and non-rationality begins.The second chapter discusses the main types of postmodern science fiction film and the concept of violence aesthetics.The post-modern science fiction film doesn't refer to some single type,but the science fiction film with postmodern characteristics including Cyberpunk,Anti-Utopian Future World and multidimensional space.The first category describes the universal state of human beings with only computers as their company in the future world.The second kind of science fiction films express their imagination of the future world,optimistic or pessimistic.This article is mainly about the anti-Utopian society with future pessimism.The third category of science fiction films focus on space travel,the travel between multiple time and space or the parallel world and so on.Through a brief analysis of the three types of concepts of violence aesthetics,Westworld belongs to the first category,but it also includes some elements of the postmodernism in the second and third category,mainly discussing the concept of violence aesthetics,including the absurd external reality,the image of " virtual human ",and the brief departure of the plot.The third chapter studies the science fiction series " Westworld" issued by HBO in 2016 from the perspective of post-modern violence aesthetics,.It is hoped to explore the applications of "intuitive" and "invisible" violence in the drama,and to excavate the new cultural connotation and significance contained in violence in the age of science and technology through the analysis of the narrative strategy and audio-visual language in the science-fiction drama.Through a detailed analysis of the narrative strategy of violence aesthetics and the beauty of violence in the Westworld,we can find out that it shows the commonality of violence(the routinization and gamification of violence)and the multiple symbolic metaphor from the perspective of narrative strategy,and it shows the formal beauty of violence from the design of the simulated game scene,the hybridity and splice of the world,the violent images,and the dialogue as well as the wanton of lines and carnival,sound and image contrast.The fourth chapter intends to analyze the value of violence aesthetics in contemporary science fiction films from the perspectives of the postmodernist criticism theory,the critique of anthropoism theory and the critique of instrumental reason.The image impact and the virtual experience brought by digital technology have provided a better release for the audience.Besides,the critique of anthropoism and the esthetics of Existentialism explore the predicament of human existence in the post modernism and the aesthetic democratization in the consumption age around the illusion and the reality and the "science and technology violence".