A Study On The Media Contents Of Mainland China's Independent Documentary Film Festivals

This thesis focuses on “mainland China's independent documentary film festivals” and divides its study into two parts.The first part examines the three most influential independent documentary film festivals in mainland China,namely,Yunnan Multi Culture Visual Festival,China Independent Film Festival,and Beijing Independent Film Festival.Since film Festivals are one of the principal channels for the spreading of independent documentaries,this thesis first explores the development and influence of mainland China's independent documentary film festivals,and analyzes their appearance,development,operation mode and so on.The second part focuses on “independent documentaries”,making a quantitative analysis of films exhibited on the three above-mentioned film festivals,dividing these films into three different types and discussing their proportions respectively.The three film types include films with a heavy use of factors violating the national cultural security,films that contain the positive representation of folk culture and can be accepted by the government,and films popular among the audience and recognized by the masses.It's hoped that the data collected and analyses made in this thesis about the development,operation mode and other related aspects of the film festivals can be of some referential significance to the regulators and the artistic creation of independent documentaries,the operation institutions of film festivals,and so on.Therefore,Chapter One of this thesis mainly explores the emergence,the social and cultural surroundings,as well as the developing course of independent documentary film festivals in mainland China.Chapter Two analyzes the three above-mentioned film festivals,including their organizers and funds sources,their positioning and purpose,their selection of time and place,their report and publicity means,the design of their structure,the sources of their judges and guests,their nomination and voting mechanism,and so on,and then discusses the operation mode of these independent documentary film festivals in mainland China.Chapter Three conducts a quantitative analysis at two levels of samples taken from films that were exhibited on the three film festivals over the years.Chapter Four summarizes the above analyses anddiscusses the prospect for the future.