Home > Bibliographies > AAST298J (Spring 2004)

Taiwanese-American Film Art and Artists by Peter Schwartz

Books

• Bloom, Harold. Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club. Philadelphia, PA: Chelsea House Publishers, 2002.
• Chan, Jachinson. Chinese American Masculinities: From Fu Manchu to Bruce Lee. New York: Routledge, 2001.
• Chu, Patricia P. Assimilating Asians: Gendered Strategies of Authorship in Asian America. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000.
• Feng, Peter X. Identities in Motion: Asian American Film and Video. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2002.
• Gee, Bill J. Asian American Media Reference Guide; A Catalog of More Than 1000 Asian American Audio-Visual Programs for Rent or Sale in the United States. New York: Asian Cine Vision, 1990.

  An index to over a 1000 films by Asian Americans and about Asian Americans, their culture and life. Also includes Hollywood movies by and about this group.

• Grossman, Andrew. Queer Asian Cinema: Shadows in the Shade. New York: Harrington Park Press, 2000.
• Hamamoto, Darrell Y. and Sandra Liu. (2000). Countervisions: Asian American Film Criticism. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2000.
• Hsing, Chun. Asian America Through the Lens: History, Representations, and Identity. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 1998.

  This book represents an examination of Asian American independent films. According to the author, his goal is to increase exposure to Asian American film artists, their independent films, and provide a historical overview of Asian American film artists. The book includes a bibliography.

• Jameson, Fredric. The Geopolitical Aesthetic: Cinema and Space in the World System. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986.
• Lee, Joann Faung Jean. Asian American Actors: Oral Histories from Stage, Screen, and Television. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2000.
• Wong, Eugene Franklin. On Visual Media Racism: Asians in the American Motion Pictures. New York: Arno Press, 1978.

Book Articles or Chapters

• Chiang, Mark. "Coming Out into the Global System: Postmodern Patriarchies and Transnational Sexualities in The Wedding Banquet." in Q and A: Queer in Asian America, ed. David L. Eng and Alice Y. Horn. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1998: 374-96.
• Dariotis, Wei-ming, and Eileen Fung. "Breaking the Soy Sauce Jar: Diaspora and Displacement in the Films of Ang Lee." in Transnational Chinese Cinemas: Identity, Nationhood, Gender, ed. Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1997: 187-220.
• Marchetti, Gina. "The Wedding Banquet: Global Chinese Cinema and the Asian American Experience." Countervisions: Asian American Film Criticism. Darrell Y. Hamamoto and Sandra Liu. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2000: 275-297.

  In this chapter of Countervisions: Asian American Film Criticism, Gina Marchetti analyzes the film The Wedding Banquet in the "transnational context of its production and reception in order to elucidate the ways in which it straddles the borders that outline the various American and global Chinese communities it treats" (276). By looking at the film in the context of Taiwanese American and Chinese American culture, Marchetti not only summarizes the plot, but also examines the "elusive nature of identity" Ang Lee seeks to explore.

Films

• Better Luck Tomorrow. Dir. Justin Lin. Los Angeles, CA: MTV Films, 2003.
• Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. Dir. Ang Lee. Culver City, CA: Sony Pictures Classics, 2000.
• Eat Drink Man Woman. Dir. Ang Lee. Taipei: Central Motion Picture, 1994.
• The Joy Luck Club. Dir. Wayne Wang. Burbank, CA: Hollywood Pictures Home Video, 1993.
• An Ocean Too Deep. Dir. Kuang-Yuan Pan and Chi-Ku Yen. Taipei: Central Motion Picture, 2001.
• Pushing Hands. Dir. Ang Lee. Taipei: Central Motion Picture, 1993.
• Wedding Banquet. Dir. Ang Lee. Taipei: Central Motion Picture, 1993.

  Gao Wai-Tung runs a successful real estate business in New York City and has a close relationship with his gay lover, Simon. However, Wai-Tung's parents are unaware he is gay and want him to get married and have children. To satisfy his parents, he marries one of his tenants, Wei-Wei, who needs a green card to stay in the U.S. Discovering that Wai-Tung was recently married, a friend of the grooms father insists on a grand wedding banquet in his successful Manhattan restaurant. According to the director, The Wedding Banquet is a "comedy about identity." Specifically, the film addresses sexual orientation, gay culture, especially that of interracial couples, familial relations between Asian American immigrant children and their blood relatives "back home," feminism, and People's Republic of China and Republic of China relations (as seen allegorically between Wei-Wei and Wai-Tung).

Journal Articles

• Chin, Daryl. "Here Comes the Sun: Media and the Moving Image in the New Millennium." PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 24.2 (2002): 42-55.
• Chua, Ling-Yen. "The Cinematic Representation of Asian Homosexuality in 'The Wedding Banquet'." Journal of Homosexuality 36.3-4 (1999): 99-112.

  Using Ang Lee's The Wedding Banquet as an example, this paper seeks to examine the rise of queer movies where Asian-American males play homosexual roles as opposed to the past where Caucasians played the role of a homosexual male and Asian Americans play that of a heterosexual male.

• Feng, Peter X. "The State of Asian American Cinema: In Search of Community." Cineaste 24.4 (1999): 20-24.
• Hou, Hsiao-hsien. "Words and Images: A Conversation with Hou Hsiao-hsien and Chu T'ien-wen." Journal of Asian American Studies 11.3 (2003): 675-716.
• Kaplan, E. Ann. "Melodrama/Subjectivity/Ideology: Western Melodrama Theories and Their Relevance to Recent Chinese Cinema." East-West Film Journal 5.1 (1991): 6-27.
• Ma, Sheng-mei. "Ang Lee's Domestic Tragicomedy: Immigrant Nostalgia, Exotic/Ethnic Tour, Global Market." Journal of Popular Culture 30.1 (1996): 191-201.

  Ang Lee's trilogy, Pushing Hands, Wedding Banquet, and Eat Drink Man Woman depicts immigrant culture in the United States. Lee brings into question cultural, racial, and sexual identities. All three films were produced through the efforts of Taiwanese and American film crews and were targeted at global audiences. According to the author: "Lee's leading roles possess an immigrant subjectivity that breaks the barriers between the first and third worlds. The trilogy comprises both immigrant nostalgia and a tour of the exotic and the ethnic."

• Wachs, Esther. (1993). "The East Is Hot: US Audiences Line Up For Films With A Chinese Flavour." Far Eastern Economic Review 156.51 (1993): 34.

  Recent films, such as the Joy Luck Club and Farewell My Concubine, that feature Taiwanese American film artists, have enjoyed success in the United States and abroad. This new Asian/Asian American film market is accompanied by increasing recognition of Asian American film artists as well as a rise in studio marketing and trade with Asia.

Newspaper or Magazine Articles

• Ansen, David. "Yippee for 'Yi Yi'." Newsweek 6 November 2000: 81.

  In his article, David Ansen reviews Edward Yang's Yi Yi, a movie about the economic, romantic, and spiritual struggles of a Taipei family. The movie focuses on NJ, a 45-year-old partner in a failing computer business. In the movie, there is a suicide attempt, a murder, and a business trip to Tokyo where NJ has an affair with his former sweetheart.

• Armentano, Paul. "Script Review: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." Creative Screenwriting 8.3 (2001): 6-11.
• Berry, Chris. "Taiwanese Melodrama Returns with a Twist in The Wedding Banquet." Cinemaya 21 (1993): 52-54.
• Darlin, Damon. "The East is Technicolor." Forbes 8 November 1993: 318.
• Durbin, Karen. (2003, April 6). "In the Minority, But Hardly a Model." New York Times 6 April 2003, Section 2: 13.

  The four upscale Southern California high school friends in Justin Lin's Better Luck Tomorrow do well at their studies and compare notes on Ivy League colleges. However, one has connections with drug dealers, another a taste for violence, and a third convinces the fourth, the movie's protagonist, to go into business with him selling cheat sheets. Caucasian classmates think they are an Asian gang, a reputation they love. This article not only addresses the story's plot, but also the model minority stereotype, and Justin Lin's success in making this film.

• Kehr, Dave (2001, January 14). "In Theaters Now: The Asian Alternative." New York Times 14 January 2001, Section 2: 1.

  This article discusses the emergence of films by Asian directors for consumption by Eastern and Western societies. Examples of films include Yi, Yi, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and In the Mood for Love while examples of directors include Edward Yang, John Woo, and Wong Kar-Wai.

• Kirkland, Bruce. (2000, December 3). "Kicking Subtitle Butt Director Ang Lee has Mainstream Plans for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." Toronto Sun 3 December 2000: S14.
• Sherman, Paul. "East Meets West in 'Rangoon' and 'Pushing Hands'." The Boston Herald 11 February 1996: 018.