Globalization
of film industries
Film is one of
the important forms in art field, it forces the progress of popular
entertainment industry. Meanwhile film shapes the further movement of media
from 1888 with the first film ‘Roundhay
Garden Scene’ in the world even it lasts for only 2 seconds. Nowadays, film reflects the media
cultures regard to different country background and in turn, is affected by
them. When the directors from different countries to shoot the films, they will
embed the native culture and reveals the life style of local citizens and the current
social situation. And the use of filmic techniques is also diverse in the ways
of representing the plots, themes and mise en scene. In respect of the
globalization of film industry in nowadays, some directors use the culture
collision of East and West countries to enhance the influence of the film to
content the worldwide audiences’ taste with different culture background.
Hollywood is a
district in Los Angeles, and it is famous for its commercial area and
entertainment industry. The film industry reaches a mature stage during the
First World War when Hollywood obtained its domination of the global market’
(Frederick, 1995). As know, Hollywood is the vanguard of the global film
industry, it brings the significant impact in the development of films, and it shapes
the filmic culture in the world. In recent years, when people once mention
Hollywood, they may think of those American famous commercial films and
superstars. Hollywood is described as the dream land to attract lots of people
to join in, and people implement their fantastic films there. Amount of great
films have been made in Hollywood, such as ‘Spider-Man’,
‘Fast Furious’, and ‘Superman’ etc., most of these films achieve prominent
results in international platform, even be fascinated by the audiences in Asian
countries.
‘A number of
factors are driving the Hollywood’s embrace of martial arts genre films, and a
growing popular interest in many forms of Asian culture’ (Klein, 2004). Because
of the media culture becomes globally, and the various forms of arts include
films, literature, music etc., are widely spread in the world. The
globalization of mass media is turned into the main trend, meanwhile the
exchange of culture in different countries is an important force in the modern
society. Particularly, the collision of Eastern and Western culture brings a
powerful impact in the wide range of audiences and cinematography. Thus,
through the globalization of media, it strengthens the relationship among Hollywood
and Asian film industry. ‘The American film industry no longer addresses a
national audience. Hollywood’s domination of international trade has altered
its relationship with the domestic market’ (Frederick, 1995). In that case,
when Hollywood produces a film, Asian market is one of the factors that they
may consider in terms of expanding the local market, and use Asian culture as a
part of the framework in structuring films.
In recent years,
Asian market can be seen as a big budget for Hollywood entertainment industry.
‘Hollywood today is fascinated with martial arts, the studios are importing
major martial arts stars like Jackie Chan and Jet Li from Hong Kong and putting
them in a succession of local big budget films’ (Klein, 2004). Hollywood film
industry is willing to cooperate with Asian superstars because it can bring
them big profits especially in China market. In compare to Asian film, the
local industries also think of some new ideas to change the stereotype of native
films. To consider the current situation of entertainment industry, some Asian
films invite Hollywood superstars to join in, so that to enhance the reputation
of the film in international platform.
In 2012, the
American film ‘Resident: Evil’
invited a famous Chinese actress Bing Bing Li to join their film shooting, and
her performance achieves success finally. ‘Resident: Evil’
is a media franchise owned by a Japanese video game company Capcon and it is a
survival horror game series initiated in 1996. Then this game series has been
expanded to amount of products includes comic books, novels, dramas and films, especially
gain the success in the film series. Bing Bing Li played a role of a spy and
she wore a red Chinese cheongsam that highlights her identity in terms of she
has the Asian face in the film. There are some scenes that taken place in
Tokyo, the set background combines with American and Japan also reveals the
globalization of media in art field. Hollywood no longer focus on the domestic
market, the internationalization of Hollywood films is the current developing
trend.
Another
film could be a good example to illustrate the Western film turns into Asianized
is ‘Lost in Translation’. This is an
American film but the director Sofia Coppola sets the background in Tokyo and
shoots the whole film in Japan as well. ‘Lost
in Translation’ is a story about exotic encounter happens to two Americans
who are Charlotte and Bob, they first meet with each other in a foreign country
in Japan. It is interesting to see the cultural collision between Eastern and
Western countries. Sofia uses this film to communicate with Japan’s culture and
represents the view of Japan’s society from the angle of Americans. This film
achieves success in the international stage.
Moreover, ‘China
market will serve as a foundation for emerging media conglomerates that could
shake the very foundation of Hollywood’s century-long’ (Curtin, 2007, p29).
China has the biggest audiences in the world, and it conducts the majority of Asian market in recent years.
Nowadays, Hollywood film industry is willing to cooperate with China, Japan and
Korea because these Asian countries force the development of local film
industries in a fast pace in the decades. The transnational cooperation also
enhances the reputation of local films and draw more attention from wide
audiences across the world. Additionally, Asian audiences are fascinating in
the Hollywood films because of the use of advanced film technique and fantastic
frames especially in those action and science fiction films.
Moreover, there
are lots of film festival launch every year for interchanging the diverse from
different countries with different cultures. It shows the ‘relevance well
beyond the study of the circulation and production of cinema and cinephile
communities’ (Iordanova & Rhyne, 2009, p10). Some famous film festival such
as Berlin International Film Festival, Cannes International Film Festival and Venice
International Film Festival etc. The set of Film festival is to reward those excellent
films and popularize the local films to a broader space in the future
development.
(Image
fromhttps://www.google.com.hk/imghp?hl=zh-CN&tab=wi)
Nowadays, the world
turns into a global village, the globalization shapes the movement of mass
media in various ways. Film as the important form of media, it is influenced by
the globalization in a certain way. The worldwide film industries with its
extremely large cultural and economic effect are mainly conducted by the
regional development and exports of products. The community of the film
business is taken by a significant transformation through the trend of
globalization. Hollywood no long monopolizes the film industry in the market,
while the new competition from many other countries has grown in the decades,
this results in an increasing number of Asian and European films to be exported
in the worldwide. The film transformation turns globally provides lots of new
opportunities for those productions of films. Besides American movies and Asian
movies, the progress of film industries in European is becoming increasingly
international as well.
From early years
to the 21st century, the America takes a majority part in commercial
producing motion pictures and with the Hollywood film industry being responsible
for close to 60% of the total America film production. American media companies
disseminate the products and the unique culture of Hollywood entertainment cross
the globe, this promotes the cultural exchange in art field. In the concern of pluralism
of mass media in recent times, this is also forcing the diverse forms of media in
a wide space. Thus, the globalization of film industry will continue growth in
a fast pace in prospect.
Iordanova,
D and Rhyne, R 2009, “Film Festival, The Festival Circuit”, St Andrews Film
Studies, U.K.
Klein,
C 2004, ‘Martial arts and globalization of US and Asian film industries’,
Comparative America Studies, vol.2, no.3, pp.360-384.
Wasser,
Frederick 1995, ‘Is Hollywood America? The Trans-nationalization of the
American Film industry’ Critical Studies in Mass Communication. Vol 12.
Pp423-437.
Martin,
C 2007, ‘Playing to the world’s biggest
audience: the globalization of Chinese film and TV’, University of
California Press, London.
