Based on the extensive analysis of historical images and the film images examined here, we can draw the conclusion that images of China in contemporary Western documentaries follow a certain pattern: antiquity, tradition, diversity, transition and threat. Chinese antiquity is firstly introduced by the traditional products which have been known to the West for thousands of years, for example silk, which has been popular since Roman times. In the early Arabic journals, tea was introduced as the national drink of the Middle Kingdom. Elegant, precious porcelain, a unique Chinese artwork highly valued in Europe in the era of Chinoiserie, conveys a connotation of delicacy and nobility. In all the documentaries featured in this dissertation, at least one of the upper-class interviewees is positioned with porcelain in the background of the shot. These artistic porcelain pieces are so expensive as to be out of the reach of the poor, and thus are used to imply a differentiated social identity. In addition,
China’s antiquity can also be represented by rice planting in a primitive agricultural landscape, and historical buildings like the Great Wall and the Royal Palace.
The distinguished arts of Chinese traditional calligraphy and painting have existed and been used by members of the elite to decorate their houses for many hundreds of years. In modern China, the Chinese are still fond of adopting traditional painting and calligraphy art as decorations both at home and at work. In a medium shot of a Chinese family, a Chinese painting is hung on the wall of the living room, which denotes the family’s social status as members of the intellectual class. In the interview settings of the BBC and CBC’s documentary series, it can be noted that all the interviewed government officials, intellectuals and entrepreneurs are positioned in a setting decorated either by porcelain artwork or a Chinese painting or sometimes both. It is quite obvious that this image composition suggests that party officials and intellectuals belong to a higher social class.
From the perspective of cultural globalization, Western culture has already had a huge impact on traditional Chinese culture. Chinese people however do persist in certain traditional festivals, such as Qing Ming, Mid-Autumn and the New Year festival, and the ways in which the Chinese celebrate these festivals is included in all of the documentaries examined here.
As the most important festival in the Chinese community, the Chinese New Year is one of film-makers’ favorite China-related subjects, in particular when combined with the lives of Chinese migrant workers. Migrant workers’ stories of their lives in this country of transition are covered in all four documentaries, in particular to portray how they celebrate Chinese New Year with their family. The huge economic transition undergone in society guarantees more opportunities than ever before, and people living in rural areas are driven to move to more developed areas. In order to earn more money in cities, they have to sacrifice their time with their families, which results in a problematic relationship with their children. Sun Feng, one of the two major characters in China Revealed, represents the 0.8 billion people living in rural China, and also the enormous number of migrant workers living in the country of
transition. The price of his work in Shanghai is his daughter’s inability to recognize him when he goes back home for Chinese New Year.
The diversity of Chinese culture and identities is constantly revisited in these documentaries. As China has the longest continous history in the world, its culture has diversified along with its territorial expansion. Nowadays, fifty-six ethnic groups live in this vast land, and each ethnic group has its own distinctive culture and traditions. For instance, the Mongol ethnic group living on the western grassland is filmed in China Revealed. From their montage, we learn that Mongols are concerned about how to preserve their culture and traditions under the pressure towards cultural assimilation into the Han Chinese mainstream. The Mongols are taken as representatives of Chinese ethnic minorities in the Discovery documentary because, from an American perspective, the Mongolian way of life shares some similarities with the cowboys’ lives in the Wild West. In the European documentaries, the directors have instead selected the Tibetans living on the Qinghai Plateau and the Uyghur living on the old Silk Road as representatives of China’s ethnic diversity.
China is in a state of transition, which could be one of the most surprising transformations happening in the world. The economic take-off must be represented by the modern city of Shanghai. In all the documentary series, the city is filmed and regarded as a token of China’s booming economy, a successful role model for China’s modernization process. Shanghai dazzles the audience, and would convince the most sceptical Western viewer that the skyline of a Chinese city could be as amazing as that of New York City or Paris. A montage of modern and dynamic city life usually encompasses image of local Chinese people in a nightclub, shiny glittering skyscrapers, in particular the Jinmao Tower, and the whole city skyline along the Yangtze River.
To emphasize an atmosphere of excitement and temptation, the film directors utilize a Chinese song with a fast, clear tempo to match these shots. The duration of each shot lasts for a couple of seconds. The image and music codes in the whole sequence applied in China Revealed, China’s Rivers and China Rises form a