From Mulan (1998) to Mulan (2020): Orientalist Imagination, Feminist Intervention, and a Compromised Progress

Abstract

This talk offers a comparative close reading of Disney's animated film Mulan (1998) and its 2020 eponymous live-action remake. Departing from the common perception that the live-action Mulan is simply an “Orientalist distortion” of the Chinese legend, the talk closely examines where the remake breaks free from and where it still embraces the animation’s cultural appropriation of China. In doing so, the talk demonstrates how the remake makes a commendable yet compromised feminist intervention into both the millennium-long legend and Disney’s cultural imagination.

About the speaker

Zhuoyi Wang is Professor of East Asian Languages and Literatures at Hamilton College, the author of Revolutionary Cycles in Chinese Cinema, 1951-1979 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), the co-editor of Maoist Laughter (Hong Kong University Press, 2019, awarded 2020 Choice’s Outstanding Academic Title), and the co-editor of Teaching Film from the People’s Republic of China (the Modern Language Association, forthcoming). He has published in about a dozen English-language and Chinese-language journals and edited volumes. He has given over 100 invited talks and lectures on Chinese-language and Hollywood cinemas for institutions and organizations in the US, mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.

Registration

This event will take place on Zoom and is open to the public, however registration is required. Click here to register.

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Chair: Dr Xiaoning Lu, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, SOAS University of London.

Organiser: SOAS China Institute

Contact email: sci@soas.ac.uk