Bridging the Divide through The Great Wall:
Deconstructing The Great Wall (the movie)
through the Industrialization of Culture
Framework in the age of Globalization
[email protected]
du
Prof. Shu-Ling Chen Berggreen and Colin Ackerman
colin.ackerman@colorado.
University of Colorado, Boulder
edu
Introduction
Globalization has changed the creation and
production process of cultural products.
The recent release of The Great Wall, a coproduction between Hollywood and the
Chinese film industry, is a telling example
of how both sides of the Pacific are trying
to profit from, through, and with each other.
However, the task of navigating the
complexities of cultural, political, social,
and media system differences could be
extremely challenging.
Through the application of the
industrialization of culture framework
(Havens & Lots, 2012) and the case study of
the movie, this project analyzes the
delicate, interdependent relationship
between Hollywood and China’s booming
film industry.
Social trends, tastes
& traditions, and
mandate
• Social trends, tastes and traditions
provide potential social and cultural
resources for creating media texts. With
the co-production between Hollywood
and China, the movie is destined to be a
cultural mesh-up.
• Mandate is the utmost goal of a given
media industry. Both Hollywood and the
Chinese film industry operate under a
common commercial mandate (though
the Chinese film industry also has
certain degree of ideological mandate).
Market access (to China) and global
reach (through Hollywood) have
necessitated a Hollywood+China
marriage.
Conditions
The Industrialization
of Culture Framework
Understanding Media
Industries (Havens & Lots,
20120)
The Great Wall
• Technology availabilities, regulation
restrictions, economic considerations
and many other factors function
together as conditions that affect how
media industries operate and what texts
are produced.
• Since China entered WTO, global reach
has become one of its ambitions. Digital
and new technologies have
revolutionized infrastructure of global
production. Hollywood becomes a
natural springboard for China’s global
reach. The economic reality of China’s
1.3 billion people & its quota regulation
of 34 foreign films/year compel
Hollywood to enter co-production
agreement.
Practices and Texts
• Through the influences of social trends,
tastes & traditions, mandate and
conditions, day-to-day operation of
media industries evolves, which
inevitably dictates the texts they
produce.
• With that understanding and as China
steps further onto the stage of global
cinema, the resurgence of the Chinese
martial arts genre is not wholly
unexpected. The genre’s global
popularity was thoroughly tested in the
era Bruce Lee and most recently through
releases such as Crouching Tiger,
Hidden Dragon, and Hero. The Great
Wall would seem to be a natural media
product of the Hollywood-China coproduction.
• Set in northern China around 1100A.D.,
the movie tells a legend (unknown to
Chinese folklore and legend): Every 60
years, mythological creatures called the
Tao Tei emerge to devour humans.
Damon, a swaggering mercenary, joins
the guardians of the Great Wall to defeat
the Tao Tei. The story probably could be
told in a few minutes. But the digital
wizardry allows many eye-popping
images which stretch the movie to its
length: 1 hour & 43 minutes.
• “The whole thing plays out as if it had
been thought up by someone who, while
watching ‘Game of Thrones’ and
smoking a bowl, started riffing on walls,
China and production money” (New York
Times).
• Production cost: US$150 million (with a
similar amount for promotion). Earning:
US$45 million (N. America), US$286
million (outside N. America) & Global
total: US$331million.
• Directed by Zhang Yimou and scripted
by Tony Gilroy, Doug Miro, and Carlo
Bernard
• “If ever a film was made with more
money than sense, this is it.” (Los
Angeles Times).
• “… A crumbling disappointment, if not a
disaster…These are more cause for
complaint than the ‘whitewashing’
Damon’s casting supposedly
represents.” (Empire)
Reflecting on the
Industrialization of
Culture Framework
• The movie probably would have been
different had Hollywood pondered over
the meanings of the current Chinese
Martial Arts cinema. The genre is more
than super heroes and their spectacular
actions wrapped up in stunning
production techniques. This genre is
also a collective phenomenon resulting
from China’s cultural policy change. The
genre represents a collection of inbetweens: nationalism,
transnationalism, tradition, modernity,
national and global identities. This
phenomenon is embedded in every level
of the framework, but it didn’t seem to
be thoughtfully examined before any
action.
• Equally, China also needs to consider
the culture framework of Hollywood
before blindly believes in its formula as
a guarantee for global reach and
success.
• The movie displays a bold structural
step (co-production), yet a timid textual
strategy (the lack of cultural
understanding of the industrialization
framework from both sides) toward the
goal of global domination. The
disappointing box office record perhaps
is one indication of this dissonance
between the giant step and the coy
strategy.
• It raises the question of whether the
institutions and structures of the global
media industries have hurried aboard
the global bandwagon without the
necessary textual strategies to truly
bridge the cultural and social divides in
order to make global media a reality.