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An Annotated Bibliography For Chinese Film Studies

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Since the majority of the 2500 listings are Chinese publications, they are recorded in Chinese characters in the nine named sections, plus a tenth headed "Others" which includes miscellaneous material on film ads, copyrights, posters, and songs, among several other topic areas. Nonetheless, Cheng makes the voluminous bibliography as useful as possible for English readers while remaining faithful to the original Chinese names for the entries. Besides the Chinese characters, the Chinese titles are romanized, i. e., written as they would be spoken in Chinese by Westerners. Also, a closing "note" with nearly every one of the Chinese entries denotes the general contents of the publication. English, European, and other Asian publications make up a small percentage of the listings. The nine main sections are Reference Materials, Film History, Specific Film Genres, Film Reviews, Film Theory and Technique, Interdisciplinary Studies, Screenplays and Scripts, Film Technology, and lastly Film Directors, Producers, Actors, Actresses, Cinematographers, Critics, and Screenplay Writers. With each entry in these all-encompassing categories are "entry number, author, title, publication, ISBN, series title note, and language code." The three indexes of subject, author, and title are also helpful to English-speaking students of Chinese film. This first volume of Cheng's ambitious, timely reference "covers materials--including monographs, conference proceedings, and theses--that relate to film studies in and about mainland China published between 1920-2003." A forthcoming second volume will record materials relating to Hong Kong and Taiwan. Like Indian films, Chinese films are attracting considerable critical and audience interest in the U. S. This reference is an incomparable guide to the history and breadth of Chinese film studies, Chinese film production, and Chinese actors and filmmakers.