The Film Making Combination - Essay Example

The Analysis of Film Making Combination of Local Asian Themes and Hollywood Production Name: Institution: Date: Course: The Analysis of Film Making Combination of Local Asian Themes and Hollywood Production Introduction In the recent past, there is more combination of local Asian themes like storytelling and martial artistic and Hollywood-style’s filmmaking style of displaying themes of individualism and pleasure. Increased literacy in Asian countries on how to access Western (Hollywood) filming style helps in regaining competency in media industry because of current low demand in the Asian traditional and cultural mode of filming today. There is an exchange of cultures between Hollywood-style production and Asian local themes in movies that leads to attracting more audience because of improved quality of films. Research and critical analysis of the combination have some implications socially, economically, psychologically and geographically. Using films from China and India as examples in showing the advantages and disadvantages of the East and west film making style combination, there is need to analyze critically the mix so that the whole process turns out of mutual benefit to both sides. Some of the advantages include economic growth, talent development and regaining of Asian filming business. On the other hand, some of the disadvantages to emanate from the combination of Asian local themes and Hollywood-style production includes distortion of cultural values, cultural imperialism, stereotyping of the Asian people and conflicts between the West and East Culture. This paper analyses the advantages and disadvantages of combining local Asian themes and Hollywood-style production during film making using examples of films from India and China. Analysis of the advantages The combination of local Asian themes and Hollywood-style production has led to an advantage of raising the failing film industry in Asia. According to Fung (2013), the consumers demand in film entertainment shifted from the Asian traditional themes of dance and storytelling in late 19th century to themes characterized with the Western culture like addressing of sexual issues publicly and western dress codes. The combination, as a result, led to saving the failing movie entertainment in Asia. Most of the Asian actors began to adopt the Western traits to act as prostitutes, husband swappers, adulterous and playboys as a way of attracting more audience. Refusal to mix the East and West cultures in movie production meant failure in the growth of entertainment industry and domination of Western culture in Asia as some of consumers had changed lifestyles coping with European lifestyle by early 20th century. The cultural gap had broken out of the interaction between the Asians and Europeans in Academics, business and politics hence no need to dominate in of narrowing down to Asian cultures in film entertainment. Since Asians had stated to cope up with the Western culture, they demanded films capturing European lifestyle (Shah, 2013). The combination of West and East cultures in film production styles helped in meeting the needs of clients thus saving entertainment business in Asia from collapse. The combination of Local Asian themes and Hollywood-style filmmaking led to more clients demanding for Asian produced movies in the market places. For instance, in 2003 the film entitled Jism raised the client demand in Indian film production by 35%, which was the turning point for the film entertainment industry in India. Jism featured an unapologetic woman who persuaded the lover to kill her wealthy husband using her sexuality. The film had demand and was sold globally hence elevating the film industry in Asia. The film high demand showed that the mindset of Indians had changed to viewing of immoral scenes in a full house set up. The report by Mahesh Bhatt who is the leading filmmaker in India stated that, “The success of Jism showed that Indians are no longer ashamed of watching steamy scenarios, which will help in the expansion of dying media entertainment” (Donovan, 2009). The high selling of Jism film in India led to a shift in the production of movies in Asian whereby majority of films end up having a mix of Western and Asian cultures. Hollywood has taken the advantage of Asians acceptance in watching the Western culture movies expand its media entertainment business in the continent. When critically analyzed, it is evident that the Western countries are investing much in Hollywood as a way of causing cultural imperialism in Asian countries. Another film that led to the growth in the deteriorating film industry in Asia by using Hollywood-style production and local Asian theme mix was Downtown Torpedoes. The movie, (Downtown Torpedoes) from China boosted the entertainment industry in Asia. It aired a group of advanced Tactical Mercenaries (ATM’s) performing high-risk industrial thefts. The high selling of the movie showed a shift in the way the Chinese opted for spy hi-jinks scenario than the use of love and marriage stories. The mix of Hollywood and the Chinese Culture theme exposition in Downtown Torpedoes increased the demand of the movie because the Chinese freely could watch prostitution, theft and promiscuity scenes publicly. Moran (2010) argued that, the combination was one way of saving the deteriorating media entertainment industry in China. The Asians had changed from their ways of living to cope up with the Western lifestyles. They opted for movies that had scenarios of the Western way of living combined with their traditional local Asian movies styles. If the movie producers had not appreciated the mix of Hollywood production style and the local Asian theme in filmmaking, media industry in Asia would have continued to deteriorate leaving Hollywood under Monopoly. Some of the Asian film production Companies still exist because of the combination. Mixing of the Asian cinematic techniques and those of Hollywood has an accompaniment of financial benefit to actors, government and film producing Companies. The combination has led to high demand of movies globally and locally leading to more profits in the industry. According to Lee (2009), the most popular movies in the World today such as Titanic fetch a lot of money in the field of media entertainment thus attracting more investment in the business. Hollywood has benefited economically from the combination to almost doubling the returns. Before the combination, the business for Hollywood was restricted to Countries oriented with Western cultures. The rising demand of a combined cinema styles in Asia opened more avenues for Hollywood in attaining the globalization goal. Hollywood has borrowed the use of martial arts acting in scenes from Bollywood as a way attracting more Asian customer to increase economic returns from film production industry. Though the mix claims to offer financial benefit to the Asian countries through paying of revenue, much of profits ends up channeled to European nations. In other words, the Asian countries sell its culture to Hollywood at cheap revenues (Shimizu, 2012). In balancing the advantage of economic growth from the combination, it is ideal to come up with ways of balancing the benefits between the two sides. Despite the mixing of the cultures from European and Asian countries, there in an imbalance in the economic gain between the two sides. Financial benefit as an advantage is eminent to whereby the role-plays in the movies under the combination of the local Asian themes and Hollywood –style production turn out excellence. Most of the characters from Asia have ended up becoming global superstars and attained better avenues for financial benefits. For example, after mixing cinematic styles in the Hindi film entitled Julie, the main character called Neha Dhupia (queen of beauty) ended up known at global level. She won various World concerts as the best actor that led to great financial development in her life. The critical analysis of financial benefit of actors has some imbalance between the film producers and the characters. The amount of money that actors fetches for movies producing companies does not match up the money paid. This is the reason why most of the actors stop to act under a company and start their own film production Companies (Lee, 2009). Actors are the ones that lead to profit returns to any film producing organization, which calls for a better financial appreciation to characters. There is also financial gain from the combination of Hollywood-style and local Asian themes to producing companies through the increased quality in movies themes exposition. Lee (2014) demonstrated that he cultures from the two sides ends up represented in the film leading to meeting the entertainment needs of both the White and the Asian-oriented cultures. Since the industry is promising to fetch financial gains, there is an escalation of competition in the field of media entertainment. To attain competence in reaching out to a wider coverage of consumers, it requires a lot of financial investment on business. Using a lot of money in improving the quality of filming can negatively affect the business leading to collapse of small film producing Companies. Furthermore, the critical analysis of the financial gains from the movie entertainment by combining the Hollywood and local Asian theme cinematic techniques can end up affected by piracy. Upcoming film producers in Asia gear toward garnering financial gain from the upcoming profitable movie industry, their efforts end up frustrated because of piracy. Bordwell (2009) argued that it was ideal for governments to implement policies to govern film production in curbing movie piracy to ensure financial gain to producers and actors. In China, there is a high rate of movie DVD piracy by the use of internet to download the movies directly from the producers’ website without an authentication causing low financial benefit to producers and actors. For instance, the movies like hard boiled, bullet in the head and the killer produced by Sam Machismo have undergone financial losses in the recent past because of high-movies’ DVD piracy in China. Analysis of the disadvantages The combination of the cinematic style involving both the Hollywood-style production and the local Asian themes has a disadvantage of Asian culture distortion. The industry of filmmaking ends up used by superior cultures to do dominate the inferior ones out of cultural imperialism. Mixing the cultures of the West and East in films is the cause for the deteriorating of the Asian culture in matters dealing with traditional family setups, marriage, traditional ceremonies and the way of worship. After watching of movies that portray the Western culture, the Asians end up adopting European lifestyles of dressing, marriage and capitalism (Donovan, 2010). A critical analysis of the changing trend in Asian lifestyles to adoption of foreign cultures is out of the movie influence. More cases of divorce, individualism and domestic violence in Asian countries today is out of the influence from the Western culture because of western culture oriented movies watched. For instance, the release of the Indian Khwaish (desire) film in 2003 led to a reduction in upholding of traditional values and cultures in India. After watching the movies, some of the Indian young people began to kiss publicly as their counterparts in the Western culture. Addressing sexual matter publicly turnout prohibited by the Indian values, cultures and beliefs while marriage procedures have restricted tradition protocols. A critical evaluation of the Indian lifestyles shows that most of their traditions end up not observed because the Western culture influence from watching movies with a combination of Hollywood-style production and local Asian themes. Feng (2012) demonstrated that European countries use the high demand of combined cinematic styles in filmmaking to stereotype Asians as a way of encouraging them to adopt Western culture. Some of the Asians consider their lifestyles outdated from the stereotypes about them watched in films. In most of the combined films in featuring the two cultures, the Asians ends up stereotyped as out fashioned and religious bound. The stereotypes have led to most of the Asian traditions, values and traditions dropped by Asian young people. The combination has led to depriving of the Asia its movie superstars out of high competence of Hollywood against other film producing Companies. Asian movie producers have been having best film actors such as Jackie Chan, Chow Yu-fat and Jet Li, but they have ended up ‘poached’ by Hollywood out of high payments and appreciations. The mix of filming styles of both East and West cinematic might be an avenue for Hollywood’s globalization agenda beginning with Asian continent (Miller, 2009). .Hollywood is on the watch out in hiring of Asian superstars coupled with shooting videos from Chinese locations with the aim of attracting more Audience from Asia. The trend of Hollywood of using Chinese actors, shooting from Asian strategic locations such as on the islands of Japan and establishment of video producing studios across Asia is a way of carrying out localization of movie industry in Asia. With time, local film producers such as Bollywood in India might collapse out of less competence in media entertainment industry. Hollywood is able to invest as much as $ 200 million in the production of a single film. The level of investment is very high for the local Asian movie producing Companies to cope up with as a situation that can lead to their collapse and rendering Hollywood under the enjoyment of domination in filmmaking industry in Asia. Domination of Hollywood in Asia means more stereotyping of the Asian Cultures and hence cartelizing of Western culture in the region. Chung (2010) stated that, the mix might end up meant for Cultural imperialism in Asia through filming from Asian setups, borrowing of Asian actors and use of martial artistic scenes with the aim of attracting Asians to the Western culture by aping the local Asian filming style. It is of a disadvantage to the Asians because their culture might end up done away with as they adopt the Western culture after watching films that portray European lifestyle as pleasing than theirs. As Western countries seek towards attaining superpower, domination in cultures is one of the ways of attaining superiority. The dominating Western culture in Asia in the recent past out of movie influences is one way of America and other European nations getting dominance in Asian The quest towards Hollywood globalization from the combination of the filming techniques using both the East and West cinematic style is of great disadvantages to other small movie producing Companies. Hollywood tries to capture a wider coverage of consumers by increasing competence through offering high-quality services to customers. Austin and Barker (2013) illustrated that, the rate at which Hollywood extends its ventures in the film industry is hard for Asian local Companies like the Indian Bollywood to compete. The mix of expressing the themes of love using the locations of Asia has led to more demand for media entertainment in the world. In early 19th Century, the market coverage for Hollywood was the least in Asia a case that was a barrier to attaining globalization. Since the adoption of a combined filmmaking of both the local Asian theme and Hollywood-style of movie production, the rate of globalization for Hollywood has increased by 41% while the growing rate for Bollywood has reduced by 18% (Tosaka, 2013). There are arguments that the combination is only effective to benefit both the West and East film industry if the factors of competition are equal. Hollywood is thus turning out profitable at the expense of Asian’s local cinema styles. Some of Asian video producing Companies instead of losing the business they have opted to join the Hollywood a situation that causes financial benefits to European nations while Asian actors and producers end up getting losses. For instance, Dr. Mira Nira, an Indian film producer decided to join Hollywood in 2001 after his film entitled Monsoon Wedding lost because of stiff competition from Hollywood. The combination of the local Asian themes and Hollywood-style in film production is of a disadvantage out of unbalancing of benefits from the film industry. The future of filmmaking is kind of favoring one side of the combination than the other. Hollywood benefits from the combination than its counterparts in Asia because of its high competence. Prominent film directors from Asian like Ringo Lam, Kirk Wong, and Tsui Hark and best martial actors like Corey Yuen and Yuen Wo Ping end up hired by Hollywood hence increasing the movie quality. Asian movie producing organizations have low chances for competence in the future by their low movie qualities. The use of Asian movie superstars and artistic in Hollywood is a way of bringing the industry of movie production under one organization in the region. In 2004, the Indian film superstar (Aishwarya Rai) acted for Hollywood in a film entitled Bride and prejudice and fetched almost $ 500 million dollars for Hollywood (Donovan, 2010). The Asian origin of the Rai attracted customers from Asia to purchase the film while the expression of love to her boyfriend attracted consumers from Europe. Hollywood uses the combination properly by investing a lot in a single movie to produce the best that fetches many returns from both sides. The Asian countries are at risk of losing taxes from locally producers of films because of the expansion of Hollywood video in Asia because of the combination. Asian countries invested much in media entertainment in 1970’s and in less than a century the efforts might end up into losses out of the Hollywood utilization of Asian cinematic styles established by the Asian government. The outcome of Hollywood’s movies is of high quality because if its ability to borrow Asian actors, martial autistics and venues than its counterparts in Asia. Moran (2010) argued that the quality of Hollywood movies turns out as best than the Asian local movie producing organization in because of the former’s affordability of the in dealing with issues such as piracy, actors’ appreciation and political differences. Conclusion The film making industry in Asia today has ended up adopting the commercial success technique of Hollywood characterized by displaying themes of action, individualism and sex with the aim of regaining economic success in film producing field. On the other hand, Hollywood mixes its filming production styles with the local Asian themes of storytelling, martial artistic and hiring of Asian actors superstars to increase its market coverage in Asia. The competence of Hollywood is high in comparison with the Asian local film producing Companies such as Bollywood in Indian leading to benefits imbalance from the two sides of the combination. The local Asian film producing companies looses while Hollywood expands its ventures in Asian rapidly to attaining its globalization goals. 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