magazinelogo

The Educational Review, USA

ISSN Online: 2575-7946 Downloads: 527085 Total View: 5337883
Frequency: monthly ISSN Print: 2575-7938 CODEN: TERUBB
Email: edu@hillpublisher.com
Article Open Access http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/er.2025.01.016

Is There Such a Thing in the Chinese and Western Documentary Film?

Le Cao

Institute of Education, Culture and Media, Meishan Branch of Sichuan Academy of Social Sciences, Meishan 620010, Sichuan, China.

*Corresponding author: Le Cao

Published: February 21,2025

Abstract

This article explores the ongoing debate surrounding documentary film's relationship with reality, focusing on the concepts of implicit realism and subjectivism. It examines the origins of documentary realism, contrasting Western direct cinema with Chinese Jishi-ism. The article argues that while documentary film inherently strives for realism, theorists have approached it from various epistemological and ontological angles. The debate over the subjectivity and objectivity of documentaries, whether documentaries are an objective presentation of truth or the subjective expression of personality. Such an assumption, which we now believe to be philosophically untenable. In fact, the reception of the films was in general less conditioned by these filmmakers’ rhetoric than by these powerful, if unstated, culturally implicit claims of objectivity. It highlights the shift from socialist realism to phenomenological realism in Chinese documentaries and the influence of postmodern-pragmatist perspectives that question the objectivity of documentaries. The article concludes that the question of convergence between representation and reality remains central to documentary film.

References

Aitken, I. (2013). Encyclopedia of the Documentary Film 3-Volume Set. Routledge.

Bunge, M. (1993). Realism and Antirealism in Social Science. Theory and Decision, 35, 207-235. doi:10.1007/BF01075199.

Cao, L. (2023). When Documentaries Meet New Media: Interactive Documentary Projects in China and the West. Springer Nature.

CCTV Research Office. (1994). Definition of Chinese TV Special Programs. TV Research, 21.

Husserl, E. (1950). Cartesianische Meditationen. In Gesammelte Werke (Husserliana) (pp. 68). Den Haag.

McGrath, J. (2023). Chinese Film: Realism and Convention from the Silent Era to the Digital Age. U of Minnesota Press.

Nichols, B. (1976). Documentary Theory and Practice. Screen, 17, 34-48. doi:10.1093/screen/17.4.34.

Nichols, B. (2017). Introduction to Documentary. Indiana University Press.

Qamar, A., Irtaza, S., & Raza, S. Y. (2024). Islamophobia in Hollywood Movies: Comparative Analysis of Pre- and Post-9/11 Movies. Journal of Development and Social Sciences, 5, 529-537. doi:10.47205/jdss.2024(5-I)48.

Qian, Y. (2024). Revolutionary Becomings: Documentary Media in Twentieth-Century China. Columbia University Press.

Rosenthal, A. (1972). The New Documentary in Action: A Casebook in Film Making. University of California Press.

Shan, W. (2005). Chinese Documentary Film History/One Hundred Years of Chinese Film Studies. Beijing: China Film Press.

Wang, Y., Wang, H., & Feng, D. (2023). Aesthetics, Technology, and Social Harmony: Constructing a “Green China” Image through Eco-Documentaries. Environmental Communication, 17, 671-687. doi:10.1080/17524032.2023.2237204.

Winston, B. (2008). Winston, Brian. Claiming the Real Ii: Documentary: Grierson and Beyond. BFI.

Xia, Z., Chen, Z., & Chao, F. (2009). Cihai. Shanghai: Shanghai Lexicographical Publishing House.

Yang, T. (1995). Traditional Realism and Documentaryism Are Incommensurable - Comparison between Traditional Realism and Documentary Ideology. Modern Communication-Journal of Communication University of China, 1.

How to cite this paper

Is There Such a Thing in the Chinese and Western Documentary Film?

How to cite this paper: Le Cao. (2025). Is There Such a Thing in the Chinese and Western Documentary Film? The Educational Review, USA9(1), 112-116.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/er.2025.01.016