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The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games
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Special Issue "The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games"

A special issue of Arts (ISSN 2076-0752). This special issue belongs to the section "New Media".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 August 2020) | Viewed by 78622

Printed Edition Available!
A printed edition of this Special Issue is available here.

Special Issue Editor

Mr. Christian Thomas

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Center for Digital Games Research, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
Interests: fantasy film; horror film; narrative-driven video games; video games for learning; adaptation studies; screenwriting; video game narrative design

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We live in a world of adaptation, and a failure to study that world means we must ignore an increasingly important part of contemporary culture.

—Dennis Cutchins

Studying the transformative journey of content from one genre or medium to another is of great interest to academics in several disciplines, to members of the public who are avid consumers of media, and also to practitioners of adaptation—and we are all practitioners, whether we are delivering a message by email that was originally intended to be spoken, or adapting a graphic novel into a television series like HBO’s Watchmen. But what exactly is adaptation, and what constitutes an original work? Scholars within the relatively new, interdisciplinary field of adaptation studies often cite persistent ideas from the Romantic era as driving current notions of what it means to be original, but should those ideas still dominate today? Or should we allow ourselves to be convinced—as Linda Hutcheon writes that she is in “On the Art of Adaptation”—that TS Eliot and Northrop Frye were correct in suggesting that “all art is derived from other art”?

Although questions such as these may seem somewhat abstruse, other questions remain concretely present whenever adaptation is involved. For example, when we see a beloved film remade, we are conditioned to immediately ask if it is faithful to the original. And in the case of content that is transferred from one medium to another—such as when the 1979 film Alien was loosely adapted into the 2014 video game Alien: Isolation—an exciting new layer of complexity emerges: we must now ask profound questions about the differences between, and the true potentials of the mediums involved in order to understand the adaptation process in a meaningful way.

How we answer these questions can help us to understand the mediums through which we create, communicate, and learn. It can help us to understand ourselves, and the culture of adaptation in which we live.

Christian Thomas
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Arts is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • adaptation studies
  • adaptation
  • film
  • media
  • film and media studies
  • video games
  • rhetoric
  • story
  • narrative video games
  • genre awareness
  • pedagogy and video games
  • pedagogy and film
  • environmental storytelling
  • digital games
  • new media
  • art direction
  • localization
  • Japanese video games
  • Chilean cinema
  • virtual worlds
  • postcolonialism
  • Star Wars films and video games
  • telltale games
  • horror video games

Published Papers (16 papers)

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Editorial

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Editorial
Introduction: The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games
by
Christian Thomas
Arts 2022, 11(4), 71; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts11040071 - 11 Jul 2022
Viewed by 2245
Abstract
We live in a world of adaptation, and a failure to study that world means we must ignore an increasingly important part of contemporary culture [...] Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Editorial
Interview: Acclaimed Game Designer Ryan Kaufman Discusses Telltale Games, Star Wars, Harry Potter, and How Video Games Can Transform Us
by
Christian Thomas
Arts 2021, 10(3), 46; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts10030046 - 08 Jul 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2321
Abstract
Ryan Kaufman—whose rich body of work often centers on video games adapted from movies or TV shows—has had a profound impact on video game designers, writers, and players alike [...] Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)

Research

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Article
What Is a Videogame Movie?
by
Mike Sell
Arts 2021, 10(2), 24; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts10020024 - 12 Apr 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 4848
Abstract
Cinematic adaptations of videogames are an increasingly common feature of film culture, and the adaptive relationship between these mediums is an increasingly common subject of film and videogame studies. However, our ability to historicize and theorize that relationship is hampered by a failure [...] Read more.
Cinematic adaptations of videogames are an increasingly common feature of film culture, and the adaptive relationship between these mediums is an increasingly common subject of film and videogame studies. However, our ability to historicize and theorize that relationship is hampered by a failure to fully define the generic character of our object of study. This essay asks, what is a videogame movie? It argues that film scholars (1) have not considered the full range of ways videogames have been represented in film; (2) have not attended fully to the historical, technological, figurative, and social dimensions of videogames; and therefore (3) have limited the set of possible texts that comprise the genre “videogame cinema.” The essay recommends a tropological approach to the problem, defining six tropes that comprise the “videogame movie” as a genre, and applying them to two films, Her and 1917, neither of them a direct adaptation of a videogame, the latter not “about” or referencing videogames in any way, yet both exemplary of a broadened concept of “videogame cinema”. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Writing for Emotional Impact in Film and Video Games: Lessons in Character Development, Realism, and Interactivity from the Alien Media Franchise
by
Christian Thomas
Arts 2021, 10(2), 20; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts10020020 - 24 Mar 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 4356
Abstract
This article compares Ridley Scott’s film Alien (1979) with Creative Assembly’s video game Alien: Isolation (2014), which is based on Scott’s film. Guidance for academics who teach creative writing—as well as for working screenwriters and video game narrative designers—emerges in the comparison, particularly [...] Read more.
This article compares Ridley Scott’s film Alien (1979) with Creative Assembly’s video game Alien: Isolation (2014), which is based on Scott’s film. Guidance for academics who teach creative writing—as well as for working screenwriters and video game narrative designers—emerges in the comparison, particularly with regard to the importance of developing strong yet vulnerable main characters who put themselves in danger in order to protect other characters with whom they have meaningful relationships. Examples from other media, including Ira Levin’s Rosemary’s Baby (1967), James Cameron’s Aliens (1986), Telltale Games’ The Walking Dead (2012), and Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us (2013), are also discussed as they relate to larger principles involved in crafting sympathetic characters, realistic settings, and compelling gameplay for media within the horror and sci-fi genres. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Impossible Origins: Trauma Narrative and Cinematic Adaptation
by
Linda Belau
Arts 2021, 10(1), 15; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts10010015 - 22 Feb 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2111
Abstract
In this essay, I explore the cinematic adaptation and the representation of trauma, while I further consider the role and significance of the notion of the origin in both trauma and in cinematic adaptation. Through an initial consideration of the relationship between the [...] Read more.
In this essay, I explore the cinematic adaptation and the representation of trauma, while I further consider the role and significance of the notion of the origin in both trauma and in cinematic adaptation. Through an initial consideration of the relationship between the theory of the impossible origin, particularly as it is articulated by Walter Benjamin, the essay goes on to analyze the significance and role of an impossible origin in the elemental form of adaptation. To this end, the essay considers the movement of adaptation from an autobiographical trauma memoir to a feature film, considering the success or failure of adaptation in situations where the original literary work concerns an experience of extremity. As I consider the vicissitudes of trauma and its grounding in a repetitious structure that leaves the survivor suspended in a kind of missed experience (or missed origin), I further explore how this missing origin (or original text in the case of adaptation) can be represented at all. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Found in Translation: Evolving Approaches for the Localization of Japanese Video Games
by
Carme Mangiron
Arts 2021, 10(1), 9; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts10010009 - 26 Jan 2021
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 6864
Abstract
Japanese video games have entertained players around the world and played an important role in the video game industry since its origins. In order to export Japanese games overseas, they need to be localized, i.e., they need to be technically, linguistically, and culturally [...] Read more.
Japanese video games have entertained players around the world and played an important role in the video game industry since its origins. In order to export Japanese games overseas, they need to be localized, i.e., they need to be technically, linguistically, and culturally adapted for the territories where they will be sold. This article hopes to shed light onto the current localization practices for Japanese games, their reception in North America, and how users’ feedback can contribute to fine-tuning localization strategies. After briefly defining what game localization entails, an overview of the localization practices followed by Japanese developers and publishers is provided. Next, the paper presents three brief case studies of the strategies applied to the localization into English of three renowned Japanese video game sagas set in Japan: Persona (1996–present), Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (2005–present), and Yakuza (2005–present). The objective of the paper is to analyze how localization practices for these series have evolved over time by looking at industry perspectives on localization, as well as the target market expectations, in order to examine how the dialogue between industry and consumers occurs. Special attention is given to how players’ feedback impacted on localization practices. A descriptive, participant-oriented, and documentary approach was used to collect information from specialized websites, blogs, and forums regarding localization strategies and the reception of the localized English versions. The analysis indicates that localization strategies for Japanese games have evolved over time from a higher to a lower degree of cultural adaptation in order to meet target markets’ expectations. However, it was also noted that despite the increasing tendency to preserve the sociocultural content of the original, the language used in the translations needs to be vivid and idiomatic in order to reach a wider audience and provide an enjoyable gameplay experience. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
The Force Is Strong with This One (but Not That One): What Makes a Successful Star Wars Video Game Adaptation?
by
Matthew Barr
Arts 2020, 9(4), 131; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040131 - 16 Dec 2020
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 4714
Abstract
The Star Wars films have probably spawned more video game adaptations than any other franchise. From the 1982 release of The Empire Strikes Back on the Atari 2600 to 2019’s Jedi: Fallen Order, around one hundred officially licensed Star Wars games have [...] Read more.
The Star Wars films have probably spawned more video game adaptations than any other franchise. From the 1982 release of The Empire Strikes Back on the Atari 2600 to 2019’s Jedi: Fallen Order, around one hundred officially licensed Star Wars games have been published to date. Inevitably, the quality of these adaptations has varied, ranging from timeless classics such as Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, to such lamentable cash grabs as the Attack of the Clones movie tie-in. But what makes certain ludic adaptations of George Lucas’ space opera more successful than others? To answer this question, the critical response to some of the best-reviewed Star Wars games is analysed here, revealing a number of potential factors to consider, including the audio-visual quality of the games, the attendant story, and aspects of the gameplay. The tension between what constitutes a good game and what makes for a good Star Wars adaptation is also discussed. It is concluded that, while many well-received adaptations share certain characteristics—such as John Williams’ iconic score, a high degree of visual fidelity, and certain mythic story elements—the very best Star Wars games are those which advance the state of the art in video games, while simultaneously evoking something of Lucas’ cinematic saga. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Tale(s) of a Forest—Re-Creation of a Primeval Forest in Three Environmental Narratives
by
Kaisa Hiltunen
,
Heidi Björklund
,
Aino Nurmesjärvi
,
Jenna Purhonen
,
Minna Rainio
,
Nina Sääskilahti
and
Antti Vallius
Arts 2020, 9(4), 125; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040125 - 01 Dec 2020
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 3328
Abstract
We analyze three environmentally conscious works that are concerned with the state of Finnish forests: the documentary film Metsän tarina/Tale of a Forest (2012), the book with the same name (2013) and the series of short documentaries Tarinoita metsästä/Tales [...] Read more.
We analyze three environmentally conscious works that are concerned with the state of Finnish forests: the documentary film Metsän tarina/Tale of a Forest (2012), the book with the same name (2013) and the series of short documentaries Tarinoita metsästä/Tales from the Forest (2013). By combining methods from arts research and ecology, we ask how the narratives adapt material from nature photography. The film and book present mythic stories and old Finnish beliefs about forests. They also contain references to cultural memory. Additionally, the biodiversity on display reflects a conventional practice to exhibit large or charismatic species. However, the ecological message remains only implicit, expressed through aesthetic choices rather than information about natural processes. Overall, we suggest that adaptation in these narratives can be understood as an artistic process of recycling and referencing and as a way to reconnect with cultural memory and nature. As such, it can enhance relationships with nature and awareness of conservation needs. However, we ask whether the past-oriented strategy is a politically effective way to activate a connection with nature in modern Finland, where discussions about environmental problems are closely connected to heated debates about forestry. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
‘The Time Is out of Joint’: Interactivity and Player Agency in Videogame Adaptations of Hamlet
by
Julian Novitz
Arts 2020, 9(4), 122; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040122 - 29 Nov 2020
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2971
Abstract
Although Shakespeare and his plays have been a frequent subject of videogame adaptations in the past, these have often been confined to either theatre-making games (which present the staging of Shakespeare plays using the mechanisms of strategy or simulation videogame genres) of education/trivia [...] Read more.
Although Shakespeare and his plays have been a frequent subject of videogame adaptations in the past, these have often been confined to either theatre-making games (which present the staging of Shakespeare plays using the mechanisms of strategy or simulation videogame genres) of education/trivia games that aim to familiarise players with Shakespeare’s texts. While references to Shakespeare abound in videogames, there have been relatively few attempts to directly adapt one of his plays into the form of an interactive videogame narrative, where the player controls one or more of the principal characters and can affect the outcome of the story. This paper will examine four videogame adaptations of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, whose differing approaches to player-agency and interactivity in relation to narrative of the classic play demonstrate the interactive potential of Shakespearean drama. While the player-driven overwriting or rewriting of the classic text may appear irreverent, it is, in each game, dependent on some conception the original play and the past tradition that it represents, which is translated into the contemporary medium of the videogame. This illustrates Jacques Derrida’s contention that the longevity and translatability of Shakespearean texts are due to their ‘spectral’ qualities, in that they allow the past to be re-examined through the lens of the present and vice versa. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Empathy and Community in the Age of Refugees: Petzold’s Radical Translation of Seghers’ Transit
by
Margarete J. Landwehr
Arts 2020, 9(4), 118; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040118 - 19 Nov 2020
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2464
Abstract
Petzold’s film constitutes a radical translation of Seghers’ novel by transforming her tale of political refugees in Vichy France into an existential allegory depicting the fluidity of identities and relationships in a globalized world. The transitory existence of Petzold’s war refugee serves as [...] Read more.
Petzold’s film constitutes a radical translation of Seghers’ novel by transforming her tale of political refugees in Vichy France into an existential allegory depicting the fluidity of identities and relationships in a globalized world. The transitory existence of Petzold’s war refugee serves as an extreme example of the instability of modern life, which allows spectators to identify and empathize with migrants’ unpredictable journeys. Moreover, the director conveys the universality of his protagonist’s story by portraying him as an Everyman bereft of distinctive personality traits, by intermingling the past (Seghers’ plot) with the present (contemporary settings), and by situating his experiences in non-descript, liminal “non-places.” Both thematically and aesthetically, narrative is portrayed as establishing a community in an unstable contemporary world. Like the anti-hero of many modern Bildungsromane, Petzold’s protagonist fails to develop a stable identity and enduring friendships that anchor him in a community, but he creates his own family of listeners through his storytelling. In a similar vein, the film’s voice-over/narrator that bridges the fictional world with that of the audience underscores the film’s (and the novel’s) central theme: in a world of rapid change and mobility, the individual who may not be able to establish a stable identity or relationships, can create, as a narrator, a community of empathic listeners. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Readapting Pandemic Premediation and Propaganda: Soderbergh’s Contagion amid COVID-19
by
Kevin C. Moore
Arts 2020, 9(4), 112; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040112 - 03 Nov 2020
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 6074
Abstract
Steven Soderbergh’s pandemic thriller Contagion (2011) was trending strongly on streaming services in the US in the early days of COVID-19 restrictions, where the fiction took on an unforeseen afterlife amid a real pandemic. In this new context, many viewers and critics reported [...] Read more.
Steven Soderbergh’s pandemic thriller Contagion (2011) was trending strongly on streaming services in the US in the early days of COVID-19 restrictions, where the fiction took on an unforeseen afterlife amid a real pandemic. In this new context, many viewers and critics reported that the film seemed “uncanny,” if not prophetic. Frameworks such as Priscilla Wald’s notion of the “outbreak narrative,” as well Richard Grusin’s “premediation,” may help to theorize this affective experience on the part of viewers. Yet the film was also designed as a public health propaganda film to make people fear and better prepare for pandemics, and the present account works to recover this history. Although the film takes liberties with reality, in particular by proposing an unlikely vaccine-development narrative, Soderbergh and screenwriter Scott Z. Burns consulted prominent scientists and policymakers as they wrote the film, in particular Larry Brilliant and Ian Lipkin. These same scientists were consulted again in March 2020, when an effort spearheaded by Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public health reunited the star-studded cast of Contagion, who created at home a series of public health announcement videos that might be thought of as a kind of re-adaptation of the film for the COVID-19 era. These public service announcements touch on key aspects of pandemic experience premediated by the original film, such as social distancing and vaccine development. Yet their very production as “work-from-home” illustrates how the film neglected to address the status of work during a pandemic. Recovering this history via Contagion allows us to rethink the film as a cultural placeholder marking a shift from post-9/11 security politics to the pandemic moment. It also becomes possible to map the cultural meaning of the technologies and practices that have facilitated the pandemic, which shape a new social order dictated by the fears and desires of an emerging work-from-home class. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Remediating ‘Prufrock’
by
Scott Freer
Arts 2020, 9(4), 104; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040104 - 15 Oct 2020
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 3186
Abstract
This article examines remediated examples of T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ (1915). Eliot’s innovative dramatic monologue has sustained an enduring inter-media afterlife, mainly because visual artists generally capitalized on the poem’s residual Victorian painterly and semi-narrative qualities. Here I [...] Read more.
This article examines remediated examples of T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ (1915). Eliot’s innovative dramatic monologue has sustained an enduring inter-media afterlife, mainly because visual artists generally capitalized on the poem’s residual Victorian painterly and semi-narrative qualities. Here I look at a wider range of visual forms from old and new media that, for both pedagogic and artistic purposes, remediate the poem’s ekphrastic, semi-narrative and modernist aesthetics: the comic strip, the animated film, the dramatic monologue film, the split-screen video poem and the photographic spatial montage. Together, they demonstrate the dialogic and multi-directional nature of remediation and articulate via inter-media strategies various literary properties and themes (e.g., character, setting, visual motifs, paralysis) of ‘Prufrock’. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Film Adaptation as Experimental Game Design
by
Pippin Barr
Arts 2020, 9(4), 103; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040103 - 09 Oct 2020
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 3039
Abstract
Film adaptation is a popular approach to game design, but it prioritizes blockbuster films and conventional “game-like” qualities of those films, such as shooting, racing, or spatial exploration. This leads to adaptations that tend to use the aesthetics and narratives of films, but [...] Read more.
Film adaptation is a popular approach to game design, but it prioritizes blockbuster films and conventional “game-like” qualities of those films, such as shooting, racing, or spatial exploration. This leads to adaptations that tend to use the aesthetics and narratives of films, but which miss out on potential design explorations of more complex cinematic qualities. In this article, I propose an experimental game design method that prioritizes an unconventional selection of films alongside strict game design constraints to explore tensions and affinities between cinema and videogames. By applying this design method and documenting the process and results, I am able both to present an experimental set of videogame film adaptations, along with potentially generative design and development themes. In the end, the project serves as an illustration of the nature of adaptation itself: a series of pointed compromises between the source and the new work. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
A Real Witcher—Slavic or Universal; from a Book, a Game or a TV Series? In the Circle of Multimedia Adaptations of a Fantasy Series of Novels “The Witcher” by A. Sapkowski
by
Sławomir Gawroński
and
Kinga Bajorek
Arts 2020, 9(4), 102; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9040102 - 03 Oct 2020
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 6665
Abstract
A series of novels about a witcher, written by Andrzej Sapkowski almost thirty years ago, has now become an inspiration for the creation of mass productions of mainstream popular culture—film and multimedia adaptations for use in computer games. It is one of the [...] Read more.
A series of novels about a witcher, written by Andrzej Sapkowski almost thirty years ago, has now become an inspiration for the creation of mass productions of mainstream popular culture—film and multimedia adaptations for use in computer games. It is one of the few examples of global messages of mass culture being based on Polish creativity. The recognition of “The Witcher”, due to the Netflix production, soon contributed to building the national pride of Polish people, and at the same time sparked a discussion in Central and Eastern European countries on the consequences of the multimedia adaptation of Andrzej Sapkowski’s prose. Questions about the dissonance between the Slavic and universal dimensions of “The Witcher” in relation to the original novels and their adaptations are a part of the traditional discourse on the adaptability of literature and its consequences for the reception by the audience. This article tries to capture the specific character of the adaptations of Andrzej Sapkowski’s literature from the point of view of typology, known from the literature of the subject, as well as to answer the question about the consequences of the discrepancy between the original book and its adaptations in the form of a film, a TV series, and computer games. The considerations in the article were based on the literature analysis and the research based on the existing sources. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
From Patricide to Patrilineality: Adapting The Wandering Earth for the Big Screen
by
Ping Zhu
Arts 2020, 9(3), 94; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9030094 - 04 Sep 2020
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 4662
Abstract
This paper discusses how Liu Cixin’s 2000 novella “The Wandering Earth” was adapted into a family melodrama that ultimately reinforces the authority of the Father and the nation-state. It analyzes the complex mechanisms, such as mise en abyme and scapegoating, that serve to [...] Read more.
This paper discusses how Liu Cixin’s 2000 novella “The Wandering Earth” was adapted into a family melodrama that ultimately reinforces the authority of the Father and the nation-state. It analyzes the complex mechanisms, such as mise en abyme and scapegoating, that serve to condone the patriarch’s power, as well as the intertextuality tying the film to the socialist culture. This paper analyses the social context that foregrounds the conversion from symbolic patricide (breaking the established system) to symbolic patrilineality (integration into the social order) in the film and also discusses the inherent tension between the radical apocalyptic vision offered in the original science fiction story and the cultural industry serving the interests of the established order. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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Article
Cultural “Authenticity” as a Conflict-Ridden Hypotext: Mulan (1998), Mulan Joins the Army (1939), and a Millennium-Long Intertextual Metamorphosis
by
Zhuoyi Wang
Arts 2020, 9(3), 78; https://doi.org/10.3390/arts9030078 - 10 Jul 2020
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 14317
Abstract
Disney’s Mulan (1998) has generated much scholarly interest in comparing the film with its hypotext: the Chinese legend of Mulan. While this comparison has produced meaningful criticism of the Orientalism inherent in Disney’s cultural appropriation, it often ironically perpetuates the Orientalist paradigm by [...] Read more.
Disney’s Mulan (1998) has generated much scholarly interest in comparing the film with its hypotext: the Chinese legend of Mulan. While this comparison has produced meaningful criticism of the Orientalism inherent in Disney’s cultural appropriation, it often ironically perpetuates the Orientalist paradigm by reducing the legend into a unified, static entity of the “authentic” Chinese “original”. This paper argues that the Chinese hypotext is an accumulation of dramatically conflicting representations of Mulan with no clear point of origin. It analyzes the Republican-era film adaptation Mulan Joins the Army (1939) as a cultural palimpsest revealing attributes associated with different stages of the legendary figure’s millennium-long intertextual metamorphosis, including a possibly nomadic woman warrior outside China proper, a Confucian role model of loyalty and filial piety, a Sinitic deity in the Sino-Barbarian dichotomy, a focus of male sexual fantasy, a Neo-Confucian exemplar of chastity, and modern models for women established for antagonistic political agendas. Similar to the previous layers of adaptation constituting the hypotext, Disney’s Mulan is simply another hypertext continuing Mulan’s metamorphosis, and it by no means contains the most dramatic intertextual change. Productive criticism of Orientalist cultural appropriations, therefore, should move beyond the dichotomy of the static East versus the change-making West, taking full account of the immense hybridity and fluidity pulsing beneath the fallacy of a monolithic cultural “authenticity”. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Art of Adaptation in Film and Video Games)
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