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The New Hollywood and the Emergence of the Asian American Cinema Movement
For Asian Americans, the two most important developments of this period were the passages of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 and the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1975. The first made it possible for millions of Asians—particularly East Asians and South Asians—to immigrate to the United States. The second created large Southeast Asian communities in many areas of the country. In terms of media, these two decades saw a slight increase in Asian American representation in Hollywood, thanks largely to the popularity of martial arts films and television programs. More importantly, we witnessed the emergence of an independent Asian American cinema movement.
Four key developments made the environment ripe for Asian American cinema. The first is the decline of the studio system. This gradually opened space for independent productions, filmmakers’ coalitions, more innovative storytelling methods, and films on less mainstream and risqué subjects. The second is the creation of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and public access television stations. These venues offered new screening opportunities for films—particularly children’s programming and documentaries—that cater to specific communities. The third is the growth of university film programs. Compared to filmmakers who learned primarily through apprenticeship, graduates of these programs generally have access to a much broader collection of films and greater knowledge of technical innovations and philosophical debates in different film traditions. As they entered the industry, they began incorporating influences from the French New Wave, Japanese cinema, experimental film and many other traditions, and created what many call the “New Hollywood.” The fourth and most important development is the emergence of the Asian American movement. This movement emphasized solidarity among different Asian ethnicities, and started popularizing the term “Asian American.” It also worked to form coalitions with other people of color to fight against imperialism (symbolized by the Vietnam War) and for racial justice.
Two key Asian American media arts collective were formed in the 1970s. Los Angeles’s Visual Communications (VC) was founded in 1970 by Duane Kubo, Robert Nakamura, Alan Ohashi and Eddie Wong. Dedicated to creating “honest” and “accurate” portrayals of Asian American life, they produced—during their first decade—numerous short educational films (see the guide for Nakamura’s Manzanar), and documented both community events and people in the community. In 1976, a group of New York-based Chinese American activists—Peter Chow, Thomas Tam, Christine Choy, Danny Yung and Tsui Hark—founded what became Asian CineVision. Because the organization’s original goal was to produce programs for the local public access channel, its original name was Chinese Cable TV. In 1978, ACV put on its first Asian American Film Festival (now Asian American International Film Festival). It was a three-day event featuring 46 films
Here, I will introduce two Asian American actors who worked in mainstream films and two people who were associated with the early Asian American film movement. The careers of Nakamura and Choy are discussed in the guides for Manzanar and Who Killed Vincent Chin? Actress and dancer Nancy Kwan (b. 1939) is the daughter of a Cantonese father and an English/Scottish mother. Educated in Hong Kong and England, she started her career by opening a ballet school in Hong Kong. At an audition for the film adaptation of The World of Suzie Wong, she attracted the attention of stage producer Ray Stark, who suggested that she attend an acting program in Hollywood. She eventually landed that film’s title role and the role of “Linda Low” in the film version of Flower Drum Song, making her one of the top celebrities in the early 1960s. Given continued discrimination in the American film industry, Kwan could not sustain her stardom, but continued to land roles for half a century. She has appeared in over 50 films, and continued to act until 2016.
San Francisco-born martial artist, actor and director Bruce Lee (1940-73) was the son of a Chinese father and a multiracial (Chinese-White) mother. He grew up in Hong Kong’s entertainment industry, and appeared in twenty films before he turned 18. When Lee began getting into too many street fights, his parents sent him back to the United States. In the mid-1960s, Lee started working in Hollywood, but—because of discrimination—he was only able to land supporting roles. Frustrated, he returned to Hong Kong in 1971, and made a trio of films—The Big Boss, Fist of Fury and Way of the Dragon—designed to be not only major box-office hits in Asia, but also showcases for Hollywood executives. The plan worked, and Warner Bros. agreed to co-produce Enter the Dragon with Lee’s Hong Kong production company, Concord Production Inc. Tragically, Lee died during the film’s post-production. In his brief career, he developed a hybrid martial arts philosophy called Jeet Kune Do, altered the portrayals of Asian males in American media, and helped to develop Afro-Asian solidarity through martial arts.
One of the founders of Asian CineVision, Thomas Tam (1946-2008) was born in Fujian and grew up in Hong Kong. Along with his family, he moved to New York in 1964. After graduating with a physics degree from the City College of New York in 1968, he became a community organizer in New York’s Chinatown. Particularly interested in public health, he organized a ten-day health fair, which grew into the Chinatown Health Clinic (now Charles B. Wang Health Center). This eventually led him to get an MPH and a PhD in SocioMedical Sciences from Columbia University. Throughout his career as a public health administrator, professor and community organizer, Tam was very active in filmmaking. He created many shorts that have been exhibited at festivals and museums (including the Whitney Museum). For the Asian American cinema movement, a particularly important film is Tourist Bus Go Home (1969). This 11-minute silent film, shot on 8mm camera, demonstrates how personal video cameras can be used to document community life and for political protest.
In contrast to Tam’s more experimental films, Loni Ding (1931-2010) created more traditional documentaries that have been viewed by millions on public televisions, K-12 schools and universities. She uses what she calls the “documemoir” approach, which focuses on telling stories from first-person perspectives. As Senior Producer and Director of San Francisco PBS station KQED-TV from 1970 to 1977, she produced and directed more than 250 half-hour programs. One of them is the Emmy-nominated “How We Got Here: The Chinese” (1975), a half-hour montage essay on five generations of Chinese immigrants in San Francisco’s Chinatown. In 1980, she wrote, produced and directed the multiple-award-winning Bean Sprouts, a five-part series on Chinese American children that dealt with issues of identity, generational relations and intercultural exchanges. Her magnum opus was the two-part Ancestors in the Americas (2001), which tells the story of early Asian immigration to the Americas. Around six million people watched the premiere of these two programs on PBS. Ding also directed important documentaries on Japanese American soldiers and Asian American women.