Ne Zha’s image transformation in Chinese animation cinema (1961–2019)

This article analyses Ne Zha’s image evolution through different animated films in the PRC from 1961 to 2019. Three key Ne Zha films are Uproar in Heaven, Ne Zha Conquers the Dragon King and Ne Zha, representing the era of ‘classical Chinese animation’, ‘modern Chinese animation’ and ‘postmodern Chinese animation’, respectively. In 2019, Ne Zha became the summer hit and the highest-grossing Chinese original animation earning ¥5.035 billion at the Chinese box office. Explorations of how classical artistic traditions and legendary stories have been transposed into these films shows that Chinese animation has retreated from the peak of national style in the 1960s and undergone change with globalization’s cultural and ideological impacts. In sum, artistic techniques associated with fine arts film, traditional narrative methods and plot stylization have gradually weakened. Contemporary elements such as Hollywood classic three-act pattern and Japanese comic character relationships and images have significantly influenced Chinese animation in the twenty-first century.

Change: Viktor&Rolf Haute Couture, Autumn/Winter 2020

Lockdown restrictions that were put in place by governments across the world during the first half of 2020 had a huge impact on the fashion industry, the full effects of which will perhaps be felt for years to come. In this short article, I will analyse the Viktor&Rolf Haute Couture, Autumn/Winter 2020 collection, which was created during this time and which directly references the change in mindset that designers and consumers alike have experienced; I will consider how the online-only presentation method has been used to further enhance the message conveyed by the clothing. The setting, music and voice-over used in this short fashion film are seemingly intended to bring an overall feeling of hope, and possibly joy, to the display of a small, yet cohesive collection that addresses the complex feelings of anxiety and isolation that characterize this historical moment.

Dress and Gulf imagery in two Malayalam films: Pathemari and Marubhoomiyile Aana

Malayalam films since the 1970s have captured the history of Gulf migration from Kerala, which occurs primarily due to the desperate need of its people for jobs and for money. Predominantly, the discourses of migrants in the films are embedded in various things, including dress from the Gulf, the insignia of opulence that depict the status of the migrants in the public sphere. Using thematic analysis of two Malayalam films, Pathemari and Marubhoomiyile Aana, this study argues that the motif of the Gulf is associated with power and control in the cultural discourse of Kerala. Drawing on the semiotic analysis of Barthes, we contend that the replacement of mundu, a traditional attire of Kerala men, by trousers, is one among several mythical markers of modernity, including perfumes and watches brought from the Gulf. The performativity and materiality of dress in these two films produce imageries of the Gulf by which the wearers, mostly male, accumulate social and symbolic capital and assert dominance in the film’s narration.

The house of Van Dyne: Defining Marvel’s superhero fashion designer

Marvel Comics superhero and founding member of The Avengers Janet Van Dyne, the Wasp, has been portrayed as an in-canon fashion designer not just of superhero costumes but also of civilian clothing. Through her continuous usage as a narrative device that functions as an authority on style and taste, the proliferous designs depicted as created by Van Dyne over her almost sixty-year history have expanded to be worn by so many heroes across the Marvel Universe that they subconsciously define our overall conceptions of superhero fashion. This article evaluates Van Dyne’s fictional fashion designs from the perspective of real-world fashion criticism in order to define Van Dyne’s design aesthetic. Through comparisons with key designers and movements within the fashion industry, this article asserts that the history of luxury fashion is the best model for placing Van Dyne designs into context and that the long-standing visual representations of Van Dyne fashions offer a unique case study to explore the narrative implications of luxury fashion within comics. This focus on fashion designs rather than iconographic superhero costumes creates new opportunities to emphasize discussions of the integrality of clothing to conceptions of superhero characterization and identity.

Between nationalism and consumerism: Devika Rani’s star persona in Indian visual culture

The career of 1930s film star Devika Rani (1908–94), often described as ‘the first lady of Indian cinema’, both confirms and challenges the received view that the nationalists’ rewritings of traditional femininity constituted the most significant force in the formation of the continent’s New Woman. Rani’s star persona demonstrates how both modernity and consumer culture, while subjected to nationalist ideology, exercised a degree of influence over the tastes and lifestyles of women living in urban centres such as Bombay and Delhi. As a member of the prominent Tagore family, which included a Nobel Prize-winning poet, and of the kulin caste, Rani enjoyed a privileged status that allowed her to embody a self-defining individual who was specifically ‘feminine and modern’ while also ‘Indian’. Drawing on the wealth of photographic material that this actress left behind, this article teases out the complexities of her trajectory as an emblematic icon of twentieth-century Indian femininity. In particular her use of costuming in her starring roles, in films such as Karma, Achhut Kanya and Nirmala, illustrates how she promoted new modes of autonomy and agency for the female subject.

Under-dressed: Vests as representations of White, liminal masculinity and the transnational body in Saturday Night Fever and Raging Bull

The 1970s is often considered a period in which masculinity was in crisis. This article considers that through cinematic representation and the use of the white cotton vest as a motif of hegemonic and working-class masculinity, masculinity was not in crisis, but in transition. The focus on films Saturday Night Fever and Raging Bull, is used here to exemplify discussions surrounding primarily hetero-normative masculinity, nationhood, tradition and the White working-class male body both dressed and undressed, and how these provide spaces through narrative and mise en scène to discuss notions of flux, change and fluidity that maps and arcs ‘masculinity’ to masculinities. The male body is deconstructed and reconstructed through the vest and becomes public spectacle. The centrality of the vest and its purpose within these (and many other) films during the period, acts as a means of revealing more than just the body of the wearer. In particular, the ethnicity of the protagonist and the repurposing of stereotypes through the vest as motif, underpin the credibility of the narrative and can be understood as a means of simplifying or coding approaches to shifting masculinities.

From Teen Angels to Vogue: The subcultural styles of the girl gang in Mi Vida Loca

Despite increasing sociological scholarship pertaining to girl gang membership in the last few decades, there continues to be a lack of engagement with the meaning of their stylistic practices and how this manifests on screen. As a corrective to this, this article considers the complexities, contradictions and ambiguities in girl gang styles and their 'symbolic meaning' for young Chicanas as represented in the first feature-length film to bring contemporary girl gang activity from the streets to the mainstream, Mi Vida Loca (1994). Examining Chola makeup, gang tattoos and dress, the article explores how the gang girl can produce meaning (political, feminist or other) and power through styles, and the tensions between 'authentic' agentic subcultural defiance and mainstream consumption, and the dualistic constructions of girlhood itself. Disadvantaged by intersecting forces, it is argued that gang girls do not necessarily have less opportunity, but greater difficulty in imposing meaning onto the world and resisting hegemonic forces through subcultural aesthetics.

The curated representation of Saga Norén: Interweaving narratives of fashion and interiors

Nordic Noir dramas have dominated the landscape of contemporary television, transforming the crime genre beyond the traditional English-speaking productions whilst forging a path for female protagonists to dominate. This article seeks to analyse the relationship between the narrative, fashion and interiors through the main female protagonist Saga Noren (Sofia Helin) in Bron/Broen (The Bridge) (2011‐18), the Danish-Swedish production of the Nordic Noir drama.

Coppola's postfeminism: Emma Watson and The Bling Ring

Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring explores the contemporary obsession with commodities and celebrity culture which leads a group of Californian teenagers to break into the homes of celebrities, in order to steal their clothes and accessories. This article examines Coppola's critique of celebrity culture and consumerism through the movie itself, and through her casting of British actor Emma Watson and the ways in which she mobilizes the celebrity persona of Watson in order to further her critique. The Bling Ring will be compared to Coppola's work to understand how it contributes to her postfeminist image. Coppola's position as a celebrity figure through her association with her father, through her own work and through her participation within the worlds of fashion and music are also explored, in order to problematize the position from which she critiques celebrity culture.