Wing Shan Ho's Screening Post-1989 China tackles what she rightly identifies as an important gap in existing work on recent Chinese cinema and television - the role of the state. She argues that existing scholarship either overstates this role, seeing "main melody" (zhuxuanlu) films and television series as no more than ciphers for state propaganda, or ignores it, idealizing independent or critical films as sites of resistance. As a corrective, Ho points out that mainstream films can both be seen as responding to social stresses and strains and also as having to pursue the market. On the other hand, many independent filmmakers and critical television producers are constrained by the presence of the state in various ways and even make alternative versions of their films to pass the censors. She therefore approaches the relationship between the state and filmmakers as a zone of negotiation, with the mainstream and the critical representing poles of possibility rather than opposition.
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