Men Can Be Flowers Too: Asian Masculinities in Popular Culture

It’s been so long since I have blogged myself; I have been extraordinarily busy chasing an income and haven’t had the time or creative and intellectual energies. I do miss it, though, and intend to come back to it. Meanwhile, enjoy this blog that Dr. CeeFu has written about masculinity in Asian pop culture.

High Yellow - Asian Popular Culture

Nicholas Tse as Hua Wuque, The Proud Twins

Every time I see articles about young Asian actors leaving behind their “flower boy” roles for more “manly” characters, I feel some kind of way. Such articles act like attractiveness and masculinity cannot go hand it hand. They might if their authors were watching what I watch.

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The Clones of Bruce Lee is a Paean to the Commodification of the Human Body

The opening scenes of The Clones of Bruce Lee dramatize the attempts of medical staff in casualty to revive a dying Bruce Lee. The story swiftly moves onto showing us how a secret service agency appropriates samples from Lee’s body in order to clone him. “Professor he’s all yours now. I only hope that what…

A short gushy blog about a Wang Lung Wei tribute clip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0NrQBwdIMk I first saw this tribute clip a few years ago when its maker Angel Vargas, aka The Flashpoint75 aka That Puerto Rican, posted it to the Heroic Sisterhood Facebook page. At the time, Angel was active on Facebook and was good enough to post many of his clips to our page (many can be…

About me

Update: I have written a book about Shaw Brothers Studios called Ask for the Moon. It features illustrations by Rebecca Stewart. You can find out more about the book here or buy it here. I am quite addicted to martial arts fu movies, which is odd when you consider that I hate violence. But when…

Mini Review: Drug War

Original title Du Zhan Director – Johnnie To Cast – Sun Honglei; Louis Koo; Huang Yi   I am such a nanna these days. I have become used to getting to bed early recently. I must be getting old. When I took my seat for a 9pm screening of Drug War after a very long…

This is a test (and an excuse to post a picture of Toshiro Mifune)

I borrowed Yojimbo, Sanjuro and Leone's Fist Full of Dollars trilogy out of my local DVD rental shop. It's owner was very endorsing of my choice, so I suppose that's a nice bonus. How are you planning on spending your weekend? (image from blogs.montealgazette.com)

This is a test…

(From Hanzo the Razor. Third film, I think...)

Great Quote No. 13

" 'New Wave' wirework shows us things we know to be untrue... But wires also feature in Jackie Chan's more 'realistic' fights, enhancing moves which at least seem possible... One might argue that this is much more of a 'Wicked Lie' than Jet Li's gravity-defying shadow kick, but, significantly, that is not an argument that…

Disciples of Shaolin – Opening Sequence

A common aesthetic device used in kung fu movies of the 70s and 80s was to show the opening credits of the film against footage of the main stars performing displays of martial arts in front of a plain (often boldly coloured) backdrop.* This was often used in films that had, as part of their…

Naked Lady Yakuza Fighting

As discussed in a previous blog I find that some of the Japanese action movies from the 60s and 70s offer a fascinating if distasteful viewing experience. A bizarre mixture of martial arts and exploitation, they are able to cover the gamut from the ridiculous to the sublime. I guess I am thinking of films like…