Among the wide range of ideas addressed in this symposium, its central themes were concerned with how we might locate mainstream and alternative film production within this local film industry on the one hand, as well as in Hong Kong’s relation to Hollywood (and other locations beyond its borders) on the other. The following is an edited version of an email conversation between two participants of the symposium, Stephanie DeBoer (SD) and Hyung-Sook Lee (HS), both doctorate candidates in the Division of Critical Studies, the School of Cinema-Television at the University of Southern California, USA. This conversation is divided into 3
parts : Copies, Ghosts and their Politics Locating Hong Kong
Symposium in Macau, photo courtesy Tan
Hong Kong/Hollywood Alternatives?
SD: There’s certainly been an increasing amount of English language writing, both popular and academic, on Hong Kong film over the past ten years or more. This is why locating this international conference in Hong Kong and Macau was so significant. It really challenges us to think through what it means to travel with ideas about Hong Kong cinema – filmmaking that seems on first glance to be so easily explained by the term "transnational." HS: The question is where the transnational quality of Hong Kong cinema comes from. The concept of "alternative" used in the title of the event led us to a partial answer to this question. The title not only speaks to the concern of Hong Kong alternative filmmaking, but also sets up Hong Kong cinema as the alternative to Hollywood. Especially in recent global contexts, "being alternative" not only implies a resistance to the mainstream but also displays a certain flexibility, easily crossing national borders. SD: There’s definitely a long-standing tendency to place Hong Kong (or more generally, Asian) cinema as an alternative to Hollywood filmmaking. But I think that the organizers of this symposium wanted to both recognize and challenge this idea of where, and in what mode, "alternative" filmmaking stands across the Hong Kong/Hollywood divide. Certainly, the presentations of the symposium that addressed transnational interactions before the 1990s – the international policies of Golden Harvest, for example, or Hong Kong film’s early regional reach – complicated any easy explanation of Hong Kong’s relationship to Hollywood. HS: Right. In fact, it is not easy to call Hong Kong cinema an alternative to anything. To do so, you should understand the global and regional reception of the local cinema as well as film texts themselves. For example, many audiences outside of Hong Kong understand Hong Kong cinema mostly as a mainstream commercial cinema instantly associated with the names of John Woo or Chow Yun-Fat. In terms of the reception of it, however, even the most commercial films from Hong Kong are often situated in alternative venues rather than mainstream theaters – especially in the US or other Western countries. SD: The first panel of the symposium, "Independent Film at the Borders," insightfully addressed the politics of independent filmmaking as it is negotiated between these kinds of local/global contexts. This panel was concerned with the practices that actually produce and define alternative cinemas as such – funding institutions that support independent filmmaking in Hong Kong, the branding of the "indy" Chinese film in the festival circuit and the importance of thinking through the significance of these films in relation to their audiences.
SD: But perhaps its best to start with the mainstream film discourses that ran through the conference, and return to the question of alternatives once we’ve set this up. I remember how interested you were in the "copy theme" that ran through many of the panels on popular filmmaking. Dr. Kwai-Cheung Lo’s paper, in the "Transnational Action" panel, was actually titled by the phrase "copies of copies." Yet he used this phrase to interrogate the implications (here, of gender) of a "mainstream" Hong Kong genre. HS: Right. Beside Dr. Lo, several papers were presented in relation to the topic, and one of the Macau panels was entirely devoted to Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill. It is important to bring up Tarantino in relation to this issue because he might have changed the general perception of copying other films. So far, when a more indigenous film industry such as the Hong Kong film industry copies Hollywood films, it has been mostly berated as a cheap commercial tactic, lacking originality. Done by Hollywood, however, it seems that copying other films gains the status of a legitimate filmmaking practice. Not only the general audiences, but even some cultural experts, too, sometimes seem to focus on "how" it is done rather than "why" it is done. SD: This also came up in the discussion for the "Transnational Flows" panel, which included presentations on Thailand in Hong Kong’s cinematic imagination, the "branding" of global cities and Hong Kong’s capitalization of Hollywood’s Charlie’s Angels. The question that this discussion ended upon was a really interesting one – how are we to deal with this question of the copy when pastiche has become a clichéd explanation of Hong Kong cinema. HS: By now, it has become a cliché to Hollywood cinema, too. In fact, it is not easy to politicize this issue, especially when copying has happened in mutual directions between Hong Kong and Hollywood. It might look mutually beneficial in a way. However, we should pay attention to the fact that Hollywood’s appropriation of Asian cinema could eventually mean the loss of global markets for films from Asia. Certainly, Kill Bill or the Matrix series garnered more revenue than any other "authentic" Asian action films released around the world. Considering this, I think that the conference was particularly successful in re-politicizing the issue. SD: This was a point that was echoed in the panel on "Hybrid Genres and Transnational Contexts" as well, where there was a concern about the deracination of Asian genres (particularly horror and ghost genres) as they are transferred to Hollywood. The question always becomes who benefits from this, meaning – and this is how it was debated in the discussion afterwards – where does the money go. HS: Right. By changing the colors or shapes of faces, images of local ghosts can flexibly cross borders, haunting the imagination of audiences everywhere. But is the capital related to those images also flowing flexibly or benefiting everybody? Who gets what from these faceless ghosts? SD: This question of "ghostliness" was important in a more local and independent Hong Kong context, as well. The panel devoted to Fruit Chan’s films was concerned with the ways in which the uncanny or ghostly qualities of this director’s filmmaking signal his concern for the specific location of Hong Kong. This quality also resonates with an ambivalent relationship to independent filmmaking – that he might be an independent filmmaker, even when the label "independent" becomes a strategic way of gaining access to money in the local funding context, or in relation to global festivals. HS: I think that, in that sense, we saw lots of "ghostly filmmaking" during this symposium. The large number of "alternative" films screened in conjunction with academic panels definitely enriched the experience of the whole event.
 Made in HongKong and Little Cheung by Fruit Chan Top Locating Hong Kong
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HS: It was impressive that the symposium began with an opening moment of
silence in remembrance of 
