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The Valiant Ones
''The Valiant Ones'' (, or ) is a 1975 wuxia film written and directed by King Hu. A Taiwanese-Hong Kong co-production, the film portrays a Ming-era conflict between Chinese officials and Japanese pirates mediated by a husband-and-wife martial arts duo. Synopsis Facing threats from Japanese pirates along China's southern coast, Chinese Ming dynasty officials recruit a husband-and-wife martial arts duo to fight their adversaries. Cast Release ''The Valiant Ones'' was screened at the 1975 Chicago International Film Festival, where it was nominated for Best Feature Film. The film also screened at the 1995 International Film Festival Rotterdam and the 2019 Hong Kong International Film Festival. The Harvard Film Archive organized a screening of the film as part of its 2013 film program ''King Hu and the Art of Wuxia'' in association with the Taiwan Ministry of Culture. ''The Valiant Ones'' is also periodically screened at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive as ...
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King Hu
King Hu Jinquan ( zh, t=胡金銓, 29 April 1932 – 14 January 1997) was a Chinese filmmaker and actor, based in British Hong Kong, Hong Kong and Taiwan. He is known for directing various ''wuxia'' films in the 1960s and 1970s, which brought Cinema of Hong Kong, Hong Kong and Cinema of Taiwan, Taiwanese cinema to new technical and artistic heights. His films ''Come Drink with Me'' (1966), ''Dragon Inn'' (1967), and ''A Touch of Zen'' (1970–1971) inaugurated a new generation of ''wuxia'' films in the late 1960s. The Harvard Film Archive described Hu as "one of the most influential and important Chinese directors in the history of cinema". Early life Hu Jinquan ( zh, t=胡金銓, s=胡金铨) was born in Beijing to a well-established family originating from Handan, Hebei. His grandfather was the governor of Henan in the late Qing dynasty. His father had studied in Japan and was the owner of the local coal mine, and his mother was a concubine. His uncle was a high-ranking offici ...
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International Film Festival Rotterdam
International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) is an annual film festival held at the end of January in various locations in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, focused on independent and experimental films. The inaugural festival took place in June 1972, led by founder Huub Bals. IFFR also hosts CineMart and BoostNL, for film producers to seek funding. History The first festival, then called Film International, was organized in June 1972 under the leadership of Huub Bals. The festival profiled itself as a promoter of alternative, innovative, and non-commercial films, with an emphasis on the Far East and developing countries. Around 1983, the festival founded CineMart to serve as a "regular film market", and later modified the business model to serve instead as a "co-production market", which helps a selected number of film producers connect with possible co-producers and funders for their film projects. After the festival founder's sudden death in 1988, a fund was initiated and named af ...
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Ultra HD Blu-ray
Ultra HD Blu-ray (4K Ultra HD, UHD-BD, or 4K Blu-ray) is a digital optical disc data storage format that is an enhanced variant of Blu-ray. Ultra HD Blu-ray supports 4K UHD (3840 × 2160 pixel resolution) video at frame rates up to 60 progressive frames per second, encoded using High-Efficiency Video Coding. These discs are incompatible with existing standard Blu-ray players. The first Ultra HD Blu-ray Discs were officially released in the United States on February 14, 2016. To differentiate retail Ultra HD Blu-ray releases, the format usually uses a black opaque or largely transparent keep case packaging format (as opposed to blue), but with the same case size as standard Blu-ray. The format is supported on Microsoft's Xbox One X, One S, Series X, and Sony's PlayStation 5. Software made for the PlayStation 5 can use 100 GB UHD Blu-ray discs. History On May 12, 2015, the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) revealed completed specifications and the official Ultra HD Blu-ray ...
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Blu-ray
Blu-ray (Blu-ray Disc or BD) is a digital optical disc data storage format designed to supersede the DVD format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released worldwide on June 20, 2006, capable of storing several hours of high-definition video ( HDTV 720p and 1080p). The main application of Blu-ray is as a medium for video material such as feature films and for the physical distribution of video games for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. The name refers to the blue laser used to read the disc, which allows information to be stored at a greater density than is possible with the longer-wavelength red laser used for DVDs, resulting in an increased capacity. The polycarbonate disc is in diameter and thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Conventional (or "pre-BDXL") Blu-ray discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual-layer discs (50GB) being the industry standard for feature-length video discs. Triple-layer discs (10 ...
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Fight Choreographer
Stage combat, fight craft or fight choreography is a specialised technique in theatre designed to create the illusion of physical combat without causing harm to the performers. It is employed in live stage plays as well as operatic and ballet productions. With the advent of cinema and television the term has widened to also include the choreography of filmed fighting sequences, as opposed to the earlier live performances on stage. It is closely related to the practice of stunts and is a common field of study for actors. Actors famous for their stage fighting skills frequently have backgrounds in dance, gymnastics or martial arts training. History Ancient The history of stage fighting and mock combat can be traced to antiquity, with Aristotle quoted as noting that tragedy is conflict between people or indeed it may be traced to the origins of the human species and primate display behaviour. Display of martial aptitude is a natural occurrence in warrior societies, and ritualiz ...
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Beijing Opera
Peking opera, or Beijing opera (), is the most dominant form of Chinese opera, which combines instrumental music, vocal performance, mime, martial arts, dance and acrobatics. It arose in Beijing in the mid-Qing dynasty (1644–1912) and became fully developed and recognized by the mid-19th century. The form was extremely popular in the Qing court and has come to be regarded as one of the cultural treasures of China. Major performance troupes are based in Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai. The art form is also preserved in Taiwan, where it is also known as (). It has also spread to other regions such as the United States and Japan. Peking opera features four main role types, '' sheng'' (gentlemen), '' dan'' (women), '' jing'' (rough men), and '' chou'' (clowns). Performing troupes often have several of each variety, as well as numerous secondary and tertiary performers. With their elaborate and colorful costumes, performers are the only focal points on Peking opera characteristicall ...
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Chinese Opera
Traditional Chinese opera (), or ''Xiqu'', is a form of musical theatre in China with roots going back to the early periods in China. It is an amalgamation of various art forms that existed in ancient China, and evolved gradually over more than a thousand years, reaching its mature form in the 13th century, during the Song dynasty (960–1279 AD). Early forms of Chinese theater are simple; however, over time, various art forms such as music, song and dance, martial arts, acrobatics, costume and make-up art, as well as literary art forms were incorporated to form traditional Chinese opera. Performers had to practice for many years to gain an understanding of the roles. Exaggerated features and colors made it easier for the audience to identify the roles portrayed by the performers. There are over a hundred regional branches of traditional Chinese opera today. In the 20th century, the Peking opera emerged in popularity and has come to be known as the "national theatre" of China ...
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The Magnificent Seven
''The Magnificent Seven'' is a 1960 American Western film directed by John Sturges. The screenplay, credited to William Roberts, is a remake – in an Old West-style – of Akira Kurosawa's 1954 Japanese film '' Seven Samurai'' (itself initially released in the United States as ''The Magnificent Seven''). The ensemble cast includes Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter, James Coburn, and Horst Buchholz as a group of seven gunfighters hired to protect a small village in Mexico from a group of marauding bandits led by Eli Wallach. The film was released by United Artists on October 12, 1960, becoming both a critical and commercial success and has been appraised as one of the greatest films of the Western genre. It spawned three sequels, a television series that aired from 1998 to 2000, and a 2016 film remake. Elmer Bernstein's film score was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Score and is listed on the American Film Institute ...
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Seven Samurai
is a 1954 Japanese epic samurai action film directed by Akira Kurosawa from a screenplay co-written with Shinobu Hashimoto and Hideo Oguni. Taking place in 1586 in the Sengoku period of Japanese history, it follows the story of a village of desperate farmers who seek to hire samurai to combat bandits who will return after the harvest to steal their crops. At the time, the film was the most expensive film made in Japan. It took a year to shoot and faced many difficulties. It was the second-highest-grossing domestic film in Japan in 1954. Many reviews compared the film to the Western film genre. ''Seven Samurai'' is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential films in cinema history. Since its release, it has consistently ranked highly in critics' lists of greatest films, such as the BFI's '' Sight & Sound'' and Rotten Tomatoes polls. It was also voted the greatest foreign-language film of all time in the BBC's 2018 international critics' poll. It is regarded a ...
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Anti-Japanese Sentiment In China
Modern anti-Japanese sentiment in China is frequently rooted in nationalist or historical conflicts, for example, it is rooted in the atrocities and the war crimes which Imperial Japan committed in China during the First Sino-Japanese War, the Boxer Rebellion (Eight-Nation Alliance), the Siege of Tsingtao, the Second Sino-Japanese War and Japan's history textbook controversies. Bitterness persists in China as a result of the Second Sino-Japanese War and Japan's post-war actions. At least to some extent, this sentiment may also be influenced by issues which affect Chinese people in Japan. According to a 2017 BBC World Service poll, mainland Chinese people hold the largest anti-Japanese sentiment in the world, with 75% of Chinese people viewing Japan's influence negatively, and 22% expressing a positive view. Anti-Japanese sentiment in China was at its highest in 2014 since the poll was first conducted in 2006 and was up 16 percent over the previous year. However, anti-Japanese s ...
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Jonathan Clements
Jonathan Michael Clements (born 9 July 1971) is a British author and scriptwriter. His non-fiction works include biographies of Confucius, Koxinga and Qin Shi Huang, as well as monthly opinion columns for '' Neo'' magazine. He is also the co-author of encyclopedias of anime and Japanese television dramas. Background Clements speaks both Chinese and Japanese, and many of his works relate to East Asia. He wrote his master's degree at the University of Stirling on manga and anime exports, predicting the rise of several trends in the international industry including back-to-front printing, direct American investment in anime, and the proliferation of attempts to substitute non-Japanese products. Subsequently, he translated over 70 anime and manga works for British distributors, and worked as a voice director and actor. He wrote his PhD at the University of Wales on the industrial history of Japanese animation, later published by the British Film Institute as ''Anime: A History'' ...
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Berkeley Art Museum And Pacific Film Archive
The Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA, formerly abbreviated as BAM/PFA) are a combined art museum, repertory movie theater, and film archive associated with the University of California, Berkeley. Lawrence Rinder was Director from 2008, succeeded by Julie Rodrigues Widholm in August, 2020. The museum is a member of the North American Reciprocal Museums program. Collection Art The University of California art collection began with ''Flight into Egypt'', a 16th-century oil on wood panel by the School of Joachim Patinir gifted to the university by San Francisco banker and financier François Louis Alfred Pioche in 1870. The museum was founded in 1963 after a donation was made to the university from artist and teacher Hans Hofmann of 45 paintings plus $250,000. A competition to design a building was announced in 1964, and the museum, designed by Mario Ciampi, and associates Ronald Wagner and Richard Jurasch, opened in 1970. Founding Director Peter Selz, former ...
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