All Outputs (49)

Ebola Syndrome (1996) and the Marginalisation of Popular Taste in Hong Kong Film History (2025)
Book Chapter

This chapter considers the position of popular films within the history of Hong Kong cinema. It takes as its focus the cycle of Category III films that appeared in the 1990s, many of which contained extreme scenes of sex and violence, and were box-of... Read More about Ebola Syndrome (1996) and the Marginalisation of Popular Taste in Hong Kong Film History.

Jet Li: A Career in Three Acts (2024)
Book Chapter

Tracing the meanings and influence of stars such as Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh, Jet Li, Zhang Ziyi , and Donnie Yen against the shifting backdrops of the Hong Kong film industry, the contributors to this important volume highlight martial... Read More about Jet Li: A Career in Three Acts.

States of danger and deceit: The European political thriller in the 1970s (2024)
Book

States of danger and deceit places key films (Z (1969), The Mattei Affair (1972), State of Siege (1972), The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum (1975), Illustrious Corpses (1976)) and filmmakers (Costa-Gavras, Elio Petri, Francesco Rosi, Volker Schlöndorf... Read More about States of danger and deceit: The European political thriller in the 1970s.

Angie Chen: Hong Kong Film Pioneer (2023)
Book Chapter

Women in East Asian Cinema: Gender representations, creative labour and global histories (2023)
Book

Examines the work of women in East Asian Cinema in front of and behind the screen
Highlights understudied areas on women’s contributions to film – East Asian film in particular
Highlights importance of re-historicising women’s creative labour in fi... Read More about Women in East Asian Cinema: Gender representations, creative labour and global histories.

Translating Personas: French Singers on Film (2023)
Book Chapter

Celebrating women in global cinema: curating a year-long programming initiative at HOME, Manchester (2022)
Book Chapter

This paper will discuss our curation of Celebrating Women in Global Cinema (CWinGC), a unique year-long programming initiative that took place across 2019 (and into 2020) at HOME, Manchester. It begins by outlining HOME’s cinema offer, identifying ho... Read More about Celebrating women in global cinema: curating a year-long programming initiative at HOME, Manchester.

Thinking space : adapting narrative cinema for installation art (2021)
Thesis

Gallery film and video installation have been figured within a discourse on the phenomenological subject, the avant-garde and its relation to the gallery as a site of political and cultural activity, and with respect to medium specificity. A question... Read More about Thinking space : adapting narrative cinema for installation art.

Popular cinema in an era of decline : politics, self-reflexivity and cinematic nostalgia in recent genre films from Hong Kong (2021)
Journal Article

Rapidly shifting landscapes : two case studies in the UK distribution and exhibition of Chinese language films in the twenty-first century (2020)
Book Chapter

This chapter considers the shifting industrial patterns of distributing and exhibiting Chinese-language films in the UK in the twenty-first century. Drawing upon their experiences as film curators, Willis and Elliott provide a detailed analysis of tw... Read More about Rapidly shifting landscapes : two case studies in the UK distribution and exhibition of Chinese language films in the twenty-first century.

British Chinese cinema and the struggle for recognition, even on the margins (2018)
Book Chapter
Chan, F., & Willis, A. (2018). British Chinese cinema and the struggle for recognition, even on the margins. In A. Thorpe, & D. Yeh (Eds.), Contesting British Chinese Culture (151-167). Palgrave. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71159-1

Manchester’s Chinese arts centre : a case study in strategic intervention (2018)
Book Chapter
Chan, F., & Willis, A. (2018). Manchester’s Chinese arts centre : a case study in strategic intervention. In A. Thorpe, & D. Yeh (Eds.), Contesting British Chinese Culture (101-116). Palgrave. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71159-1

Before and after the awful Dr Orloff : rethinking an early career “respectable” Jess Franco (2018)
Book Chapter

From killer snakes to taxi hunters : Hong Kong horror in an exploitation context (2018)
Book Chapter

Interventions on cultural margins : the case of the Chinese Film Forum UK and the presence of Taiwan cinema in the UK (2017)
Book Chapter
Chan, F., & Willis, A. (2017). Interventions on cultural margins : the case of the Chinese Film Forum UK and the presence of Taiwan cinema in the UK. In K. Chiu, M. Rawnsley, & G. Rawnsley (Eds.), Taiwan Cinema: International Reception and Social Change (80-91). Routledge

An icon rises from the grave : the 21st century cult stardom of Paul Naschy (2017)
Book Chapter

Steven Spielberg and the rise of the celebrity film director (2017)
Book Chapter
Fairclough, K., & Willis, A. (2017). Steven Spielberg and the rise of the celebrity film director. In N. Morris (Ed.), A Companion to Steven Spielberg (466-478). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118726747.ch26

This chapter looks at Steven Spielberg's career at different stages, considering how it can be read as emblematic of the rise of what might be termed the celebrity director. By the early 1970s, when a new young generation of directors found their way... Read More about Steven Spielberg and the rise of the celebrity film director.

North Square, New Street Law and Outlaws : class and race in recent northern legal television drama (2017)
Book Chapter
Pal, S., & Willis, A. (2017). North Square, New Street Law and Outlaws : class and race in recent northern legal television drama. In E. Mazierska (Ed.), Heading North: The North of England in Film and Television (173-192). Palgrave. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-52500-6

'Crossing Hennessy', 'Big Blue Lake' and 'Flowing Stories': Re-centring the local in recent Hong Kong Cinema (2016)
Book Chapter
Willis, A. (2016). 'Crossing Hennessy', 'Big Blue Lake' and 'Flowing Stories': Re-centring the local in recent Hong Kong Cinema. In F. Chan, & A. Willis (Eds.), Chinese Cinemas : International Perspectives (84-95). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315691893-7

A number of observers of the Hong Kong film industry have identified and discussed the seemingly inexorable drift of major Hong Kong creative talents towards the perceived riches and box office rewards on offer in mainland China. At the same time as... Read More about 'Crossing Hennessy', 'Big Blue Lake' and 'Flowing Stories': Re-centring the local in recent Hong Kong Cinema.

Jim Allen : Still relevent after all these years (2016)
Exhibition / Performance

A major retrospective of the work of one of the UKs leading political screenwriters. This season screened all Allen's major works and included Q&A sessions with collaborators Tony Garnett and Rebecca O'Brien. Director ken Loach also contributed speci... Read More about Jim Allen : Still relevent after all these years.