Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction
- 1 Hong Kong, Britain, China: The Documentary Film, 1896–1941, A Page of History (1941) and The Battle of Shanghai (1937)
- 2 Hong Kong, Britain, China: The Documentary Film, 1947–69, the ‘Picturesque’ Committed Film and Water Comes over the Hills from the East (1965)
- 3 Colonial Film: The Development of Official Film–making in Hong Kong, 1945–73, the Hong Kong Film Unit (1959–73) and This is Hong Kong (1961)
- 4 Public-service Broadcasting in an Authoritarian Setting: The Case of Radio Television Hong Kong and the Development of Television Documentary Film in Hong Kong
- 5 The Documentary Films of Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) and The Hong Kong Case (1989)
- 6 Aesthetics and Radicalism: An Overview of Independent Documentary Film in Hong Kong, 1973–2013
- 7 A Critical Analysis of Significant Independent Documentary Films of the Past Three Decades
- Conclusions: The Future of Independent Documentary Film in Hong Kong, China and the Region
- Bibliography
- Index
1 - Hong Kong, Britain, China: The Documentary Film, 1896–1941, A Page of History (1941) and The Battle of Shanghai (1937)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction
- 1 Hong Kong, Britain, China: The Documentary Film, 1896–1941, A Page of History (1941) and The Battle of Shanghai (1937)
- 2 Hong Kong, Britain, China: The Documentary Film, 1947–69, the ‘Picturesque’ Committed Film and Water Comes over the Hills from the East (1965)
- 3 Colonial Film: The Development of Official Film–making in Hong Kong, 1945–73, the Hong Kong Film Unit (1959–73) and This is Hong Kong (1961)
- 4 Public-service Broadcasting in an Authoritarian Setting: The Case of Radio Television Hong Kong and the Development of Television Documentary Film in Hong Kong
- 5 The Documentary Films of Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) and The Hong Kong Case (1989)
- 6 Aesthetics and Radicalism: An Overview of Independent Documentary Film in Hong Kong, 1973–2013
- 7 A Critical Analysis of Significant Independent Documentary Films of the Past Three Decades
- Conclusions: The Future of Independent Documentary Film in Hong Kong, China and the Region
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
HISTORICAL SUMMARY
Hong Kong entered the orbit of British imperial power when that power was almost at its zenith in the middle of the nineteenth century. The manner of entry was also a particularly violent, and in some ways also atypical, one. At that point in time the British Empire was expanding across the world out of the older eighteenth-century mercantile imperium, in search of new trading opportunities elsewhere. At the same time, imperial strategy was moving away from the formal annexation of new territories to the establishment of trading settlements, some of which also doubled as strategic military outposts. The older, more ruthless mercantilist approach, in which a conquered country's markets would be deployed to the advantage of the metropole, and that country then be forced to import goods from said metropole, generated inevitable hostility amongst subject populations, and, in addition, and most importantly from the point of view of the British Treasury, finally proved to be overly expensive to maintain.
By the mid-nineteenth century British imperialist officials and traders had largely moved on from this subjugation-mercantilist model to one based on adherence to the principles of ‘free trade’, and the establishment of trading settlements and arrangements based – usually quite loosely – on such principles. Now, the primary concern was to ensure that trade could take place ‘fairly’, according to the ‘laws’ of supply and demand, and unhindered by local protectionist obstructions.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Hong Kong Documentary Film , pp. 6 - 45Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2014