Reflections of the Soul: A Cinematic Trilogy of Forceful Women—The Assassin, the Writer, and the Worker
Abstract
When the film and television work in the form of a "big heroine" appears, it is known that a strong female image; the woman at the peak of life, even at the top of the world, is shaped as a "sense of power woman". But the life logic of these women, the ruling logic, and the fundamental victory of the narrative logic battle can all be attributed to the space of male logic. Therefore, the representation of women's sense of power in the films and documentaries examined by the author today does not involve women who merely simulate strength through male narrative logic. Instead, it focuses on women who authentically follow their own realities. These are women who are secretive and composed assassins, talented writers, and resilient workers. They are allowed to be emotionally vulnerable, have the right to make their own choices, and genuinely embody a sense of power.
References
- Lenin, V. I. (2024). Not By Politics Alone: The Other Lenin. Verso Books.
- Godard, J.-L. (1998), Histoire(s) du cinéma, 4 vols, Paris: Gallimard.
- Qiao, Zongyu. (2015). "Female Assassins in Kunqu." In Chinese Actors: Issue 1, 2015 (Issue 43 in Total) (pp. 62)
- Bordo, S. (2023). Unbearable weight: Feminism, Western culture, and the body. Univ of California Press.
- Deng, K., & Chan, L. T. H. (2025). “Translatability and the Politics of Multilingualism: The Discourse on Chinese-Manchu Translation in the Eighteenth Century”. In Routledge Handbook of East Asian Translation (pp. 50-64). Routledge.
- Fran Martin, “The China Simulacrum: Genre, Feminism, and Pan-Chinese Cultural Politics in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”, in Chris Berry and Feii Lu (ed.), Island on the Edge: Taiwan New Cinema and After, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2005.
- Chan, K. (2004). “The Global Return of the Wu xia Pian (Chinese Sword-Fighting Movie): Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”. Cinema Journal, 3-17.
- Ni, Z. (2021). “The fluidity of desire and cross-cultural media: A re-examination of the gender politics in the transnational wuxia film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (2000). Journal of Chinese Culture and Communication, (02), 213-221.
- Lu, X. (1922). A Madman's Diary.
- Engels, F., & Untermann, E. (2021). The origin of the family, private property and the state. In Politics and Kinship (pp. 217-223). Routledge.
- Tasker, Y. (2012). Spectacular bodies: Gender, genre and the action cinema. Routledge.
- Mulvey, L. (1975). “Visual pleasure and narrative cinema”. Screen, 16(3), 6-18.
- Kristeva, J. (1974). About Chinese Women (pp. 138-59). New York: Boyars.
- Johnson, M. (1994). “Women as Action Heroes: Is Violence a Positive Direction for Females?”. Glamour, 92, 153.
- Dai, J., Sun, B., Yang, Y., & An, S. (2019). "The invention of 'Cultural Revolution' and 'woman' and Chinese cinema: Dai Jinhua on 'May Fourth and Film'". Film Art, (03), 15-20.
- Peng, H. Y. (2016). “To Kill or Not to Kill: Auteurism and Storytelling”.
- Galtung, J., & Hoivik, T. (1971). “Structural and direct violence: A note on operationalization”. Journal of Peace research, 8(1), 73-76.
- Frazer, E., & Hutchings, K. (2014). “Feminism and the critique of violence: negotiating feminist political agency”. Journal of Political Ideologies, 19(2), 143-163.
- Su, S. (2015). The Red Cliffs Ode. Peking University Press.
- Wang, J. (2009). Re-examination of the origin of Chinese heroes. Journal of Lanzhou University.
- Lu, X. (1923). A brief history of Chinese fiction. Beijing: People’s Literature Publishing House.
- Liu, M. H. (2023). Analysis of the evolution of the character Nie Yinniang: A case study of Nie Yinniang stories from Tang to Qing. Jingu Wen Chuang, 47, 66-70.
- Li, J. G. (1993). Tang and Five Dynasties: Records of strange and marvelous tales. Tianjin: Nankai University Press.
- Kraushaar, F. (2017). “Fighting Swaying Imbalances of Powers: The Transformation of Spiritual Freedom in Tang Tales into Individual Freedom in Hou Hsiao-hsien’s The Assassin”. Acta Universitatis Carolinae Philologica, (4), 109-125.
- Lai, K. L. (2000). “The Daodejing: Resources for contemporary feminist thinking”.
- Wang, R. R. (2009). “Kundao: A Lived Body in Female Daoism”. Journal of Chinese philosophy, 36(2), 277-292.
- Lupke, C. (2016). The Sinophone cinema of Hou Hsiao-hsien: Culture, style, voice, and motion. Cambria Press.
- Cuomo, C. (2002). On ecofeminist philosophy. Ethics and the Environment, 7(2), 1-11.
- Möller, H. G. (1999). “Zhuangzi's Dream of the Butterfly: A Daoist Interpretation”. Philosophy East and West, 439-450.
- Rawnsley, G. D., & Rawnsley, M. Y. T. (Eds.). (2011). Global Chinese Cinema: The Culture and Politics of'Hero'. Routledge.
- Woolf, V. (2014). “A Room of One's Own:(1929)”. In The people, place, and space reader (pp. 304-308). Routledge.
- Atwood, M. (2002). Negotiating with the dead: A writer on writing. Cambridge University Press.
- Bielby, D. D. (2009). Gender inequality in culture industries: Women and men writers in film and television. Sociologie du travail, 51(2), 237-252.
- Mahar, K. (2006). “Regendering the Movies”.
- Martin, A., & Clark, V. (1987). What Women Wrote: Scenarios, 1912–1929. Cinema History Microfilm Series. University Publications of America.
- Francke, L. (1994). “Script girls: Women screenwriters in Hollywood”. (No Title).
- Haskell, M. (2016). From reverence to rape: The treatment of women in the movies. University of Chicago Press.
- Lu, S. H. (1997). Transnational Chinese cinemas: Identity, nationhood, gender. University of Hawaii Press.
- Su, T. (2018). Guide to Divorce. People’s Literature Publishing House.
- Wang, S. (2004). The life of an addict. China Film Publishing House.
- Dai, J. H. (1998). Rewriting women: Gender writing and cultural space in the 1980s and 1990s. Women’s Studies Review, 2, 51-55.
- Nichols, B. (2024). Introduction to documentary. Indiana University Press.
- Hemingway, E. (1995). The Old Man and the Sea. 1952. New York: Scribner.
- Hatzfeld, N. (2014). Filmed images of women factory workers: work, gender and dignity, variations on a classic trilogy (1962-2011). Clio. Women, Gender, History, (38).
- Rose, E. K. (2018). The rise and fall of female labor force participation during World War II in the United States. The Journal of Economic History, 78(3), 673-711.
- U.S. Census Bureau, Department of Commerce. (1947). Labor force, employment, and unemployment in the United States, 1940 to 1946 (Vol. P–15, No. 2 of Current Population Reports: Labor Force). U.S. Department of Commerce.
- Selective Service System. (1948). Quotas, calls and inductions (Vol. 12 of Special Monographs). U.S. Government Printing Office.
- Landy, M. (2014). British genres: cinema and society, 1930-1960 (Vol. 1205). Princeton University Press.