Exploring Chinese Cinema: [i]The King of Masks[/i]

The stories the world tells through film transcend news of current events and help us to understand the many ways people are alike, despite the barriers of language and political and religious ideology. The U.S. shares a rich cinematic history with other countries. This shared heritage is a foundation on which our countries can build a relationship of cultural understanding, one that will directly affect the youth of each nation.

Film is a powerful and visual language. It is also a universal language. The International Film Classroom was developed by The Film Foundation in cooperation with IBM and the United States Department of State. The program engages middle and high school students in the study of exceptional foreign films.

The goal of the Exploring Chinese Cinema lessons is to introduce students to foreign language film study, providing visual literacy skills to assist in reading and interpreting moving images of other cultures.

Although the three Chinese films are quite different in content and cinematic style, each reflects China’s changing society. The Film Foundation and its Chinese partners selected these films based on the following criteria: age-appropriate content, excellence in filmmaking, and educational value.

This unit is intended as an introduction only and not as an in-depth study of China or China’s rich film heritage. Each lesson has multiple activities that can be taught over 3–5 days. The lessons are interdisciplinary in approach, both reinforcing and challenging students’ knowledge of literature, history, geography, art and music.

Set in Sichuan Province in the 1930s, The King of Masks (1996, directed by Wu Tianming) tells the story of Bian Lian Wang, an aging street performer. He is a master of the Chinese dramatic art of face-changing, and longs to pass the secrets of his art to a male heir, but he has no child. At a marketplace for abandoned children, he purchases an 8-year-old child and names him Doggie. Complications arise when Wang realizes he has been duped. Doggie is a girl, and girls are forbidden to practice the ancient art.

Teachers will need a DVD copy of the film to correspond with the written lesson material. The King of Masks may be rented, purchased or borrowed for use in the classroom.

Lesson Plan
Student Handouts
About the Director