International critical reception of acclaimed Chinese films: a content analysis of film reviews

Film reviews promote and comment on films. Studying reviews on Chinese films by international critics sheds light on the critical reception of Chinese cinema. This study investigates how international critics assess four critically acclaimed Chinese films: Lust, Caution, Tuya’s Marriage, Stray Dogs, and Black Coal, Thin Ice. These selected films have been acclaimed at A-listed international film festivals in the past 18 years (2007–2024) with top prize or runner-up. This research collects 112 film reviews drawn from professional critics and personal sources (for example, Sight and Sound, Variety, Reel Views, and Robert Cashill) and builds a corpus. These reviews are analyzed by a framework that includes constituent elements of film reviews such as motif, narrative, mise-en-scène, composition, image, and genre. This framework draws from film theory and criticism on structural and cultural aspects of films. It enables the close reading of film reviews and reveals how elements of films contribute to the reception. The findings suggest that critics favor Chinese films that address realistic themes, feature concise and fast-paced narratives, demonstrate cohesive mise-en-scène and composition within the film, and negotiate with genre tropes. This research provides insights into what international critics think of Chinese cinema and hopefully inspires filmmakers to produce films that participate in global communication. The limitation is that this study only selects film reviews written in English that is the most widely used language and serves as the lingua franca for global communication. Reliance on reviews written in English could inadvertently introduce a certain degree of bias. Future research could explore film reviews in other languages to reveal the global reception of Chinese cinema.