Translating the Margins: New Asian Cinema, Independent Cinema, and Minor Transnationalism at the Hong Kong Asian Film Festival

Abstract

Although recent scholarship has examined how film festivals contribute to the growth of screen markets in China and Asia, there has been less analysis of the role of film festivals in promoting public cultures and public debate. This chapter looks at the Hong Kong Asian Film Festival (HKAFF) as a case study of how activist practices of screen selection, competition, and mediation have helped to foster new identities and social imaginaries that transcend physical and political borders, such as Indie Nation, by seeking out transnational alliances with alternative screen organizations in China, and overseas. Ultimately, it suggests that these alliances constitute a form of “minor transnationalism,” a practice that is also a form of translation from or at the margins.