Reconstruction Vol. 16, No. 2

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When Is a Gay-themed Film Not a Tongzhi Film? Yaoi, BL Films and Gay Exploitation Cinema in Chinese Culture / Siu Yan Xavier Tam

Abstract

Inspired by the commentaries on Brokeback Mountain, especially Chris Berry's assertion of Boys Love mimicry, and my observation of the multiplicity of Chinese "gay" films, this essay attempts to situate three modalities of "gay" film - tongzhi film, BL film and gay exploitation cinema vis-à-vis yaoi subculture and gay identification.

Keywords: tongzhi film, yaoi, BL films, gay exploitation cinema

<1> When we see two men kissing or having sex on the screen, we probably identify this film as a gay film. Take Ang Lee's film Brokeback Mountain (2005), for example. In the documentary, Sharing the Story: The Making of Brokeback Mountain, the narrator mentions that many film critics consider Brokeback Mountain to be a gay cowboy story; Ang Lee and Heath Ledger, however, insist that the film is, more than a gay cowboy story, a great American epic love story. [1] Moreover, some assert that the film is a portrayal of the relationship between two bisexual or closeted gay cowboys, suggesting that to label it a so-called gay cowboy film is a cliché (Miller 2007: 50-60). Still others think term it a queer film because it explores and subverts the rigid boundaries of heterosexuality, homosexuality, homosociality and monogamy (Osterweil 2007: 38-42). Apart from these interpretations, Chris Berry makes some interesting points in his article, "The Chinese Side of the Mountain," asserting that the film is a blend of American family melodrama and Chinese family-ethics film that "mimics" the Japanese Yaoi/Boys Love cultural tradition:

[…] Brokeback is also different from Lee's other films because it draws on another regional subcultural tradition - popular culture stories produced for and often by straight women about love between two handsome young men. These come in various forms and go by different names in different places, including Yaoi, Tanbi, Danmei, Boy's Love, and tongrennu. (2007: 32)

<2> What Berry has observed is a lively subcultural practice-a group of young women referred to by the pejorative Japanese term fujoshi (literally "rotten girls"), who devote themselves to "gay" films traditionally considered to be made for "gay" men. I put "gay" in quotation marks since most of the "gay" films, or more precisely films involving gay characters, in the Asian context are not produced for the identification of gay men, but for the solidarity of fujoshi. More to the point, many Chinese films depicting gay characters are not made for either fujoshi or gay men on an all-or-nothing scheme. Many filmmakers understand that a single target audience cannot guarantee a successful box office, especially during the recession that has hard-hit local film industry in Hong Kong and Taiwan. They skillfully employ actors who probably appeal to gay audiences and situate the gay-appealing actors in conventional BL narratives. By means of this complicated strategy, they secure a higher attendance rate, thereby increasing their revenue. Sometimes the actors and even the filmmakers themselves involved in the representation of gay characters are homophobic. For example, in Hong Kong, the film director Scud and the actors of the film, City Without Baseball (无野之城 Mou ye chi sing, 2008), were invited to attend an interview on a gay-themed radio show, We Are Family. The host asked one of the actors Ah Chung about his reaction were a gay man to approached him; he responded that he would hit this man. Later the film director Scud legitimized his actor's comments on gay-bashing as a matter of freedom of speech. Given that the film launched its promotion campaign in Asia's largest gay personnel website Fridae.com, it is safe to assume that its target audience was gay men. The homophobic speech associated with the crew, however, led to a larger debate of what constitutes a "gay" film. In other words, the homophobic attitude (itself a meta-narrative or interpretive framework that set the pre-viewing understanding of the film) led to questions of definition and agency: "Is it necessary for a 'gay' film to be made by 'gay-friendly' people?"

<3> Inspired by the commentaries on Brokeback Mountain, especially Berry's assertion of Boys Love mimicry, and my observation of the multiplicity of Chinese "gay" films, this essay attempts to situate three modalities of "gay" film - tongzhi film, BL film and gay exploitation cinema vis-à-vis yaoi subculture and gay identification.

A Working Definition of Yaoi, BL and Fujoshi

<4> It has been suggested that Japanese culture influences the Chinese communities in Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. Although this essay deals with Chinese films, to facilitate a more thorough discussion on BL films, it is inevitable that we explore the Japanese yaoi subculture. Yaoi and Boys Love are two interrelated notions: sometimes they are used distinctively, but some scholars use them interchangeably. Since they use either term as an umbrella term, confusion often results. often creates confusion. It is therefore necessary that I briefly define my terms.

<5> Yaoi is an acronym derived from the Japanese aphorism, Yama nashi, ochi nashi, imi nashi, or "no climax, no conclusion, no meaning" (Kotani 2007: 223). It refers to the parody subculture wherein certain female amateur illustrators routinely appropriate heterosexual male characters in popular animation and comics and create homoerotic illustrations usually without narrative development in dōjinshi, or fanzines (Kotani 2007:223).

<6> In other words, "no climax, no conclusion, no meaning" emphasizes the sexually explicit content and the unconnected dimension of different depictions in the fanzine. Additionally, some Japanese scholars think that yaoi followed on the heels of the literary tradition ofshōnen ai mono, or "young boys' love stories" found in Japanese women's novel (Kotani 223). Moreover, participants sometimes refer yaoi as 801 since "8" can be pronounced as "ya" and the physical sign of "01" is similar to that of "oi."

<7> In the abstract introducing Saito Tamaki's article "Otaku Sexuality," Kotani Mari defines yaoi, in a broader sense, as "a culture that rereads and reconstructs male heterosexist society along the lines of female desires" and, in a narrow sense, "a term used to describe texts and a broader subculture characterized by a predilection for male-male love stories, stories created by and for women" (2007: 222-224).

<8> At the same time, Boys Love comics/manga (BL comics) usually refer to the original comics depicting the pure love between young boys created by and mainly for women. Thus, the difference between yaoi and BL texts is that the former is the fan parody of converting heterosexual male characters in an original ACG (Anime/Comics/Game) text to parody output and the latter is an original creation (Kotani 2007: 223). Recently, the distinction between yaoi and BL has blurred both because some participants in the two practices mix the two and because some BL readers refuse to admit their involvement with yaoi. Due to issues of language proficiency and miscomprehension, many Western scholars ignore the difference between yaoi and BL in their research. Reclaiming the difference, however, is meaningful for the study of the subcultural phenomenon, but to do so is beyond the scope of this essay. At the moment, instead, I employ the terms yaoi and BL to referred to subculture and text respectively, and as I do so, and I will use them interchangeably.

<9> In the United States, Henry Jenkins researches fandom in popular culture. In his book Textual Poachers, he observes that there are some women who appropriate the male protagonists in sci-fi into homoerotic fantasy. He calls these parody illustrators "textual poachers" and their illustrations "slash fiction" (1992: 185-222). This phenomenon in the U.S. resembles yaoi practice in Japan. With the recent increase in popularity of Japanese yaoi and BL comics within the American market, scholars have tended to use yaoi and Boys Love, as opposed to textual poaching, to refer both to this parody practice and to the subculture of women who consume texts involving love stories between men.

<10> With regard to the naming of participants within this subcultural practice, I follow Berry's lead and suggest that different places come with different names. In Japanese, the parody fanzine is called dōjinshi and the participants, dōjin. Yaoi participants form a constituent of the dōjinshi subculture. In American fanzine subculture, the counterparts of dōjinshi anddōjin are slash fiction and textual poachers respectively. Similarly, in Mandarin Chinese, tongrenzhi refers to dōjinshi and tongrennü refers to dōjin. Yaoi names the likes of Tanbi and June are used to refer to Japanese BL comics aesthetics and periodicals respectively (Kotani 2007: 223). Danmei refers specifically to the aesthetics of yaoi/BL texts in Mainland China. These names represent yaoi and BL in precisely the same manner that Xerox has become a generic term of photocopying.

<11> Apart from dōjinshi, "textual poachers" and tongrennü, yaoi scholarship in English pays little attention to the Japanese term fujoshi, a term otherwise used to refer to BL fans. According to Kotani Mari, fujoshi is the female equivalent of otaku and is favored by female BL fans as a self-label. The word fu means "fallen" or "decay," and joshi means "young woman." BL fans prefer the pronunciation of fujoshi as a homonym of the Japanese word for "wife" or "lady" (2007: 224). Additionally, for many the term refers to be a unitary group of young straight women who embrace so-called gay-themed stories. But in point of fact, this is inaccurate. In September, 2008, Brian Leung, host of the LGBT radio program We Are Family, interviewed two self-identified lesbian high school fujoshi, R and Shirley, on the issue of yaoi/BL (2008; Leung 2009). In their interview, they explain that, while most fujoshi are young straight girls, there are some exceptional lesbian fujoshi such as themselves. According to R and Shirley, there are three levels of fujoshi. The beginner level only responds to pure love type of BL texts; the intermediate level enjoys reading hentai ("abnormal" or "perverse." e.g. S & M) and more sexually explicit types of BL texts. The advanced level brings male friends and relatives into their imagined BL fantasies and are eager to know gay friends in real life. The advanced level of fujoshi is also known as the bone-ash level, where "bone-ash" is a metaphor denoting the most decayed or decadent of fujoshi. In addition to R & Shirley's scheme, the Chinese-translated comic book, The Hopes of Fujoshi (腐女子的本願 Funüzhi de benyuan, 2009) introduces the concept of the kifujin [貴腐人, literally "noble rotten women"], the ultimate fujoshi who, unlike ordinary fujoshi, enjoys a higher social and economic level, as well as the possibility of having a boyfriend (Kusame 2009: 13).

Glocalizing Yaoi

<12> According to Frank Lechner, "globalization" is "the worldwide diffusion of practices, expansion of relations across continents, organization of social life on a global scale, and growth of a shared global consciousness" (2005: 330-333); supplementing Lechner's notion, according to George Ritzer, "glocalization" is the "interpenetration of the global and the local resulting in unique outcomes in different geographical areas," and "grobalization" refers to the "imperialistic ambitions of nations, corporations, organizations, and the like and their desire, indeed need, to impose themselves on various geographic areas" (2007: 13-15). Following Ritzer, I suggest that yaoi circulates as a matter of glocalization. Furthermore, the glocalization of yaoi is no longer centered on Japan. It is multi-centric, a point often ignored by researchers in yaoi in the transnational context. There is, then, a sore need to aim for the transnational scale when studying BL films within their Chinese context.

<13> Insofar as we have different terms in Japanese, English and Chinese for yaoi and BL, it ought be evident that there exists a transnational dialogue between the various manifestations of BL/yaoi subcultures across different geopolitical regions. For instance, some American academics have established a research portal--YaoiResearchWiki (www.yaoiresearchwiki.com)--for researching global contexts vis-à-vis various cultural forms. The bibliographical list of the YaoiResearchWiki portal comprises three categories, namely shōnen-ai, Boys Love and yaoi. Important to note, few references mention the term fujoshi.

<14> Within the American experience, there exists a counterpart to yaoi, homoerotic sci-fi slash fiction. When Japanese yaoi/BL comics were introduced into the States, the imported texts quickly gained popularity within a particular female subcultural community. In Hong Kong, Taiwan and the PRC, there also exist female fandom of gay-themed and related texts. For example, Leslie Cheung (1956-2003) attracts many ladies, including scholar Natalia Chan who given an entire book over to her devotion to Leslie. Just as telling, the Japanese yaoi/BL subculture has exerted considerable influence over its Chinese counterpart, and vice versa. For example, the Taiwanese BL mimicry Formula 17 has been well received among fujoshi in Japan. The text bears, as well, a Japanese subtitle, Boku no koi, kare no himitsu, literally "my love, his secret."

<15> With the advent of the Internet and the digitalization of media, the circulation of yaoi/BL texts is no longer restricted to the local but can and does reach different places globally.

<16> It is precisely for this reason that many yaoi researches assert that these texts are subversive in terms of cultural flows. Romit Dasgupta's article "The Film Bishonen and Queer(N)Asia through Japanese Popular Culture" bears witness to such subversion by recognizing a kind of shōjo manga (comics for teenage girls, i.e. BL manga) featuring gay relationships between bishōnen ( literally, "beautiful youth," young slim androgynous handsome boy characters in BL manga) (2006: 56). In exploring how Japan popular culture (especially yaoi) flows to other Asian regions in the transnational context, he appropriates Audrey Yue's coinage of "Queer(N)Asia" to explain queer Asian experiences. He notes that many scholars adopt a Western-centric discourse for investigating queer Asian identities, especially gay male identity, suggesting that the gym, parties, designer clothing inscribing sub-cultural practices of gay men in the Asian context are, part and parcel, identical to those of Westerners (60-61). Missed in Western queer discourse, Dasgupta suggests, are that there is a growing popularity of gay texts consumed by younger females that commodifies queer identities and sub-cultures (66-67), that the cultural flow of yaoi is multiple and that, although the subculture originated in Japan, the glocalized yaoi cultural products outside of Japan, especially in Taiwan and Hong Kong, do in fact influence Japan in a reverse flow of influence (67-68).

<17> In contrast to Dasgupta's queer understanding of yaoi, in Japan there is an ongoing debate between fujoshi and gay activists regarding the exploitative nature of yaoi. Gay activists might complaint of yaoi to a BL comics periodical. And fujoshi might argue that they are not participants of yaoi-that is, that they are not dōjinshi-and assert, rather, that they are victims of patriarchy. At this point, yaoi and BL are deemed different (Liu 2009). To this, certain Christians condemn gay people, suggesting that they pollute the innocent minds of fujoshi, who were to their way of thinking originally consumers of BL but not gay texts. The queerscape wherein Dasgupta imagines that bishōnen as yaoi likely destabilizes gender assumption and sexualities (2007: 69). What he suggests, instead, is oppositional reading, accepting as he does that reading by fujoshi, as dominant readings, reinforces certain gender stereotypes. BY extension, the majority of readers who consume BL texts might not use BL texts subversively. I agree with Dasgupta's understanding that there are several "queer" readings of BL texts. To understand BL texts thoroughly, however, we need elucidate how fujoshi read film. As with yaoi and BL films, the reception of fujoshi provides a crucial parameter, underscoring just how necessary it is to study BL films within the context of cult films.

Approaching BL Film and Gay Film as Cult Film

<18> The study of BL film, as in film studies and the study of subculture, is a rarity in English language scholarship, likely because many scholars do not understand Japanese and yaoi subculture well. These same scholars learned that yaoi subculture refers to a group of girls in the ACG fandom, but they routinely fail to link the fan-girl fujoshi experience and yaoi subculture to their study. In many cases, they do not know any fujoshi in real life and, thus, lack the practical point of reference. This absence suggests, inevitably, the necessity of ethnographic methods in the study of fujoshi.

<19> In her article "Subcultural Studies and the Film Audience: Rethinking the Film Viewing Context", criticizing the overemphasis of psychoanalytic and postmodernist theories, Gina Marchetti brilliantly recognizes that many researchers into cult film fail overlook, even dismiss the interaction between film texts and the participants of certain subcultural groups; as a direct result, some subcultural studies appear clichéd (2008: 405-412). Appropriating Marchetti's methodological proposition, I engage in the relationship between BL film/gay film and fujoshi/gay audiences from a personal perspective as an insider/an aca-fan/an observer per se. Finding resonance with Marchetti's understanding of cult film ethnographical methodology, I realize my observations made in this essay might not rise to the level of accepted ethnographical methods used in the discipline of social sciences; yet, I believe strongly that an inclusion of my observations made when I socialized with my fujoshi and ACG fan friends remains beneficial to the discussion of BL films and ACG fandom insofar as they contribute to a larger picture of yaoi and ACG subculture.

<20> I first identified myself as a gay man when I was 16. In 2000, when I was 18, my friend asked me to help him at the comic festival where he wanted to cosplay as a young maid ACG character. Cosplay is a neologism derived from costume and play. To ACG fans, cosplay refers to the carnival when ACG fans disguise themselves as their favorite characters from the ACG world. I should note at this juncture that I am neither a cosplayer nor a big ACG fan. I recall from this time when he debuted his cross-dressing cosplay patrolling experience that it was quite traumatic: in several instances, people spat saliva on him. Later, at other cosplay events, he met some cosplayer girlfriends; and in 2002, he opened a small shop selling ACG souvenirs in arcade in Mongkok, alongside his cosplayer friends.

<21> In the opening ceremony held for the shop, my friend did cosplay as a maiden. He hugged another male cosplayer friend who did cosplay as a male character. As they hugged, they shouted, "BL! BL! BL!" For me, it was such an interesting appropriation of the term. At the same time, my friend had installed his girlfriend as shopkeeper. When I visited their shop, she often greeted me with her BL-hentai comics. As a gay man reading those comics, I failed to identify with the S & M relationship between the "gay" characters. Instead, I found them amusing, funny.

<22> I knew from that point that she was a fujoshi.

<23> Tellingly, had my friend not dated her at that time, she would have become a "triple-loss" youth, someone without job, school or love. Additionally, all the people in the shop, myself included, came from grassroots families of modest means; save my friend and I, his other cosplayer business partners and customers all were undereducated. Besides, I also know some fujoshi when I was an undergraduate. In a feminist cultural studies class, I met a classmate who identified herself as fujoshi. Later, she would enroll in a course on queer theory because she thought she would better understand male homosexuality and, thus, be closer to the BL characters. She had not understood that queer theory serves postmodernist critique of essentialist sexual notions. All in all, she is a bone-ash level fujoshi. As I work on this essay, she recommended that I might read Kusame's The Qualities of Fujoshi (腐女子的品格 Funüzhi de pinge, 2008). I also knew a lecturer in humanities who is a prototypical kifujin who could boast that she had seen Brokeback Mountain some ten times because she found the male relationship both so very touching and fascinating. She also confided to me that she regularly attended most screenings in the Lesbian and Gay Film Festival. Ironically, although I am a gay man, I had not watched Ang's film at the cinema.

<24> I should like to suggest that film scholars approach the study of gay film as cult film, in the sense that Matt Hills uses the term. Refusing cult film as either "cult-as-genre" or "cult-as-fan-discourse," he argues that cult films serve as modalities in the negotiation between producers, audiences, PR and critical discourses (2008: 451). As for "cult-as-genre," Hills observes that, when we talk about genre, we in fact identify several textual features of a film and then accord the film to a given genre. This scheme is problematic, however, in the study of cult film, in large part because we identify both Chinese martial art films (in the Western context) and queer musicals like Rocky Horror Picture Show as cult films, however their textual features differ. What ought be obvious, the former features martial arts masters; the latter stages transvestite singers.

<25>Iconography, thus, as a textual feature, is an insufficient parameter for the determination of a work as a cult film (Hills 2008: 336-451). As for "cult-as-fan-discourse," Hills notes that a cult film is determined by the following of a significant fandom; some cult films are promoted as such by a shrewd marketing team long before they gain the attention of enthusiastic audiences and devoted fans. Hence, Hills proposes that:

Here, 'cult' operates as a modality which inflects the film's more conventionally generic elements, but it also seems to move closer to becoming an accepted genre contract between film-maker and fans. Thus, multiple levels of filmmaker/publicist/journalist/audience cultification can be said to overlap and intersect around the filmic object of Donnie Darko [as a cult film]. (2008: 451)

<26> Furthermore, when they introduce the anthology, The Cult Film Reader, Ernest Mathijs and Xavier Mendik note:

A cult film is a film with an active and lively communal following. Highly committed and rebellious in its appreciation, its audience regularly finds itself at odds with the prevailing cultural mores, displaying a preference for strange topics and allegorical themes that rub against cultural sensitivities and resist dominant politics. Cult films transgress common notions of good and bad taste, and they challenge genre conventions and coherent storytelling, often using intertexual references, gore, leaving loose ends or creating a sense of nostalgia. They frequently have troublesome production histories, coloured by accidents, failures, legends and mysterious that

involves their stars and directors, and in spite of often-limited accessibility, they have a continuous market value and a long-lasting public presence. (2008: 11)

<27> Referring both to Hills and Mathijs and Mendik, I consider gay(-themed) film to be a modality instead of purely a "genre", and the same can be said for BL films. I contend that lesbian and gay films should be considered as such because "lesbian," "gay" and even "queer" are often used as qualities to shape the genre label assigned; various gay, lesbian and queer films might share different textual features. For instance, in his book Straightly-gay, Brian Leung laments the notable absence of gay comedy, gay sci-fi film, gay gangster film, gay cartoon, gay ghost film, gay Chinese New Year film, gay wuxia film (2009: 174). By saying as much, Leung implies both that different "gay" films need not share a single set of textual features that qualify a genre and that "gay" films are determined by the reception of gay people as "fans." Against this reading, gay-themed films, BL films included, are neither "cult-as-genre" nor "cult-as-fan-discourse." The benefit of conceptualizing gay-themed films/BL films as "modality" in Hills's sense of cult film is that we can immediately identify the inadequacy of genre theory in understanding in such instances.

<28> For the remainder of this essay, I will explore in some detail the three modalities of "gay" film-tongzhi film, BL film and gay exploitation cinema-which adhere to the above notion. To elaborate, I use tongzhi film to denote "politically correct" LGBT-themed films, BL film for those films marketed as such, and gay exploitation cinema for those films targeting an LGBT audience. What remains at issue, promotional campaigns supporting these films often lead us to question whether works made by filmmakers who showed hostility towards LGBT people can, in truth, be termed tongzhi film in any real sense.

An Overview of BL Films

<29> Brokeback Mountain stands as a mimicry of BL comics in the U.S. In Japan, we have the BL films, Boys Love and Yaji & Kita: The Midnight Pilgrims, both dedicated to fujoshi. In Taiwan, Formula 17 and Eternal Summer, for example, resemble BL films. And in Hong Kong, Dasgupta proposes bishōnen as yaoi. I consider City without Baseball and Permanent Residence as problematic pieces in the study of these modalities. I prefer to elaborate them vis-à-vis fandom and consumption, theme and marketing and critical discourses.

BL Film and Female Authorship

<30> In his "The Chinese Side of the Mountain," Berry observes that BL texts are "popular culture stories produced for and often by straight women about love between two handsome young men." According to Kotani, BL is "a term used to describe texts and a broader subculture characterized by a predilection for male-male love stories, stories created by and for women." And yaoi scholars generally agree that BL texts are comprise of a kind of so-called "gay-themed" stories created by and consumed by women. The first part of the assumption-"created by women"-implies that the authorship of BL texts is female; the second part of the assumption- "created for women"-asserts that the consumption and fandom of BL text belong to women.

<31> To a certain extent, the first part of the assumption- "created by women" -is valid. But in reality, the matter of authorship of BL/ yaoi can be far more complicated.

<32> Whereas the original short story of "Brokeback Mountain" (1997) was penned by the American female journalist and writer, Annie Proulx (b. 1935), the director of the filmic adaptation is a male, Ang Lee; the screenwriters are Larry McMurtry and Dianna Ossana, a combination of a man and a woman (2008: 35). Similarly, for the Japanese BL film Boys Love (ボーイズラブ Bōizu Rabu, 2006), the director (Kōtarō Terauchi, b. 1975) and the screenwriter (Saki Senoo) are men. As for Stanley Kwan's Lan Yu (藍宇, 2001) identified by Berry as a BL mimicry, it is originated from an internet novel written by a woman (identified only as a Beijing tongzhi) and directed by a gay man (Stanley Kwan, b. 1957) (36). As for the Taiwanese Formula 17 (17歲的天空 Shi qi sui de tian kong, 2004), directed by Chen Yin-jung, the script is written by a gay man (Rady Fu). The Taiwanese film Eternal Summer (盛夏光年 Shengxia guang nian, 2006), was filmed by male director Leste Chen (b. 1984). The Japanese tale of the love between two samurai, Yaji and Kita (真夜中の弥次さん喜多さん Mayonaka no Yaji-san Kita-san, 2005), adapted from a comic book inspired by the traditional kokkeibon, or Japanese comical novel, written by a male writer, Jippensha Ikku (十返舎一九, 1765-1831) was shot by male director Kudo Kankuro (b. 1970). In addition to films, in the production of yaoi and BL comics in Japan, there are both female authors as well as some anonymous male authors who use female pseudonyms. Thus, to assume that all BL and yaoi productions are created by female only is problematic and categorically untrue. In reality, the authors of BL texts come from different sexes, genders and sexualities; the authors of gay-themed films or gay films, then, cannot always be said to be gay men.

BL Films and Female Consumption

<33> The second part of the initial assumption is that BL film is created for women, suggesting that females are the major consumers of BL texts or fujoshi forms the fandom of yaoi/BL. To a certain extent, it may ring true. Berry proposes the following hypothesis:

. . . what is different about Brokeback Mountain is that it also draws on Yaoi or tongrennu culture. By this I mean that it stages a gay male love story for female audiences. In one sense, this is very easy to understand. As a mainstream film, Brokeback Mountain was never intended only or even primarily for gay audiences. They would be too few to sustain a mainstream release. But when a straight couple is deciding which film they will go to see on a Saturday night, who do you think decides they will see Brokeback Mountain? The man or the woman? The answer is obvious. Not many straight men would suggest seeing a gay love story. (2008: 34)

<34> In Hong Kong, however, Brokeback Mountain has risen to cult status. For example, the Brokeback multiple-watching experience of mykifujin lecturer is evidence in support of Berry's hypothesis. Furthermore, the Japanese films, Boys Love and Yaji and Kita: The Midnight Pilgrims, boast a huge fujoshi fan population. The popularity of the Boys Love has led to a dramatic stage production with a totally different story. The actor who plays the film character journalist Taishin becomes a teacher in the new production. He struggles against the blackmail of BL love with his students. The fan base for Yaji and Kita is even more remarkable: alongside of the special edition of DVD box set dedicated to loyal fujoshi fans, there are routine fan gatherings and activities organized.

<35> The consumption of these works by female fujoshi, it would seem, plays just as an important role in determining BL films as fujoshi do in BL comics. But is female consumption sufficient to explain the popularity of BL films?

<36> The answer is clearly "no."

<37> Cult film experts, among them Mathijs and Mendik and Hills, suggest that a rigorous investigation of the marketing aspects is needed in the study of cult films (2008: 11; 2008: 451). For in addition to the consumption and fandom of BL cultural texts, BL films benefit greatly and may even "serve as" a marketing strategy.

BL films as Niche Marketing Strategy

<38> Apart from the previous assumptions on authorship and consumption about BL films and texts, according to Shiau Hong-Chi, the label "Boys Love" corresponds to a niche market strategy in the film industry in Taiwan these days. In his "Marketing Boys' Love: Taiwan's Independent Film, Eternal Summer, and Its Audiences," Shiau investigates the audience focus group in the promotion of Eternal Summer (2008: 157-171), a gay-themed film following the success of similar films, Formula 17 and Brokeback Mountain. Surprisingly, the Taiwanese local film industry was in decline at that time, and the number of productions and audiences had dropped sharply.

<39> The successful box office of these films, however, indicates the profitability of the gay-themed film as a niche market. With the rise of small cinema complexes in shopping malls and the decline of large theatre, it is believed that gay men and high school girls now form the majority of movie goers in Taiwan. In the focus group of Eternal Summer, the director had expressed his belief that the gay men must have been pleased by the shirtless bed scenes between Jonathan and Shane. In fact, his assumption proved wrong. Most gay men disliked the film because Jonathan's unrequited love towards Shane recalls on one level gay men's traumatic memory of rejection by straight men, especially good male friends. I had watched the film with two gay friends and one "fag hag," all Comparative Literature classmates who were taking a course in queer theory. All expressed their dislike of the film, suggesting that the representation of sexualities is repressive and not "queer" enough.

<40> True, a number of my other gay friends preferred the actor Joseph Chang in the role of Shane, not the least for his "college frat jock" body, but they also found the storyline uncomfortable. Surprisingly, within the focus group showed the film, high school girls expressed unanimous feedback. Most of them felt remorse for the character of Jonathan, suggesting that fujoshi high school girls likely identified Jonathan as a typical uke , the preferred and most desirable character in BL texts. As a marketing strategy, the production staff of Eternal Summer cast a gay-appealing actor and a fujoshi-appealing actor into a BL-like narrative. More to the point, by promoting the film as BL film instead of gay film, the marketing team had shifted overtly their promotional focus from gay men to high school girls. Ultimately, they filled the theatres with of female audiences.

Gendering BL Films and Fujoshi-led Misogyny

<41> In my personal anecdote of Eternal Summer vis-à-vis Shiau's empiricist reception study, it is indicated that there is a subtle difference between BL and gay films. One major characteristic of BL text would be the representation of a gay couple with dichotomous "gender" roles. In Japanese, the two so-called gay "genders" in BL texts are seme, the attacker, and uke, the receiver. The seme is usually portrayed with masculine traits, having a boyish appearance and short hair, protecting the partner and being dominant and active; the uke is often depicted with feminine traits, having androgynous long hair and big eyes and being submissive. Sexually speaking, seme and uke are usually active (penetrator) and passive (receptive to penetration), respectively. To supplement this "essentialist" distinction, the comics book, The Qualities of Fujoshi, provides a more complicated typification of BL characters which introduces nine types of male characters in BL comics. Type 1 is called student's union president uke, who is usually a calm, responsible and chic perfectionist (Kusame 2008: 110). Type 2 is feeble, loyal puppy-like seme who is caring and nice (111). Type 3 is elitist seme who is confident in and proud of himself and has strong leadership skills (111). Type 4 is artistic uke who has a pure heart and thinks that no one can truly understand him (112). Type 5 is named "S-glasses" seme who is eccentric and has a thirst for knowledge (112). Type 6 is nicknamed "Friend A" who is a boy-next-door type and who gives others a sense of security (113). Type 7 is innocent uke who is eager to make friends and make people happy (113). Type 8 is stubborn, wayward, wishy-washy uke (114). Type 9 is hippie-like seme who enjoys a footloose lifestyle (114). What is immediately obvious, in terms of their depictions genders and sexualities, yaoi subculture/BL texts are by their very nature hardly so subversive as most scholars assert.

<42> Set in a contemporary Japanese cityscape, the film Boys Love is a tragedy of triangular love between a couple, Taishin and Noel, and Noel's admirer, Chidori. Noel is a sassy, egocentric and promiscuous high school student while Taishin is a magazine editor whose task is to interview Noel as a part-time model. Different from Noel's personality, Taishin is a lovely, sexually puritan, innocent and shy. Noel is skilled at painting while Taishin is skilled at boxing. Because he thinks no one can understand him, Noel draws; Taishin is a loyal if effete person whose psyche comes to the fore with sports. Noel is promiscuous, and Taishin is monogamous. Noel has long hair and big eyes, feminine in physical appearance; Taishin maintains a boyish short hair. Moreover, when Chidori attempts to hit Taishin, Noel sacrifices himself and is subsequently hurt. In the end, Taishin embraces Noel and they soak themselves in the sea in an attempt to protect Noel from the suffering in the world. Discounting Noel's stronger egocentric personality for the moment, Noel and Taishin resemble a playboy (Type 4) and a slightly sportsman (Type 2), respectively.

<43> In the Taiwanese film Formula 17, Tien is a young and innocent village boy, and Bai sports a bad reputation as a playboy-but a playboy who suffers from the phobia of real love. In something on a twist on expectations, Tien is the uke with short hair; Bai is a well-groomed metrosexual seme with fashionable clothing and long hair. A Type 7 uke, Tien is depicted as an innocent village boy who is eager to seek a monogamous lover; Bai is Type 9 seme whose footloose lifestyle renders him incapable to finding "real love."

<44> Apart from Boys Love and Formula 17, Berry looks at Brokeback Mountain and identifies ranch hand Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) as a seme with weak determination and rodeo cowboy Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) an uke with stronger determination in Brokeback (2008: 36). Having experienced first-hand the childhood trauma of witnessing gay-bashing, Ennis is afraid of being discriminated against. Cowardly, Ennis is a timid Type 2 seme. Jack is braver and takes the initiative in their relationship, establishing him as a Type 1 uke.

<45> What should be apparent now in most BL texts is an absence of women. Boys Love and Formula 17 have no female characters. The female characters of Brokeback Mountain are not emphasized. And in Eternal Summer, the only female Hui-Chia is depicted as "third party" who deliberately steps between Jonathan and Shane. She fails to tempt Jonathan but triumphs with Shane. Thus, she is depicted as a villain who brings misery down upon all three. In fact, the absence of women is itself an example of subtle misogyny, even as it creates a negative space of escapism for the fujoshi, distancing their physical selves from the characters within the texts. In Brian Leung's fujoshi radio interview, R and Shirley suggest that most fujoshi find the depiction of teenage girls in such comics, as ridiculous and "bitchy" individuals who find in menacing the handsome male characters, annoying. They find the BL relationship is a fair one, different from the patriarchal and heterosexist relationship, at least in part because the protagonists are all males. Hence, the act of erasing women from BL texts underscores that fujoshi-led misogyny is a parameter shaping the scope of BL films.

The Romanticization of Gay Love in BL films

<46> The romanticization of gay love is a feature of BL films. However, it is a vague concept, suggesting that BL films only show those aspects of gay love of interest to fujoshi consumers. Consider how they are focused on the sentiments of Boys Love. The love between gay men is rarely identified as an articulation of their essentialist identity. In Hong Kong Lesbian and Gay Film Festival 2007, I attended the two screenings of Boys Love. After one show, when I was about to leave the auditorium, I overheard murmuring between a gay couple, obviously dissatisfied with the final scene in which Taishin hugs Noel and they retreat into the sea. Their comments suggested that the tragic sentiments in the finale are viewed as distractions among gay audiences. Similarly, a gay student who had attended the film me found the film wholly unrealistic. My observation of the responses of females within the audience detected a shared sense of excited. And however much the romanticization of gay love remains an element of BL films, it is affective and, therefore, difficult to measure it.

<47> Due to research constraints, I paid little attention to what elements of BL films contribute to the sentiments of fujoshi but suggest that further systematic reception studies of BL films ought be done. Although some postmodernist critics might find the study of romanticization an essentialist notion, this kind of reception study may best describe the difference of reactions among different group audiences I witnessed.

Critique-al Visibility and Gay Exploitative Cinema

<48> How we read a film is a critical and political notion. In her article "Queer Visibility in Commodity Culture," Rosemary Hennessy writes:

Critique is a political practice and a mode of reading that establishes the intimate links between the visible and the historical by taking as its starting point a systemic understanding of the social. A radical critique of sexuality or sexual identity understands that the visibility of any particular construction of sexuality or sexual identity is historical in that it is shaped by an ensemble of social arrangements. As a way of seeing sexuality, critique insists on making connections between the emergence of a discourse or identity in industrialized social formations and the international division of labor, between sexy commodity images and labor, the spectacle and the sweatshop, style and class. (1995: 176)

<49> In the Brokeback Mountain anecdote beginning this essay, I mentioned certain readings, as a "gay cowboy movie," as Ang Lee's "great American epic love story," as "Boys Love" mimicry, among others. Each reading has a different political implication. By claiming his film as a great American epic love story, Lee wishes shifts the focus to other non-sexualized aspects of his film and, in doing so, averts homophobic commentaries and attracts larger audiences. Recognizing the film as BL mimicry, Berry distinguishes between BL and "gay" films, suggesting that people recognize a difference between various depictions of gay people.

<50> In Japan, the conflict between gay activists and fujoshi over the exploitative nature of yaoi/BL, as previously mentioned, undermines how we recognize different representations of male same-sex love. In Hong Kong and Taiwan, the homophobic but gay film director Scud aroused controversy with his two films. The controversy reading his debut film, City Without Baseball, as gay exploitative. A fictional story about the Hong Kong Baseball Team and acted by real-life baseball players from the team, the film narrates the ups and downs of the baseball team and how the bi-curious boy Ah Chun and Ah Chun's girlfriend share in their adoration towards chief player Ah Chung. Ultimately, Ah Chun is rejected by Ah Chung.

<51> The marketing team initially targeted their pitch at gay audiences. They spent huge sums in hanging up posters at bus stops showing the shirtless actors; moreover, they promoted it at the biggest Asian gay website portal Fridae.com (www.fridae.com) by posting banners and giving away free preview tickets. Once the local LGBT radio program We Are Family interviewed the director and the main actors Ah Chun and Ah Chung, at which time Ah Chung resorted to gay-bashing speech. Due to his homophobic remarks, some local queer activists spearheaded a boycott, even as the crew attempted to legitimize their homophobic remarks under the rubric of freedom of speech (Tan 2008).

<52> Due to the boycott, Scud shifted their promotional strategy towards women by asserting that the male scenes tailored to the interests of women. In a free preview, local social-activist-cum-fag-hag, Christina Chan, was upset by the crews of the film (2008). At the showing, Chan sat with her friend behind Scud and the two leading actors, Ah Chung and Ah Chun. While the film was showing, Chan muttered about the homophobic sense of the film to her friend. Ah Chung stood up and insulted her, using with coarse language twice before a packed house. None of the film crew stopped him. In an online radio program, Scud said that it is meaningless for queer activists to boycott his film because it would not help the elimination of homophobia. A week later, the windows of Scud's office were destroyed. He accused boycotters. The police arrested no one for the incident, and his accusation was considered by many as homophobic. [2]

<53> In her "Anti-gay Speech: A Necessary Evil?", Yau Ching notes that the distinction between "authentic" and "pseudo-gay" films is problematic since the boundary is not known (2008). To a certain extent, I agree with her assessment that there is no fixed boundary between different modalities or genres of film. However, in reality the daily comments made by the film audiences essentialize some qualities (e.g. textual features) of films and put them into select categories. On the Facebook group webpage "Boycott HK movie City Without Baseball," there are many discussions of what constitutestongzhi films and gay films, for example. One of the commentators, Uranus Lai, thinks that to judge the validity of the boycott against City Without Baseball is relevant to rationale of the boycott; he even as to why homophobic people might shoot films targeting at gay people, underscoring that readings of a particular film are multiple. Potential audiences judge whether a film is homophobic before they view it. In such a context, a critical discursive space is negotiated over the issue of visibility of a minority group (e.g., gay people). Different labels concerning film genre or modality are generated for understanding the film.

<54> These incidents question whether this film is a gay film or a BL film, or even a gay exploitative film. Conventionally, a baseball film about homosocial bonding is a buddy film, and a buddy film is not women's genre per se. A buddy film about aggression could not be a BL film for women since it lacks a certain sentimentality associated with fujoshi. It does not have the morose ending of Boys Love. Bolstering the validity of this postulate, consider my friend's comments on Eternal Summer, the mutterings of a gay couple and my student's dissatisfaction. To attract pink money, it seems the prerequisite is gay identification. This film does not, further evidence that the behavior by Scud's film crew is, unquestionably, homophobic.

<55> But does promoting a film on Fridae.com necessarily qualified it as a politically gay-friendly film or tongzhi film?

<56> As Chou Wah-Shan puts, the aim of tongzhi is to fight against homophobia:

Tongzhi symbolizes a strong sentiment for integrating the sexual (legitimizing same-sex love), political (sharing the goals of combating heterosexism), and cultural (reappropriating Chinese identity). It is the cultural uniqueness of stressing both zhi (subverting heterosexism) and tong (sexual difference) between tongzhi and non-tongzhi) that the insights of the tongzhi perspective lie, of going beyond the homo-hetero dichotomy without losing the sociopolitical specificity of the sexual minority. (2000: 3)

<57> It seems obvious that some films targeting pink money may not neatly fit Chou's conceptualization of Tongzhi. By shifting its promotion target from gay men to fujoshi women, there is a possibility that City Without Baseball infringes the cultural citizenship of gay men and even fujoshi. As they have legitimized gay-bashing, the discourses by Scud and his team failed to qualify as tongzhi, given that their advocacy of homophobic speech distances themselves from tongzhi. Hence, there exists room for asserting that films of this kind are gay/ tongzhi exploitative film. To sum up, different critical positions may lead to different critiques, suggesting that the boundaries between tongzhi films, BL film and gay exploitation cinema remained unfixed. Some views might view a given film as gay exploitative, while some find pleasure in reference to homosexualities. The negotiation between different film modalities is never-ending.

Conclusion: When is a Gay-themed film not a Tongzhi film?

<58> Tongzhi is a discourse employed by Chinese activists for fighting against homophobia. The abstract concept of "Critique-al Visibility" explains why LGBT people, for example, cannot accept every portrayal of themselves in cinema as faithful to their (sexual)(ly)/(political)(ly)/(marketing/consumerist) identities. In the lack of positive portrayals, ordinary gay people would consider any portrayals related to them as portrayals of themselves; queer people with "Critique-al Visibility" will look for portrayals faithful to their sexualities/ political stance. For the depictions of gay love, the differentiation among BL film, gay film, and tongzhi film can be considered as a matter of "Critique-al Visibility." Berry's recognition of Brokeback Mountain as BL mimicry shows that he has "Critique-al Visibility" differentiating the film from highly-politicized tongzhi discourse. Although Scud recently has come out as gay, his homophobic persona offers a gap for negotiating "Critique-al Visibility." To claim his films as gay exploitative cinema with reference to his homophobic persona is to re-assert the highly politicized notion of tongzhi and indicates that even gay directors can be homophobic. Each label (e.g. BL film, tongzhi film) bares different political weightiness depending upon contexts.

Acknowledgements: The author expresses his deepest gratitude to his thesis supervisor, Dr. Gina Marchetti, as well as to his external and internal examiners, Professor Chris Berry and Dr. Travis Kong. All shortcomings, however, are entirely his own.

Notes

[1] Cf. Sharing the Story: The Making of Brokeback Mountain, 2006.

[2] For example, Eric Leung, one of the hosts of We Are Family, expresses that it is homophobic for the director of City Without Baseball Scud to accuse the people who boycotted his film for the destruction of his office before the police found someone guilty. See Eric@RTHK Radio2 [Eric Leung]. "Wuyezhicheng, niwuyeama? (無野之城, 你無野丫嘛?/ City Without Baseball, What had happened?)" Yahoo! Blog. 10 June 2008, Yahoo! Blog. Webblog. 1 March, 2010.

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