The Generation, Transformation, and Dissipation of the “Sixth Generation” Cinema in China: The Entropy Change of a Concept

Abstract Ever since its advent in the 1990s, the term “Sixth Generation,” as a postulated label, has so far run the course of three consecutive phases: generation, transformation, and dissipation. In the first phase (1990–2003), the Sixth Generation directors based their films on the authenticity of their individual experiences and significantly altered the structure of cinematic power and aesthetic expression in China. The second phase (2003–2008) witnessed the group’s entry into a period characterized by a “generation-less” narrative drawing closer to mainstream cultural capital, market, and filmic techniques. The market overexploited the label of the Sixth Generation, and its independent identity was corrupted. 2009 and 2010 constituted the third phase in which the Sixth Generation sought all the possibilities for market survival by shooting a wide range of films, from mainstream production to commercial films. Since 2011, the label “Sixth Generation” went through a process of self-dissolution. Nevertheless, these directors once again came together on the platform of new media, transforming their energy through microfilm and continuing to exert social influence directly or indirectly.