| The Cave of the Silken Web | |
| Director: | Dan Duyu |
| Screenplay: | Guan Ji'an |
| Starring: | Yin Mingzhu |
| Cinematography: | Dan Ganting |
| Runtime: | 60 min |
| Country: | Republic of China |
| Language: | Silent (Chinese intertitles) |
The Cave of the Silken Web a.k.a. Journey to the West - the Spiders Cave a.k.a. Spiders is a 1927 Chinese film directed by Dan Duyu and starring Yin Mingzhu as the first spider spirit.[1] It is based on an episode of the shenmo fantasy novel Journey to the West, a Chinese literary classic written in the Ming Dynasty.
The ten-reel silent film was produced by Shanghai Yingxi Company.[1]
It was thought to be a lost film until 2011, when an original copy of The Cave of the Silken Web was discovered in the archives of the National Library in Mo i Rana, Norway.[2] [3] [4] The film was presented at the 2013 Films from the South festival in Oslo.[5] Roughly three-quarters of the film is preserved, the first reel and a section in the middle is lost. The Norwegian copy has retained the original Chinese intertitles, but includes additional jokes in Norwegian written for the local audience.
The film was followed by a sequel in 1930: The Cave of the Silken Web II a.k.a. Spiders II, also directed by Dan Duyu and starring Yin Mingzhu.[6] The sequel is believed to be a lost film.[7]