Description

Horror to the Extreme

Changing Boundaries in Asian Cinema

Jinhee Choi and Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano

  • Published: August 2009
  • Subject Listing: Film Studies, Asian Studies
  • Bibliographic information: 260 pp., 6 x 9 in.
  • Territorial rights: North American rights only
  • Distributed for: Hong Kong University Press
  • Series: TransAsia: Screen Cultures
  • Contents

"From The Ring to The Host and beyond, Asian horror has become a regional brand with global reach. Yet, this culturally and commercially significant phenomenon has been conspicuously neglected - until now. Horror to the Extreme is the book we've all been waiting for. Focusing heavily on Japanese and Korean films, but extending to Hong Kong and Southeast Asia, it follows the contours of the hit genre and examines it from a variety of angles, making this an ideal book for newcomers and connoisseurs alike." - Chris Berry, Goldsmiths, University of London

This book compares production and consumption of Asian horror cinemas in different national contexts and their multidirectional dialogues with Hollywood and neighboring Asian cultures. Individual essays highlight common themes including technology, digital media, adolescent audience sensibilities, transnational co-productions, pan-Asian marketing techniques, and variations on good vs. evil evident in many Asian horror films.

Contributors include Kevin Heffernan, Adam Knee, Chi-Yun Shin, Chika Kinoshita, Robert Cagle, Emilie Yeh Yueh-yu, Neda Ng Hei-tung, Hyun-suk Seo, Kyung Hyun Kim, and Robert Hyland.

Jinhee Choi is a lecturer of film studies at the University of Kent.

Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano is an assistant professor of film studies at Carleton University.
Contents
List of Contributors

Introduction - Jinhee Choi and Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano

I. Contesting Genres: From J-horror to "Asia Extreme"
1. J-horror: New Media's Impact on Contemporary Japanese Horror Cinema - Mitsuyo Wada-Marciano
2. A Cinema of Girlhood: Sonyeo Sensibility and the Decorative Impulse in the Korean Horror Cinema - Jinhee Choi
3. Inner Senses and the Changing Face of Hong Kong Horror Cinema - Kevin Heffernan
4. The Pan-Asian Outlook of The Eye - Adam Knee
5. The Art of Branding: Tartan "Asia Extreme" Films - Chi-Yun Shin

II. Contextualizing Horror: Film Movement, National History, and Taboo
6. The Mummy Complex: Kurosawa Kiyoshi's Loft and J-horror - Chika Kinoshita
7. The Good, the Bad, and the South Korean: Violence, Morality, and the South Korean Extreme Film - Robert L. Cagle
8. Magic, Medicine, Cannibalism: The China Demon in Hong Kong Horror - Emilie Yueh-yu Yeh and Neda Hei-tung Ng

III. Iconography of Horror: Personal Belongings, Bodies, and Violence
9. That Unobscure Object of Desire and Horror: On Some Uncanny Things in Recent Korean Horror Films - Hyun-suk Seo
10. "Tell the Kitchen That There's Too Much Buchu in the Dumpling": Reading Park Chan-wook's "Unknowable" Oldboy - Kyung Hyun Kim
11. A Politics of Excess: Violence and Violation in Miike Takashi's Audition - Robert Hyland

Notes
Bibliography
Index
Reviews