Between local and global: The Hong Kong Film Syndrome in South Korea

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Content BETWEEN LOCAL AND GLOBAL:
THE HONG KONG FILM SYNDROME IN SOUTH KOREA
by
Hyung-Sook Lee
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
C IN EM A-TELE VISION (CRITICAL STUDIES)
August 2006
Copyright 2006 Hyung-Sook Lee
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UMI Number: 3236522
Copyright 2006 by
Lee, Hyung-Sook
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To My Mom, Dad, Brother,
And the Rest of My Family
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Every dissertation has its story. So I believe. At least this dissertation was done in
a certain circumstance that created difficulty for everybody involved in it. Some
compromises were inevitable and some stories are left for future discussion. But
for now, this is what came out to the world.
I want to express my deep gratitude to my dissertation chair Dr. David James, and
committee members Dr. Priya Jaikumar and Dr. Stanley Rosen, for their time,
incredible patience, and most of all, for their invaluable insights that helped me go
through this process. Without their generous support up to the last minute, this
work would have easily yielded to the pressing circumstance.
Words cannot deliver my love and thanks for my family. They made everything
possible from the beginning. My late father, mother, brother, and my beautiful
newly added family members. They let me grow up pursuing what I wanted. I
dream to be a better person for them. Thank you for being with me.
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IV
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication ii
Acknowledgements iii
List of Tables v
Abstract vi
Introduction 1
Chapter I. The Anxious Local Cinema:
Issues of South Korean Cinema in
the 1980s-1990s 28
Chapter II. The Encounter Between Peripherals:
The Hong Kong Film Syndrome in South Korea 61
1. The Period of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome
(1987-1994) 61
2. The Sino-Effects in South Korean Cinema 94
Chapter HI. Traveling Stars, Shifting Boundaries 127
1. Transnational Popular Culture and the Tension of
Regional Identity: A Ban on Happy Together in
South Korea 127
2. Hybrid Identity and the (Un)Settling of Borders:
Hailing Takeshi Kaneshiro, East Asian Style 153
Chapter IV. Changing Scenes: Moving from Local to Global 187
Conclusion 227
Bibliography 234
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V
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Annual Record of Korean Films’ Entry to
International Film Festivals 4
Table 2: Annual Export Record of Korean Films 4
Table 3: Domestic Film Production vs. Foreign Film
Import Chart 50
Table 4: The Number of Foreign Films Imported in South
Korea 73
Table 5: The Distribution of VCRs in Korea 83
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VI
ABSTRACT
This dissertation examines the significance of transnational cultural exchange
between the South Korean and Hong Kong film industries from the mid-1980s to
the 2000s. By looking at the influence of the neighboring culture on Korean
cinema in its transitional period, I argue that local collaborations mark a crucial
intermediate stage for a local culture such as Korean cinema to move onward to
larger global markets.
The mid-1980s to the mid-1990s in Korean film culture can be
designated as the period of the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome.” At this time, not
only were an enormous number of Hong Kong films imported into Korea, but also
they were more popular than Korean films among domestic audiences. This
phenomenon was succeeded by “Hanryu,” the enthusiastic reception of Korean
popular culture including cinema, in Asia in the 2000s. The dissertation traces the
relation between the two cultural trends, focusing on the way in which the
influence of Hong Kong cinema led into the popularity of Korean cinema. From
the perspective of the Korean film industry, the study suggests that Hong Kong
cinema supplied a creative inspiration as well as alternative cinematic pleasure
both to the Korean film industry and audience at that time, which eventually
assisted the transformation of the domestic film culture.
To better understand the function of the neighbor’s culture during the
transitional period of Korean cinema, the study first looks at the situation of the
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Korean film industry at the time, especially focusing on oppressive national
politics and economic pressure from Hollywood. Following is an in-depth analysis
of the popularity of Hong Kong cinema and its influence on later Korean films.
Particular attention is paid to transnational stars such as Leslie Cheung or Takeshi
Kaneshiro as agents who widened the cultural imagination of Korean society. The
overview of the later stage, “Hanryu” and the Pan-Asian co-productions, will
elucidate the numerous “East Asian strategies” witnessed in international film
markets. Through the specific case study of the culture industries of Korea and
Hong Kong, the dissertation suggests the important catalytic role of local
cooperation in the globalization of a local culture.
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1
INTRODUCTION
In the wee hours of April the 1st 2004,1 arrived in Hong Kong for the first time in
my life. Although I had never been there, I felt as if I knew the city so well and was
returning after a short absence. Yes, the city was so familiar to me, not through
knowledge learned from books or statistics, but through the images and sounds that
made stories from recorded lives of people in it. Since my late teen years, I grew up
watching more Hong Kong films than films produced in my own country South
Korea. It was not because I had a special taste for exotic foreign culture, but simply
because they were widely available and at that time Hong Kong films were more
popular than Korean films among Korean youth. Having culturally subsisted on a
regular diet of Hong Kong films for years, I felt as if I was not just watching, but
vicariously living the lives of Hong Kong people through the films. Therefore, when
I first set my feet on the land of Hong Kong, almost fifteen years after I first knew
the city through a film, it was exactly what they called “deja vu,” the moment that
you feel like you have lived before.1
After a few days of participating in a conference on transnational Hong
Kong cinema, I managed to find time to go to the special screenings of Leslie
Cheung and Anita Mui, held by the Hong Kong Film Festival. They represented two
pillars of the glorious days of the Hong Kong film industry in the 1980s and the
1990s, along with a few other notable names. And they had passed away a year
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before; Cheung on April 1st, 2003 in an alleged suicide, and Mui shortly after that,
from cancer. Having heard Cheung’s suicide news on the second day of my PhD
examination, a day when I had to write extensively about the history of Hong Kong
and Korean films, I know that his and later Mui’s death was not only a tragedy for
Hong Kong society but for all Asian societies that keep very endearing memories of
them through their screen presence. In the theater where I went to see their films, I
encountered a group of Korean fens of my generation who were visiting Hong Kong
just to commemorate the one-year anniversary of Cheung’s death. Seeing those
Korean fens there in one theater in Hong Kong was such an unexpected but
meaningful experience to me. They not only brought back all my cherished cultural
memories of my youth, but also seemed to prove all the hypotheses and speculation
that I was formulating about the role of Hong Kong films in Korea for the last two
decades in regard to all the border crossing desires and movements that were
provoked in Korean popular culture through Hong Kong cinema. Hong Kong
cinema always reminds me of the imagery of fluidity, transition, and movement. It
may be because of the changes that Korean society and popular culture in general
were experiencing, together with Hong Kong cinema’s significant presence in both.
Could it be coincidence or is there any correlation? That is die initial question that
nudged me to delve into the relationship between Hong Kong and South Korea, and
their film cultures.
This dissertation intends to answer the question above and also to
expand the inquiry further by examining the influence of Hong Kong cinema on
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Korean cinema, particularly since the mid-1980s. By looking at the various levels of
influence that Hong Kong cinema left on the cultural and social imagination of
Korean people as well as on the film texts and industrial practices of Korean cinema,
I argue that the encounter between compatible local cultures and their mutual
collaborations provide a crucial intermediate stage for a specific local culture such
as Korean cinema to develop into a globally competitive culture industry.
Since the late 1990s, the global film circuit has praised the Korean film
industry for its rapid growth.2 The symptom of success was first witnessed in the
recent zealous ardor over Korean popular culture in Asia, called the “Hanryu” or the
“Korean Wave.” In this regional cultural trend, Korean pop music, TV dramas, and
films inspire enormous fandom in not only Korea’s closet neighboring countries in
East Asia such as China, Japan or Taiwan, but also in numerous Southeast Asian
countries. While the popularity of other areas of Korean pop culture remains to be a
regional phenomenon during this period of “Hanryu,” Korean cinema is getting
recognition from wider global audiences. The success is demonstrated in critical
acclaim and box office revenues. Not only has there been a remarkable increase in
the number of Korean films entered for international film festivals in the recent few
years (Table 1), but the number of prestigious awards won by Korean filmmakers
has escalated as well.3 The commercial potential of Korean films was also
demonstrated during the same period in domestic and foreign box office. In
particular, the rising export number of Korean films verifies the demand of Korean
films from foreign film industries lately (Table 2).
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Table 1: Annual Record of Korean Films’ Entry to International Film Festivals
Year Number of Film
Festivals Entered
Number of Korean
Films Entered
Number of Entry
1992 41 59 133
1993 58 51 103
1994 54 39 90
1995 60 48 124
1996 53 78 160
1997 54 40 123
1998 68 72 187
1999 73 72 187
2000 138 126 387
2001 96 176 431
2002 108 156 362
2003 159 120 423
2004 160 130 475
Table 2: Annual Export Record of Korean Films4
Year Number of Films
Exported
Price Per Film (US $)
1992 14 13,993
1993 14 12,417
1994 14 44,349
1995 15 13,912
1996 30 13,467
1997 36 13,667
1998 33 93,144
1999 75 79,590
2000 38 185,625
2001 102 110,289
2002 133 112,422
2003 162 191,228
2004 193 301,993
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All these situations prove that Korean cinema as well as general Korean
popular culture is experiencing the height of its prosperity at the moment. There are
opinions that it is still premature to announce the “international success” of Korean
cinema at the moment, especially because most export revenues of Korean films are
garnered from Asian markets. According to the KOFIC statistics, in 2004,77.80% of
the entire annual film export results were sold to Asian countries; 61% in 2003; 70%
in 2002, etc. In terms of commercial success in international markets beyond Asia,
Korean films are far behind compared to other films from East Asia, especially those
Chinese language films that entered the global market long before Korean films
did.5 Even so, if we look at the dramatic improvement that Korean cinema has made
in a short period not only in a commercial sense but also in its aesthetic maturity as
determined by film festivals, it could still be considered to be a success that makes
us anticipate more to come.
The dramatic improvement of Korean cinema in recent years greatly
increased interest in Korean cinema in academia and journalism both inside and
outside of Korea. The resultant numerous recent analyses contributed to
contemporary Korean cinema are usually filled with an adulatory and celebratory
tone, attributing the success of the national film industry to such domestic factors as
the perseverance of the industry in improving the quality of products and the
increased government support for the film industry. However, if you simply look
back only a few years before the success, the dismal state of the industry was almost
mourned by many Korean film critics. This is evidenced when KIM Kyung Hyun
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said, “...during the mid-1990s...various South Korean newspaper and magazine
articles reported that its unhealthy national film industry might virtually be
eliminated in a few years.”6 When films from China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan
started to receive recognition in various international film festivals in the 1980s and
the 1990s, the Korean film industry was still at a dismal stage. Internally, decades of
the harsh military dictatorship and the conservative tradition of die Confucian
patriarchal principles made the society a stifling place not only in terms of artistic
expression but also in terms of freedom of speech. Externally, the cultural and
economic pressure from the Hollywood industry that requested “free trade” in the
Korean domestic markets, threatened the survival of the local film industry. Caught
in between such ideological and economic pressures from inside and outside, the
oudook for the Korean film industry was anything but hopeful at that time.
Then, how did the Korean film industry make such a big leap from a
miserably declining state to an internationally aspiring culture industry within such a
short period? To find the answers only within the efforts of the domestic industry
and the government is not sufficient. It especially does not fully account for the
transformation of the cultural imagination as well as the industrial practices that led
to the current prosperity of the particular national cinema. Nevertheless, so far, that
has been the primary explanation for the recent success of Korean cinema. This
dissertation intends to offer a perspective that has been practically bypassed in
accounting for the recent shift of status in Korean cinema. The aspect that I am
particularly looking into is the conspicuous presence of Hong Kong cinema in
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Korean film culture, especially during the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, the
“meanwhile” period of Korean cinema; between its despair and its recent eminence.
I suggest that the analysis of the influence coming from the Hong Kong film
industry leads to a more comprehensive understanding of the positive transformation
of Korean cinema and the film industry at a later period.
The enormous influx of Hong Kong films into Korea began to happen
during the depressing period of the Korean domestic film market. Contrary to what
Korean cinema was going through at that time, Hong Kong cinema, often referred to
as the “East Asian Hollywood,” had by that time already earned recognition for both
its aesthetic and commercial values in the global marketplace. Soon it rapidly and
widely appealed to Korean audiences, leading to the fervor, popularly dubbed as the
“Hong Kong Film Syndrome” by Korean media. In fact, the production values and
technical aspects of most of these Hong Kong films were not as sophisticated as
those of Hollywood films. However, they were still more advanced and glamorous
than what Korean films at that time had to offer to Korean audiences. More
importantly, the cultural, historical, and physiological affinity between people of
Hong Kong and Korea was effectively delivered through Hong Kong films and
provided the Korean audience with a stronger emotional reverberation than other
foreign films. Thus, Hong Kong films during the time provided an alternative
viewing pleasure for Korean audiences, at a time when the domestic market was
filled with Hollywood films and a few struggling Korean films.
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Despite the sensation over this neighborhood local cinema, however, the
phenomenon was hardly granted any proper analytical attention; neither inside nor
outside of Korea. Hardly any publications dealing with an in-depth analysis of the
contemporary history of Korean cinema produced in English language academia
mention this enormously popular phenomenon at all.7 The situation is similar in
academic film studies within Korea. Some of the major publications on the history
of Korean cinema in recent years almost completely overlook this cultural incident
in the history of Korean cinema.8
I think that there are several reasons for such neglect in recognizing the
influence of Hong Kong cinema. As for film studies in English language academia,
the short period of time in which Korean film studies has been paid attention to
could be the reason for the limited resources and perspectives so far. As for the
situation inside Korea, I am interested in several possible factors. First, one of the
reasons for such bypassing of the conspicuous cultural trend can be found in the fact
that the Korean film history has primarily been written in nationalistic terms until
now. This is the case with most social and cultural discourse in Korea. I would say
that this is an attitude resulting from the traumatic history that Korean people had to
experience over decades. The Japanese colonization and the atrocities done to
Korean people during the period left indelible scars to the memory of Koreans, not
only those who lived through the time but also those to whom the history has been
passed down through various forms. Before the pain was healed, Korean people had
to undergo the tragic Korean War. The subsequent independence was given
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imperfectly, with the nation divided in half and the South subsumed under the “Neo
colonial” control of the US. The thirty years of the military regimes, whose power
could not survive without the support of Washington, was as equally oppressive
experience rather than a liberation to most Korean people. Eventually, over years,
the main concern of most Korean politicians, intellectuals, and other citizens became
how to build the independent power and sovereignty of the nation so that the people
would no longer have to undergo the hardships that it had for almost the entire
twentieth century. The anxiety led to the development of a rather exclusive right-
wing nationalism, in which any opinions dismissing or undermining the struggles or
efforts that the people had undergone were not welcomed. Also, after years of
control by the Japanese colonial and the US neo-colonial powers, there are strong
anti-Japanese and anti-American sensitivities suffusing Korean society for the latter
half of the century. Such sensitivity sometimes leads to automatically downplaying
any foreign influence in the culture and society in order to put the efforts and
achievement of Korean people first. I would say that Korean film historians’
dismissal of the huge influence of Hong Kong films in Korean film culture from the
mid-1980s to the mid-1990s could also be understood in such a context of
nationalistic sensibility that exists even in academia.
The second reason might be found in the status of film studies in
Korean academia itself. In fact, it was only after the mid-1990s, after Korean cinema
started to gain recognition in numerous international film circuits and academic film
studies, that Korean film studies also began its prosperous stage. It is this period that
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active academic re/evaluating and re/writing of the history of Korean cinema surged,
as part of efforts to stabilize and strengthen the position of the field in the Korean
academic circuit. Although there were numerous valuable works done in the field
previously, they were not enough in amount and range to give an in-depth sense of
the history of Korean cinema. The rapid increase in academic publications on films,
as well as heightened attention to film studies itself in Korea, made this period an
important turning point in Korean film studies. To compensate for the insufficient
number of works in the field, not surprisingly, most initial efforts tried to establish
the canonical history of Korean cinema; mostly following the practices of auteur
studies, exclusive textual studies mostly based on psychoanalysis, or genre studies,
or industrial analysis. Such attitude is also partly influenced by the attention to
Korean film studies from outside. With the sudden success of Korean films in
international markets, the demand for information on this unknown national cinema
increased, and domestic academia needed to produce works that met the demand.
Therefore, the study of the “pure” history of Korean cinema proliferated first.
Related to that, the third reason for the bias against dealing with the
influence of Hong Kong cinema may be found in the fact that Hong Kong cinema
was not only foreign but also generally considered to be shamelessly commercial
and cheap entertainment. The deep impression of commercialism in the specific
local cinema subsequently led Korean cultural analysts to belittle and eventually
overlook the significant intervention it made on the Korean film culture and history.
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Fourthly, the important cultural influence of Hong Kong was mostly
overshadowed by “graver” matters that directly threatened the Korean film industry
at that time. The threat came from Hollywood who pressured the Korean
government to forgo the exclusive economic protection of the domestic film industry.
While the whole Korean film culture was preoccupied with the serious matters that
threatened the survival of the domestic industry and national cultural autonomy, a
relatively “light” matter like the popularity of Hong Kong commercial films was
dismissed from the main discourse of Korean film culture.9
The fifth factor may be the rapid success of Korean cinema in
international and domestic markets right after the stage of the Hong Kong Film
Syndrome. While Korean film culture was busy responding to and celebrating the
remarkable growth of its own, what happened immediately before the success might
have been paid less attention to in discussing the recent history of Korean cinema.
It is quite understandable since even in Western film studies, the
discourse of transnational cultural relations came to its fruition only after discourse
regarding national cinema is exhausted. This dissertation, therefore, intends to be the
“next stage” of what has been done in Korean film studies, by paying attention to the
so far overlooked aspect of the Korean film history in its transitional period: the
transnational relations between Hong Kong and South Korean film industries and its
significance in the later global accomplishment of Korean films. Therefore, this
study is first and foremost a writing of Korean film history but the content
significantly extends to the analysis of various cultural influences coming from
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Hong Kong. Therefore, I would rather say that this study is situated at the
intersection between Korean and Hong Kong film studies.
Whereas Korean film studies have not sufficiently illuminated its
relation to other cultures except the occasional mention of Hollywood so far, the
studies of Hong Kong cinema in the West, which began earlier than that of Korean
cinema, have been frequently articulated in terms of its development in transnational
contexts1 0 as well as within the discourse of national, auteur, or genre cinema.1 1 I
find the reasons for such early and fully developed attention to Hong Kong films in
the Western academia in the following several factors: first, obviously the particular
historical condition of Hong Kong society affected this. As many people have noted,
the 1984 Sino-British treaty became the turning point around which we can observe
the significant shift in the Hong Kong film production and interpretation. We can
witness the increasing production of films that reflect the anxious psychology of the
people in Hong Kong from this moment in both art and commercial cinema.
Eventually these films began to make good texts for serious discussion of Hong
Kong society in general as well as Hong Kong cinema in particular. However, what
is more important is that this change in political reality set a good interpretive
paradigm for Hong Kong cinema that proved to generate tremendous academic
productivity. From this point, a lot of Hong Kong films were, arguably, interpreted
as social allegory. Whether this approach is appropriate or not, the study of Hong
Kong cinema began to flourish within this discourse of allegory and the subsequent
criticism against it.
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Secondly, I believe that the international recognition of the mainland
Chinese films, especially those of Zhang Yimou and CHEN Kaige, and the
Taiwanese films represented by HOU Hsiao-hsien, Edward Yang, Ang Lee,
definitely influenced to direct more attention to Hong Kong films in Western
academia. Even though China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan were governed by different
political regimes until 1997, when Hong Kong was returned to China, they were all
ethnically Chinese, separated by the turbulent political situation. Therefore, to most
foreigners who were not familiar with the particular culture and history, they were
considered to be sibling societies.1 2 Moreover, even before 1997 those three film
industries cooperated in various ways, creating more active and visible border-
crossing traffic than any other film industries in Asia. The subsequent outcomes
sometimes blurred the boundaries among the three distinct film industries, making
them good cases to discuss the issues of ethnicity, locality, transnationality, and
cultural hybridity, etc. Especially when we look at the influence of Hong Kong
action costume dramas displayed in the later films of Zhang, Chen, or Lee the
success of the three Chinese language cinemas around the same period seem to have
cross-fertilized, not only in brining academic attention to them but in terms of
developing unique local film aesthetics.1 3
Thirdly, I think that part of this international penchant for Hong Kong
films resulted from the changing trend of Western film academia. When the field of
film studies was predominantly occupied with the study of major film texts and
auteurs, finding appropriate quality texts needed to precede the analysis/study of
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them. Thus, “good films” deserved academic attention whereas “bad films” did not.
But in recent years, especially since the mid-1980s, the Western film academy
slightly shifted its main interest from the analysis of film texts to studies that
significantly consider modes of consumption and production. Therefore, not only the
“quality films” but also the commercial films supported by mass reception also
became an important part of the discussion. In this new trend, Hong Kong cinema,
which is mostly known by Western audiences for its commercial genre films,
emerged as significant objects of analysis.
The whole situation made Hong Kong cinema a “hot topic” not only in
the area of East Asian film studies, but at the various intersections of film studies,
social science, and humanities studies. Particularly in the area of film studies, which
I am devoted to, however, one of the major tendencies of research focusing on its
reception in various Western contexts, is to frame the local cinema within the
discourse of “cult” cinema, even as an art house cinema, or at least in the boundary
of non-mainstream cinema, regardless of the nature of individual films in discussion.
This is quite understandable considering the way non-Westem cinema is received in
Western film circuits, especially in the US where only Hollywood cinema is
considered to be mainstream.1 4 Projecting the non-Westem perspective of such non-
Westem cinema, I intend to discuss Hong Kong cinema as a fully-fledged
mainstream commercial cinema that was received as such in its neighboring film
culture in Korea. As a mainstream cinema consumed by the masses, the influence of
Hong Kong cinema in Korean film culture was more widely spread and more visible
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than that in other Western film cultures. Emphasizing the prevalent role of the
specific local cinema in reshaping the Korea film culture, this study will therefore
not only add a significant variation to Korean film studies but will hopefully provide
an alternative perspective to Hong Kong films studies based on the transnational
reception of films.
At the intersection of both Korean and Hong Kong film studies, this
dissertation also hopes to contribute to the area of star/fan studies in the context of
East Asian cinema, which has almost been neglected in the research of this regional
popular culture except for a few cases. With such intention, I make considerable
efforts to look at the function of Hong Kong performers or “stars,” whose careers
made significant interventions in the transformation of the overall climate of Korean
culture and society. Although each individual star’s career or personal background
may be looked at in close detail during the discussion, the focus does not lie in
estimating the conspicuous roles of them in the history of East Asian cinemas or in
establishing a biographical saga of the concerned cultural figures. Instead of
emphasizing the aspect of “star-auteur” of these cultural personalities, I look at their
cultural significance in relation to the overall status of popular culture in Korean
society when they were a conspicuous presence in it.
Popular culture has always been placed in a lower position on the
cultural hierarchy in most societies. It is regarded as less sophisticated, immature,
and as a more easily disposable temporary phenomenon than “high” or “elite”
culture. This has especially been the case in Korean society, which even today is
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under the strong influence of Confucian ideology. Confucian ideology often draws
clear lines between the “high” and “low” status of different social values and factors
and puts them in a hierarchical order. Being generally understood as a part of
popular culture, films therefore have been subject to such prejudice in the society.
The realm of film culture has always been regarded as existing outside of the
boundary of the major decision making processes in society, residing in the extra
and supplementary realm of “leisure” and “entertainment.” Therefore, it was a
subject to be easily manipulated by many levels of authoritative social powers for
different purposes and was also easily dismissed when it was not cooperative with
them. Because Hong Kong Cinema was perceived to be one of the most commercial
entertainments of the period, fandom of Hong Kong cinema was also generally
regarded as an immature, temporary, and leisurely social activity that did not have
an essential influence on the other structures of the society.
However, I find signs of the changing status of popular culture in the
attitude with which Korean society dealt with two notable Hong Kong stars during
their presence in the Korean popular culture. The importance of their role in the
given text lies in the fact that while participating in popular culture they became the
central agents in testing the existing social and cultural norms of Korean society.
Also, the fact that they are foreign stars provides significant insights between the
relationship between transnational cultural encounters and social transformation. As
foreign stars, they not only effectively spread the different cultures to the mass of
Korean society, but they eventually caused Korean people to change their
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perspective toward numerous “others” around them. By looking at the cultural
incidents and social attitudes surrounding the particular Hong Kong stars during the
period in Korea, this study delves into the significant social function of popular stars
and popular culture in general witnessed in Korean society in the 1990s and onward.
Lastly, this study also intends to add a variation to the discussion of
cultural globalization especially in the area of films studies. In many cases, the study
of cultural globalization follows the top-down model of globalization processes in
which the most focus is placed on the unequal relationship and tension between the
more potent global cultural force and rather vulnerable and susceptible local one.
This model of analysis emphasizes the influence of global economic and cultural
hegemony on the smaller cultural markets. Therefore, such global vs. local relations
are mostly written in the narrative of cultural penetrator vs. victim. In film studies,
one of the most significant works in this area is Global Hollywood and its update
Global Hollywood II which elucidate global vs.s local relations by looking at the
complicated networks that Hollywood builds with the culture industries of rest of the
world.1 5
I want to slightly shift my perspective toward cultural globalization
though I will operate in considerable contact with such top-down models of
discussion. I want to focus more on die bottom-up sense of globalization, in which
local culture’s ambition toward the larger global market is significantly
foregrounded. In fact, in local societies like South Korea, the term “globalization,”
which is translated into Korean, “segyehwa” is doubly inflected: it first means the
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all-engulfing influence of the Western culture in the rest of the world but at the same
time it indicates the efforts to build and augment local culture’s own autonomous
power so that it can be disseminated to the larger global market. The “segyehwa”
was adopted as a national policy in Korea by the KIM Young-sam government,
during the early 1990s:
...no state in the post-Cold War era has embraced
globalisation as publicly as South Korea under the Kim
Young-sam administration. After a series of initial
preparations, President Kim formally announced the
segyehwa policy in the Sydney speech of 17 November 1994
(...). Using the Korean term segyehwa (segye meaning
‘world’ and hwa meaning ‘becoming/turning into’) for
‘globalisation’, Kim’s segyehwa campaign reveals a
nationalistic urge for Korea’s advancement in a rapidly
globalising world.1 6
The concept of bottom-up globalisation implied in “segyehwa” can be applied to any
local culture industry’s effort to expand its markets in the world. Chinese language
cinemas have successfully achieved such globalization of their own cultural assets,
as is witnessed in the ubiquitous presence and influence of Chinese martial arts
cinema in Hollywood and other non-Chinese films at the moment. Korean cinema
also offers an interesting case of bottom-up globalization, not only seen in the
successful reception of Korean films by international audiences in recent years, but
also witnessed in the nearly dozen production deals to remake or adapt Korean films
17
by Hollywood film studios.
When we look at globalization from such a bottom-up perspective,
however, the local sectors are in fact revealed to have had very active and diverse
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roles in the power play of global cultural markets in addition to being victims of
cultural imperialism of the West They sometimes are incorporated into the central
cultural hegemony of the West, not simply by being subsumed and dissolved into it
but by actively affecting the reshaping and reformulation of the existing center.
Therefore, I suggest that the globalization of a local culture should be explained in
consideration of numerous sub-relationships of cultural encounters at different levels,
rather than be understood in terms of the bipolar relationship of global vs. local.
When looking at the process of cultural globalization from such a
bottom-up perspective, the relationship between compatible local cultures is
sometimes more significant than that of the local versus the global in making a
transition in die cultural status of a local culture. In fact, there are several notable
efforts paid to such aspects of local collaborations in recent East Asian film studies.
The studies on global reception of Hong Kong films demonstrate some of such
perspectives, regardless of their West-centered view in the case I’ve indicated
previously. Chinese cinema studies in general is, in feet, very advanced in this field
because of the interesting relations that the three-fold Chinese language cinemas
have. In many cases, they are discussed within the boundary of this tripartite
IS
Chinese cinema complex though. Recently, Koichi Iwabuchi’s publications make
notable contributions to the analysis of the inter-Asian cultural relationship. His
works elucidate the transnational relationship of Japanese popular culture with
various Asian societies and speculate on the meaning of it in a larger global context.
Although not fully devoted to cinema or popular cultural studies, the journal Inter-
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2 0
Asian Cultural Studies, established in 2000, also pays special attention to the flow of
cultural, social, and economic capitals inside the Asian region.
This dissertation shares academic concerns with such recent works on
inter-Asian communications, particularly in the context of film cultures. Despite the
increasing interest in this topic, the discussion of Korean culture in terms of its inter-
Asian cultural relationship has been scarce. Therefore, I want to add the Korean
context to such existing discussion, hopefully providing concrete material specificity
to the discussion of transnationalism rather than being engaged in abstract
theoretical dialogue. Therefore, this study is not a theory-based textual analysis
without contextual consideration nor an industrial analysis deprived of textual and
theoretical observation. Fundamentally rooted in the cultural studies tradition,
however, the dissertation does not exclude any materials or approaches that may
contribute to demonstrating the significant relations between Hong Kong and
Korean film industries that affected the transformation of Korean film culture.
Therefore, the study includes subjects both from the history and culture of Korean
and Hong Kong cinema when appropriate for the overall perspective of the work.
The first chapter, “The Anxious Local Cinema. Issues of South Korean
Cinema in the 1980s - 1990s” explains the status of the Korean cinema up to the
1980s in relation to the social and political situation in society at that time. The
military regime and its ideological coercion of domestic cultural production, the
particular gender perspectives of society reflected in Korean cinema, and the
struggle to protect the domestic film market against Hollywood will be discussed in
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2 1
detail in order to provide a general overview of the cultural climate that Hong Kong
films made a significant cultural intervention into.
The second chapter, “The Encounter Between Peripherals: The Hong
Kong Film Syndrome in South Korea,” is divided into two smaller sub-chapters. The
first one, “The Period of Hong Kong Film Syndrome (1987-1994)” defines the term
and delineates the timeline of the specific cultural phenomenon. Also, by giving a
detailed overview of the situation in which Hong Kong cinema was enthusiastically
received by Korean audiences and speculating upon the possible reasons for such
fandom in relation to the condition of Korean film culture and society, I analyze the
significance of the encounter between the two neighboring local cultures. The
second sub-chapter, “The Sino-Effects in South Korean Cinema,” more specifically
looks into the direct and indirect influence of Hong Kong cinema on the film texts
and the industrial practices of Korea cinema. By following the traces of
transformation that Korean cinema started to display when it was inspired by
popular Hong Kong cinema, I suggest that this is the period that Korean film
aesthetics started to change to fit the taste of wider audience groups beyond national
borders.
The chapter “Traveling Stars, Shifting Boundaries” primarily discusses
two major stars of the Hong Kong film industry, Leslie Cheung and Takeshi
Kaneshiro, as significant cultural catalysts in the transformation of Korean film
culture in the 1990s. The first sub-chapter, “Transnational Popular Culture and the
Tension of Regional Identity: A Ban on Happy Together in South Korea,” looks into
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the particular incident of ban on Cheung’s gay film, Happy Together (dir. Wong Kar-
wai, 1997) in Korea. I specifically observe this case of censorship in relation to
Cheung’s huge fen base in Korea and also his own homosexual identity that caused
controversy in the conservative Korean society at that time. By looking into the
political as well as cultural ramification of this incident, I show how the changing
status of Korean popular culture in the society was clearly displayed during the
period. “Hybrid Identity and the (Un)Settling of Borders: Hailing Takeshi Kaneshiro,
East Asian Style” discusses another film star introduced to Korea through Hong
Kong cinema, Takeshi Kaneshiro. Focusing on his hybrid ethnic identity and
multicultural and transnational career development, the chapter proposes his rather
indirect but crucial role in shifting the cultural imagination of Korean people and the
culture industry from a primarily national to a significant transnational realm.
The last chapter is “Changing Scenes: Moving from Local to Global,”
which discusses Korean cinema in its later relation to a larger context of East Asian
and global cinema culture. This chapter speculates upon the “after stage” of the
Hong Kong Film Syndrome in Korea, focusing on the significant changes made to
the status and industrial practices of Korean cinema. The popularity of Korean
popular culture in Asia, “Hanryu” or the “Korean Wave,” will be discussed as the
reverse situation of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome. Also, the resultant proliferation
of pan-Asian collaborations or co-productions in filmmaking will be observed in
terms of its possible role in changing the scenes of the global film markets. The last
part of the discussion will be devoted to a detailed analysis of a Korean film Oldboy
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and a Hong Kong film So Close in terms of the similar textual strategies that they
utilize to make themselves both locally and globally appealing cultural products.
Overall the relationship between Hong Kong and Korean cinema
discussed in this dissertation has more meaning when thinking about their next stage
in the laiger global market and their collaborative efforts in it. Although this
dissertation is one of the initial efforts to elucidate such transnational collaboration
in the history of Korea cinema, more discoveries were made while the current
project was being researched and written. One of the most important results of such
efforts is the recent illumination of the transnational relationship between Hong
Kong and Korean film cultures in the early 1970s which has been almost overlooked
in the history of Korean cinema so far. Seeing such attention to diversifying Korean
film studies, I hope more fruitful works will be produced in the area of transnational
relations of Asian cinemas.
Before I begin my major discussion, I want to briefly mention the
transliteration system used in this dissertation. When a Chinese and Korean name or
a film title has a widely used English version, I use them. As for the rest of Chinese
and Hong Kong names and titles, I use the Mandarin Pinyin system. As for the rest
of Korean names and titles, I use the McCune-Reischauer system. In such cases, the
Chinese and Korean people’ s names appearing in the main text of the dissertation
are written in the order of the last name followed by the first name in the way they
are written in East Asia. To avoid confusion, each first name is capitalized. All
quotes and titles originated from Korean sources are my own translations.
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Introduction Endnotes
1 Ackbar Abbas use the term “deja disparu” rather than “deja vu” to explain such
familiarity of Hong Kong provoked through contemporary Hong Kong cinema.
According to him, “deja disparu” is “the feeling that what is new and unique about
the situation is always already gone, and we are left holding a handful of cliches, or
a cluster of memories of what has never been.” Abbas, Hong Kong: Culture and the
Politics o f Disappearance (Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press,
1997), 25.
2 See such accolades in Julian Stringer, “Introduction”; Darcy Paquet, “The Korean
Film Industry: 1992 to the Present”; Jeeyoung Shin, “Globalisation and New Korean
Cinema,” in Chi-Yun Shin and Julian Stringer, eds., New Korean Cinema (New
York: New York University Press, 2005).
3 Some of the notable honors include IM Kwon-taek’s winning of the Best Director
Award with Strokes o f Fire [Chihwason] at the Cannes International Film Festival in
2002, and YI Chang-dong’s winning of the same award with Oasis [Oasisu] at the
Venice International Film Festival in the same year. In 2004, KIM Ki-dok won the
Best Director Award with Samaritan Girl [Samaria] and 3-hvn jPinjip] at the Berlin
and the Venice International Film Festival, respectively. In the same year, PARK
Chan-wook was awarded with the Grand Prix at the Cannes International Film
Festival with Oldboy [Olduboi].
4 Both Table 1 and 2 are recreated by extracting records from the same statistics
available at the website of the Korean Film Council (KOFIC) at
http://www.kofic.or.kr.
5 In the period of 1994 - 2003, eight out of the top ten grossing Asian films in the
US market are Chinese language films, including Crouching Tiger, Hidden dragon
(dir. Ang Lee, 2000), the co-production of China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan (source:
Liz Shackleton, “East Meets Midwest,” Screen International 3 Oct, 2003,19,
requoted from Stanley Rosen, “Chinese Cinema in the Era of Globalization:
Prospects for Chinese Films on the International Market, with Special Reference to
the United States,” paper presented at the symposium, “From Past to Future: 100
Years of Chinese Cinema,” New York City, 24-25 Oct, 2005).
In the box office records of the foreign language films in the US market from
the 1980 to 2005, four of Chinese language films Crouching Tiger, Hero (dir.
ZHANG Yimou, 2002), KungFu Hustle (dir. Stephen Chow, 2004), and Iron
Monkey (dir. YUEN Woo-ping, 1993) were included on the top ten list, with
Crouching Tiger being the best grossing one of the period. The only Korean film
listed in the top hundred list is Kim Ki-dok’s Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and
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Spring [Pom, yorum, kaul, kyoul, kurigo pom] (2003) at eighty fourth rank (source:
http://www. boxofficemojo. com).
I want to express my deep gratitude to prof. Stanley Rosen for kindly supplying
these information to me and also for providing his valuable insights regarding the
hastiness of claiming international success of Korean cinema, especially that vis-a-
vis Chinese language cinemas at the moment.
6 Kyung Hyun Kim, The Remasculinization o f Korean Cinema (Durham and
London: Duke University Press, 2004), ix. Also see, Chung-hon Chung, “Hanguk
yonghwa wae wigiinga (Why is Korean cinema at crisis)?,” Yonghwa Pyongron
(Film Criticism) 9, 1997,43-57.
7 See Shin & Stringer eds., New Korean Cinema; Hyangjin Lee, Contemporary
Korean Cinema: Identity, Culture, Politics (Manchester and New York: Manchester
University Press, 2000); Kyung Hyun Kim, The Remasculinization o f Korean
Cinema, etc. Only recently Korean film scholar Soyoung Kim published an article
on the transnational genre similarity of Hong Kong and Korean action films in the
1960s and 1970s. See Soyoung Kim, “Genre as Contact Zone: Hong Kong Action
and Korean Hwalkuk,” in Meaghan Morris, et. al eds, Hong Kong Connections:
Transnational Imagination in Action Cinema (Durham and London: Duke
University Press & Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2005), 97-110.
8 Chong-won Kim & Chung-hon Chung, Uri yonghwa 100-nydn (The 100 years of
our cinema), (Seoul: Hyongamsa, 2001); Hak-su Kim, Sukurin pakui hanguk
yonghwasa (The off-screen history of Korean cinema), (Seoul: Inmul kwa sasangsa.
2002); Hyon-chan Ho, Hanguk yonghwa 100-nydn (The 100 years of Korean
cinema) (Seoul: Munhak sasangsa, 2000); Hwa Kim, Korean Film History (Seoul:
Tain midio, 2003); Seok Young Chang, In Search o f New Wave o f Korean Films
(Seoul: Hyondae mihaksa, 2000); Su-nam Kim, Hanguk yonghwa ui chaengjom kwa
sayu (The issues and ideas of Korean cinema), (Seoul: Munye madang, 1997); Tae-
won Kim ed, Melodurama, chopok, yesulyoghwa (Melodrama, organized gangsters,
and art house cinema), (Seoul: Hyondae mihaksa, 2003), etc.
9 Here and for the rest of the dissertation, I use the phrase “Korean film culture” as
an umbrella term to include the area of production, distribution, and the reception of
Korean cinema. Therefore, all the fields that are related to film, including the
Korean film audience, critics, scholars, as well as the industry is implicated in it.
1 0 See previously mentioned Morris e t al, Hong Kong Connections', Chia-chi Wu,
Chinese Language Cinemas in Transnational Flux, PhD Dissertation (University of
Southern California, 2004); Esther C. M. Yau ed., A t Full Speed: Hong Kong
Cinema in a Borderless World (Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota
Press, 2001); Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu ed., Transnational Chinese Cinemas: Identity,
Nationhood, Gender (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1997), etc. There are
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also several essays dealing with this issue in Poshek Fu and David Desser eds., The
Cinema o f Hong Kong: History, Arts, Identity (Cambridge and New York:
Cambridge University Press, 2000); Laikwan Pang and Day Wong eds,
Masculinities and Hong Kong Cinema (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press,
2005).
1 1 See David Bordwell, Planet Hong Kong: Popular Cinema and the A rt o f
Entertainment (Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: Harvard
University Press, 2000); Jeremy Tambling, Wong Kar-wai’ s Happy Together (Hong
Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2003); Karen Fang, John Woo’ s A Better
Tomorrow (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2004); Kenneth E. Hall, John
Woo: The Films (Jefferson, North Carolina, and London: McFarland & Company,
Inc., Publishers, 1999); Peter Brunette, Wong Kar-wai (Urbana and Chicago.
University of Illinois Press, 2005); Stephen Teo, Hong Kong Cinema: The Extra
Dimension (London: BFI Publishing, 1997); Stephen Teo, Wong Kar-wai (London:
BFT Publishing, 2005); Yinjing Zhang, Chinese National Cinema (New York and
London: Routledge, 2004); Wimal Dissanayake, Wong Kar-wai^ Ashes o f Time
(Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2003), etc.
1 2 I expect that there might be different opinions about such categorization of
“ethnic Chinese” depending upon different perspectives. What I am indicating here
is the general impression of “Chineseness” that people outside of the three Chinese
language territories have as non-experts of the complicated culture and history.
1 3 I thank prof. David James for the insight of such mutual influence especially
between the films of Zhang and Chen, and Hong Kong commercial cinema.
1 4 See Wu’s dissertation and other related essays in Yau, Fu and Desser, Morris e t al,
etc. for such cases of reception studies of Hong Kong cinema or the critique of them.
1 5 Toby Miller, et al, Global Hollywood (London: BFI Publishing, 2001) and Global
Hollywood 2 (London: BFI Publishing, 2005). For more general perspectives toward
the issue, see Arjun Appadurai, M odernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions o f
Globalization (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996); Edward W. Said,
Culture and Imperialism (New York: Vintage Books, 1994); John Tomlinson,
Cultural Imperialism: A Critical Introduction (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1991); John Tomlinson, Globalization and Culture (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1999); Rob Wilson and Wimal Dissanayake, eds.,
Global/Local: Cultural Production and the Transnational Imaginary (Durham and
London: Duke Univeristy Pres, 1996), etc. If the discussion of active roles of local
culture in such globalization is mentioned in these works, it is usually added as a
supplemental nuance rather than as a major subject of interest. In most cases of such
mentions, the discussion is usually focused on local culture’s response, expressed in
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terms of resistance, toward the direct infiltration of bigger cultural hegemony into
their territory.
1 6 Jeeyoung Shin, “Globalisation and New Korean Cinema,” in Shin and Stringer
eds., New Korean Cinema, 53.
1 7 Korean film, IJMare [Siworae] (dir. YI Hyon-sung, 2000) was recently remade
into The Lake House (dir. Alejandro Agresti) by Warner Bros. Pictures, in 2006.
Besides this, M y Wife is a Gangster [Chopok manura] (dir. CHO Chin-kyu, 2001),
M y Sassy Girl [Yopgijogin kunyo] (dir. KWAK Chae-yong, 2001), A Tale o f Two
Sisters [Changhwa, hongryon] (dir. KIM Chi-un, 2002), My Teacher Mr. Kim
[Sonsaeng kimbongdu] (dir. CHANG Kyu-song, 2003), Oldboy, etc. are currently
being discussed to be remade into Hollywood films. For more detailed information,
see Jason Han, “Korean Films Set to Invade America in 2006,” Ohmynews 05 July
2005, available at
http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=237317&rel_no=l
1 8 See Koichi Iwabuchi, Recentering Globalization: Popular Culture and Japanese
Trasnationalism (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002). Also there are
books that he edited: Feeling Asian Modernities: Transnational Consumption o f
Japanese JT'Dramas (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2004); Rouge
Flows ” Trans-Asian Cultural Traffic (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press,
2004).
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CHAPTER I
THE ANXIOUS LOCAL CINEMA:
ISSUES OF SOUTH KOREAN CINEMA IN THE 1980S - 1990S
The development of South Korean cinema, just like other national cinemas, cannot
be thought of separately from the social circumstance in which it is produced.
Therefore, each film, not just film content, significantly indicates the condition of
the society when it was made. Therefore, films are not only mirrors, but an index of
the trajectory that the society has undergone. The way in which films are produced,
circulated, and received all reflects what society and people wanted in them.
This chapter looks at the relationship between cinema and society
within a particular period of Korean history, the 1980s - 1990s. In observing the
situation, I especially pay attention to the status of South Korean cinema in society.
As a popular culture, South Korean cinema has always been subject to the
manipulation of state power. The situation was even more aggravated in the 1980s,
when the new military regime severely oppressed the general freedom of speech of
citizens. The creativity of the film culture wilted, and the South Korean audience
turned away from domestic films. Moreover, the new economic pressure from
Hollywood threatened the survival of the domestic film industry. Over all, it is a
period of despair and disappointment in Korean film history. By looking at various
situations that South Korean cinema was confronting at that time, this chapter sets
up the background for the later discussion of the transition and transformation of
South Korean cinema in the following years.
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Cinema, Politics, and Censorship
South Korean cinema has been strongly influenced by society’s political
circumstances. During the 1980s, it was thoroughly politicized in one way or another.
Its relation to national politics was, in feet, not a newly emerging situation. I would
say that since its inception, the specific national cinema of South Korea was “always
and already” under the strong influence of national politics. Therefore, in the
following discussion, I will briefly introduce how the history of Korean cinema as
well as that of South Korean cinema has developed in close relation to the political
circumstances of the nation.
The history of Korean cinema began when Korea was under Japanese
rule from 1910 to 1945. The first Korean film during the period is recorded to be
The Righteous Revenge [Uirijok kuto] made by KIM To-san in 1919. It was not a
complete form of cinema from the contemporary perspective, but it combined pieces
of moving images inserted to complement a theater play. Nonetheless, the film
ushered in the era of filmmaking by Korean people. However, under the specific
socio-political situation, the films in Korea during this time were mostly co
productions between Korean and Japanese filmmakers, and were under the close
watch of the Japanese authority. There were monumental films made by Korean
directors, such as Arirang (dir. NA Un-kyu, 1926), or The Ferry Without a Boatman,
[Imja opnun nautpae] (dir. YI Kyu-hwan, 1932), that were acclaimed by later film
critics for their nationalistic spirit as implied in their texts. Nevertheless, they still
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had to represent such nationalism or patriotism in a metaphoric way to minimize
damage by the censorship of the Japanese authority. Especially during the latter
period of the occupation era, when Japan participated in the Pacific War in the 1930s,
the oppression of any nationalistic and patriotic activities by Korean people became
harsher and the majority of films made by Korean filmmakers were propaganda
films to support the war efforts of Japan.
With the liberation from the Japanese colony, the Cold War superpowers
divided the country in half at latitude 38° north, and virtually took the place of Japan
as the country’s actual controlling power. The South came under the American
military rule, and the North was controlled by the USSR Soon after, the ideological
confrontation of the Cold War powers on the Korean peninsula led the country to a
devastating civil war, the Korean War (1950-1953). After three years of tragic battle,
the war ended when both the North and South signed an armistice, and agreed to go
their separate ways. The South developed its political and economic system based
on democratic capitalism whereas the North developed based on socialist
communism. Due to the lack of communication between the North and South since
the end of the war, except through special arrangements by both governments, the
social, political, and cultural history of the North and South started to be written
separately from that moment.
The history of South Korean cinema, hence, began after the Korean
War.1 Although Korea finally found its peaceful state after the Japanese occupation
and the Korean War, it did not find its political stability. The political tension that
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31
continued in the territory seriously affected every aspect of the lives of its citizens.
The film culture was not an exception to such influence, and one of the direct
influences of such political instability on the film culture materialized in the form of
censorship. The ideological war between South Korea and its Northern counterpart
provided a good reason for the government to control film content. Any content that
criticized the government or society was subject to political persecution. The
situation became worse especially after South Korea was under the control of
military presidents for almost three decades.
The first president of South Korea, RHEE Syng Man was a dictator,
supported by the US power. He oppressed his political opponents, and continually
prolonged his presidency by manipulating the election ballots. Eventually in April of
the 1960s, the citizens of Korea rose up against Rhee’s dictatorship, and Rhee had to
resign from his seat after thirteen years of presidency and flee to the US to find
political shelter.
Within nine months of the resignation of Rhee, military general PARK
Chung Hee took control of the state power by coup. Not long after, however, Park
turned out to be as harsh a dictator as Rhee, if not harsher. Just like Rhee, Park had
an ambition to stay in power forever, hi 1972, he carried out a constitutional reform
called “Yushin,” which stipulated the life-long presidency of Park himself. Park’s
political ambition led him to take complete control of every aspect of citizens’ lives
in Korea, often through forceful measures.
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The positive legacy of Park’s era, though, was the rapid economic
development and industrialization of society. Within two decades after the Korean
War, Park rebuilt the country’s economy, speedily erasing the traces of devastation
from the war. The achievement was remarkable, and was commemorated as the
“Miracle of Han River.” The rapid development, however, did have its negative
side-effects. To make a fast and visible improvement in economic status, the lowest
strata of the economic system, the labor workers, were severely exploited and
sacrificed.2
Despite the economic development, Park’s era is, in general,
remembered to be a harshly oppressive period in which the entire society was under
government surveillance. The film culture could not avoid the scrutiny of the
government either. With the establishment of the Motion Picture Law in 1962, and
the several ensuing revisions of the law, Park implemented various measures to
regulate the film industry and film content. Nevertheless, the strenuous efforts and
several distinguished talents in the Korean film industry made remarkable
achievements, for which the period of 1960s is remembered as the “Golden Age” of
Korean cinema by Korean film culture.3 Renowned filmmakers such as SHIN Sang-
ok, YU Hyon-mok, KIM Ki-yong, YI Man-hui led the prosperous period of the Post-
War Korean cinema, producing monumental works in the national film history.
Films like The Housemaid (dir. KIM Ki-yong, 1960), Stray Bullets (dir. Yu Hyon-
mok, 1961), My M other and Her Guest (dir. Shin Sang-ok, 1961), Full Autumn (dir.
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Yi Man-hui, 1966) are considered to be some of the best films ever made in the
Korean film industry 4
However, with years of rigid regulation by the military regime, and also
with the inlxoduction of TVs in Korea, the Korean film industry in the 1970s
gradually lost the vibrancy of the 1960s. The film production dwindled in its quality
as well as in quantity. Especially about the harsh censorship over film content by the
Park government is well described in the following passage from Korean film critic
LEE Yong-il:
... the film genre which had remarkably withered in the 1970s
was problem films and positive artistic films....The films in
the 1970s lacked artistic spirit in filmmaking and the attitudes
of filmmakers were too easy-going. In particular, even if the
films did not contain ideas on problem consciousness and if
the films had contained social matters or had described social
facts very truly and critically, those screenplays were
regulated by the censorship authorities according to the then
existing ‘Emergency Measures’. If the films were not in line
with what we call the ideology of ‘Renovation’ or national
integration, they were regulated. By enforcement of the film
policy for so many years, the film directors and producers
realized that to make popular films in line with the then film
policy or low class entertainment films for countryside
theaters was much wiser and the only way they could
survive.5
Lacking the motivation for artistic exploration and challenge, eventually the
filmmakers turned to making easy money and non-problem films that did not get
them in trouble with the government As a result besides making the “good movies”
that were encouraged by the government, such as films with anti-communist
messages or films adapted from famous literary works, filmmakers tended to rely on
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3 4
several genre films for commercial purposes: one was a teen/school movie genre,
and the other was a so called “hostess movie” genre. Whereas teen/school movies
were mostly divested of any social commentary, “hostess movies” often contained a
critical perspective toward rapid industrialization. In theses films, hostesses were
often portrayed as negative byproducts of the economic development of
industrialization in Korean society. As the films of this genre proliferated, however,
most hostess films became cheap spin-offs of several famous titles, and quickly
turned into female exploitation films.
Just like Rhee’s case, Park’ s ambition for life-long presidency was put
to an abrupt end when he was assassinated by his own confidant, the director of the
Korean Central Intelligence Agency, KIM Jae-gyu, in 1979. The seat was soon filled
when another military general, CHUN Doo Hwan, took over with yet another
military coup and announced martial law in the country. In Kwangju, the southwest
province of Korea, there were huge political protests among politicians and civilians
against the martial law and Chun’s advance to the presidency. Chun sent military
forces to Kwangju to crack down the protests. Chun’s military force isolated the
district from the rest of the country and cruelly massacred the protesting citizens.
This is called the “Kwangju Massacre” or “Kwangju Uprising,” and is remembered
as one of the saddest moments of South Korean history. The government officially
announced that 191 people were killed and 852 people were injured during die ten
day massacre. Citizens in Kwangju, however, claimed that the death toll reached as
high as 2000, and that the government hid the truth.
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The grave and repressive period, in terms of freedom of expression in
Korean society, continued in the 1980s under Chun’s dictatorial rule. After the tragic
massacre in Kwangju, Chun did not allow any challenges to his authority or any
question of its legitimacy. Countless politicians, political activists, college students,
intellectuals, and journalists, etc. were either put in jail, lost their jobs, or were
mysteriously killed during their anti-govemment activism. The suppression of
freedom of speech by Chun’s government was systematic through a reconfiguration
of the nation’s media:
Like his predecessor, Chun mobilized the mass media to
legitimate his authority and centralize his power... .To impose
uniform political opinion, state power silenced
antigovemment voices. Protesters were criticized as
“enemies” of Korean society and its security. The Chun
government increased control over the media in 1980 by
instituting Ollon Tongpyehap (the Media Consolidation
Measure), which eliminated one national television network,
three national radio stations, three national and four local
newspapers, and more than 150 periodicals. Chun’s regime
also established systematic control of the news media through
daily “press guidelines.” Presenting opinions contrary to
those guidelines became almost impossible 6
It is not hard to imagine that the film industry, under such a suffocating social and
political atmosphere, could not fully demonstrate its artistic range. According to the
president of Motion Picture Promotion Corporation (MPPC), one of the government
organizations, the basic censoring principles of the period was as follows:
Among the guidelines the government sets are these: That our
traditional culture should be mixed with foreign cultures to
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create a more brilliant culture... .In censorship, generally,
security of the nation is most important. Second, films should
not hurt our cultural heritage. Third, they should not criticize
or disregard certain groups in society, such as religious
organizations.7
In this remark of the president of MPPC, the indication of the importance of the
“security of the nation” needs to be paid special attention. Although this principle of
censoring artistic material seems to protect and secure the welfare of citizens, in feet
this was the most arbitrary principle used to regulate the freedom of expression
during the military regime. Based on this principle, the military government could
basically oppress any critical opinions against the president, the government, or the
social system, by accusing them of presenting a challenge to national security.
When social or political commentary in a feature film was harshly
censored, such expression found a path that evaded government censorship. One of
the ways people expressed such social and political criticism was through
independent short films, mostly made by cultural activists or college film groups.
These films were often shown in conjunction with political demonstrations that did
not stop during die military regime, despite die severe persecution of leftist activists
by the government. Along with the political demonstrations, the screening of such
shorts was considered illegal, and was often cracked down on through the use of
political force. The arrest of the filmmakers of an independent film with social
criticism, Parcmgsae (The Bluebird, Seoul Visual Collective, 1986), illustrates one
such case of government persecution of independent films with sensitive content
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While the politically and socially critical material was mostly produced
through non-mainstream independent cinema, the military government’s oppressive
censorship led to an interesting turn in the trend of mainstream Korean cinema
during the 1980s: the proliferation of “erotic films” or sexploitation films. Analysis
by later journalists and social and cultural critics suggests, that the rapidly increased
production of such exploitation films was actually encouraged and supported by
Chun’s government as a way to turn citizens’ attention away from national politics
during a politically charged era. Journalists later called this manipulation Chun’s
government’s “3S-policy.”9
The “3S” stands for “Sports, Sex, and Screen.” As ludicrous as this
sounds, this “3S-policy” gravely shaped the overall cultural climate of Korean
society in the 1980s. As a part of this “3S-policy,” Chun’s government took great
efforts to promote sports in society, opening the era of professional baseball games
in Korea in 1982. Also under his regime, Korea held global scale sports festivals,
such as the 1986 Asian Games and the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games, not to mention
numerous smaller scale international sports games. Especially notable are the Asian
Games and the Olympic Games, the first global scale sports festivals that took place
in Korea. The holding of two of such giant sporting events seemed to indicate
improvement in the economic and cultural status of Korea within the international
community, and therefore the successful leadership of Chun as president of the
nation. To most Korean citizens, seeing the games of numerous international sports
stars in their own country for the first time was an exhilarating experience for which
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they could be proud. Such festivities could temporarily, if not permanently, make
them oblivious to the tragic memory of Kwangju and the harsh political persecution
carried out by the military government. This is a hypocritical and hypnotic policy
with which the military government wished to dumb down the majority of Korean
citizens and make them insensitive to the social and political issues surrounding
them.
A similar device used to veer the attention of the citizens from politics
was the promotion of “sex” and “screen,” which, in a combined form, set in motion
a particular trend of filmmaking in the film industry of the 1980s. In the following
section, I will discuss this issue of “sex” and “screen” of “3S-policy” in relation to
the gender relations of the society.
Cinema, Issues of Gender, and “3S policy”
Like most other countries in the world, Korea is fundamentally a patriarchal society
where more privileges are given to male members than female ones. The patriarchy
in Korea derives from the influence of Confucianism. Although Confucianism was
introduced to the Korean peninsular far earlier, the period when it took deep root in
the everyday life of people was when the Chosun Dynasty adopted it as a ruling
principle in the 14th century. Ever since, the influence of Confucianism set a
foundation for the basic ideas, principles, and manners of various aspects of the
society, and some of that legacy continues today. Confucianism emphasizes the
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importance of the male patriarch in a society, which is often embodied by the phrase,
“Man is sky, woman is the ground.” Therefore, the foundation of the gender
relations in contemporary Korean society is none other than the ancient philosophy
from China.
Along with Confucianism, another factor that heavily influenced the
shaping of the unequal division of gender roles in the society was a history of
national crisis, such as during the colonization of Korea by Japan and the Korean
War. Especially during national crisis, when the nation’s state power was threatened
by external forces, women’s chastity was often metaphorically equated with the
national integrity. With such a logic, a female body was often seen to symbolize the
national territory. And the experience of brutalization of such bodies during turmoil
was often regarded as parallel to the suffering of the entire nation. Therefore, the
more a nation undergoes crisis, the more suffering the nation’s women are subject to
experience. The Korean Comfort Women cases during the Pacific Wars under the
Japanese colony and die countless rapes and brutalization of women during die
Korean War are evidence of the painful experiences women endure when state
power is challenged by enemy forces.
Especially during the Korean War, those who victimized Korean women
were not only the enemy soldiers, but also the UN soldiers of the allied countries.
Those UN soldiers might have been allies in terms of the war efforts in South Korea,
however in some cases, they were no better than enemy soldiers as sexual aggressors
to Korean women. The war also produced a lot of prostitutes in Korea, who in most
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cases fell into the profession for the survival of themselves and their family during
the devastated war period. After the war, ironically, the victimized women and the
continuing business of prostitution, both of which were the outcome of the brutal
history of the war, were considered to be the humiliating memory of the war,
constantly haunting the post-war society. Therefore, although they were as much
victims as other people in the country during the war period, their experience
contributed to situate women in a more disempowered position than men in the
society.
The third factor unique to the Korean history that perpetuated the
uneven gender relations in society was the militarism that penetrated into the society
until now. The basic principle of militarism was to win over opposing subjects in a
forceful manner. In such a coercive culture, authority or physical strength became
almost the standard to decide the hierarchy among people. In such a culture, women,
again, were subject to fall into a disadvantageous position because they were
designated less authority in society in general, and they tended to have less physical
strength than men.
The militarism penetrated into society when Korea came under the
control of the military government for almost three decades. However, a more
significant influence of the military culture came from the military duty of Korean
male citizens. Shortly after the liberation in 1949, the Korean constitution stipulated
that every male citizen over eighteen year’s old was bound to fulfill a military
service as a national duty The time of the service has changed slightly over the
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41
years, and currently it is a little over two years. The feet that this was the national
duty imposed on every man in society, meant that almost every household of society
was influenced by the military culture in some ways.
Such a culture of militarism in Korea further perpetuated the uneven
gender division in the society, and oftentimes made the reasonable conversation and
mutual understanding between Korean men and women more difficult than it should
be. Even today, the word “feminism” or “feminist” is regarded to be an antagonistic
word to most Korean men, and this was especially well proved when we observed
the internet boards of any Korean websites in which any feminism-related or
women-related issues are brought forth. Most Korean adult men thought that they
sacrificed a considerable time of their youth because of their obligatory military
service. Therefore, they thought that they rightfully deserved all of the privileges
and advantages that society had provided to men on a public or an individual level.
On the other hand, with the introduction of academic feminism and the
feminist movement in South Korea in the 1970s,1 0 Korean women, who have been
long suffering and oppressed under fee patriarchal system, started to voice women’s
rights in society, and tried hard to promote women’s positions in it. Whenever men
claimed their rightful privileges in society accompanying their national duty, women
argued back by demanding the same privileges for their child bearing function,
which most of the time, cost them more years of difficulty and sacrifices in their life
than the obligatory military service. At first sight, such arguments seem to be quite
selfish or even childish on both parts of Korean men and women who intentionally
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turned blind-eyes to the other’s situation to defend themselves. Unfortunately,
however, such disputes over gender division do not seem to be easily resolved when
both Korean men and women think that they are in a way sacrificed by social
systems.
Such uneven development of gender relations influenced by the
tradition of Confucian patriarchy, the history of national crisis, and the culture of
militarism, significantly influenced the overall gender representation of Korean
cinema. As if such already existing uneven gender relations is not enough, the
promotion of “sex and screen” in the “3S-policy” during Chun’s military regime
deliberately manipulated the representation of gender and sexuality in cultural
products for a specific political purpose.
As mentioned earlier, the 1980s in the mainstream Korean cinema is
recalled as the period of sexploitation films or soft pom films. Although the social
moral of the country was still conservative, based on the deep-rooted Confucian
legacy, and women’s chastity before marriage was still regarded as an important
virtue in society,1 1 the films made during the period presented diverse sensual
content of extramarital affairs or promiscuous relationships accompanied with
abundant nudity. In most films, the main focus was to show the bare bodies of
actresses as much as possible, and often the story seemed to exist only as a backdrop
to show such nudity. Mostly, the female bodies tended to be exposed more than male
bodies. In many cases, what you can see about male bodies in such films was the
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bare top at most, whereas the female actress in the same film often risked entire
nudity, although full frontal nudity was prohibited by law.
Some of the most popular films during the period are the Madame Aema
[Aema Puin] (dir. CHUNG In-yop, 1982) series, or the Prostitution [Maechun] (dir.
YU Jin-son, 1987) series. Madame Aema deals with a story in which a married
woman gradually matures in pursuing her sexual desire, showing close resemblance
to the French soft pom, Emmanuel! (dir. Just Jaeckin, 1974) series in the 1970s.
Until die mid-1990s, there were eleven series of Madame Aema made by numerous
directors. The content of Prostitution is pretty self-explanatory from the title. The
first films of both series grossed the top of each year’s box office. Also, director YI
Jang-ho, who was well known for his critical social perspectives in his films in the
1970s, also joined in producing such erotic movies by making commercially
successful Between The Knees [Mump kwa murup sai] (1984) and Chidong (1985).
The success of these films led to the production of countless other similar
sexploitation movies, some of which were take-offs of the already famous titles, and
some created its own line of successful series.1 2
As mentioned in the previous section, the 1970s also saw the
proliferation of a similar kind of slight sexploitation films, often referred to as
“hostess movies.” There are, however, overall difference between the films that
exploit the female body and image in the 1970s, and those in the 1980s. The
“hostess films” in the 1970s were mostly based on melodramatic sensibilities, with a
slight added sense of social criticism, whether it was successful or not. Films like
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Prostitution in the 1980s also attempted brief social criticism by comparing
prostitution to the marriage custom in the society in which social and economic class
were the most significant standard to choose spouses. However, in most exploitation
films in the 1980s, including Prostitution itself the themes or stories were often
ignored more than they had been with the films in the 1970s. If there were any
attempted serious messages in the films, they were mostly overshadowed by the
sensual images that were the main focus of the film. If the films in the 1970s had the
melodramatic elements that could have at least appealed to some female fens, the
shameless sexploitation films in the 1980s that dealt with women solely as sexual
objects could be said to have primarily catered to the adult male demographic.
Because of the proliferation of such sex films in the mainstream Korean
film industry, Korean films in the 1980s in general were not regarded as a serious
genre of art. The images of the bare women’s bodies that covered most film posters
on the street billboards of the period, projected the impression that the majority of
films were low-taste cheap products that mainly provoked prurient interest. This was
an unfortunate result of the military-authoritarian politics, its “3S policy,” and the
film industry’s cooperation with such circumstances. In such a social and cultural
atmosphere that encouraged the production of cultural products that contain biased
representations of gender images, the gender division of society could not help being
further perpetuated.
It is not like there were no serious and critically acclaimed Korean films
made in the mainstream industry during the period. Director Im Kwon-taek made
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several prominent films of the period, such as Mandala [Mandara] (1981), The
Surrogate Woman [Ssibaji] (1987), Come Come Come Upward [Aje aje bara aje]
(1989), and garnered awards from prestigious international film festivals. Director
PAE Yong-kyun also brought international honor to the nation’s film culture by
winning the Grand Prize at Locarno Film Festival with his art-piece Why Has Bodhi-
Dharma Left fo r the East? [Tamla ga tongtsok uro gan kkadalgun, 1989], One of the
socially sensible directors of the 1970s, Yi Chang-ho made The Man with Three
Coffins [Nagunenun kileso do shwiji annunda, 1987], One Fine Windy Day [Param
puro choun nal] (1980), and Declaration o f Fools [Pabo sonon] (1983), etc. PARK
Kwang-su made a social criticism in Chilsu and Mansu [Chilsu wa mansu] (1988).
Also, YI Tu-yong made costume dramas Pimak (1980) and Muleya Muleya (1984)
and showcased them in numerous international film festivals including the Venice
and the Cannes festivals. The critical achievement of these films, particularly in
international film festivals, was encouraging for the film industry especially when
most Korean films were discounted as low-taste culture.
Even such critically acclaimed 1980s films, however, could not suggest
any fresh perspectives to illuminate the gender issues in society and in Korean films.
In terms of representation of gender, most of these films either did not seem to pay
special attention to the gender issues, or simply recounted the traditional gender
roles. Sometimes, they even repeated the customary exploitation of female bodies
and images in their films, just like other commercially-oriented films. Overall, the
biased representation of gender, in conjunction with the “sex and screen” promotion
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of the government’s “3S-policyremained as one of the most controversial aspects
of the Korean cinema in the 1980s.
Korean Cinema and Global Hollywood
Another aspect that demarcated the period of the 1980s in the history of Korean
cinema is its complicated relations with external markets, especially with
Hollywood. Hollywood has been dominating the world film markets especially since
the Second World War. While the film industries in other countries that had been
directly involved in the war were almost completely demolished, because of its
relative safe distance from the war, the US film industry not only survived but even
flourished, taking advantage of a period when most of the Western European film
industry was devastated by the war. Ever since, no other national film industry has
been able to successfully emulate the formidable powerhouse, Hollywood, in terms
of its abundant material, and technical and human resources. Therefore, Hollywood
became the sole dominant film industry, the products of which pervaded almost
every society and fascinated people all over the world. As of today, according to
Toby Miller, “US companies own between 40 and 90 per cent of the movies shown
in most parts of the world.”1 3 On such a scale, it can be said that the entire world
film market is almost monopolized by Hollywood. Hence, Jack Valenti, the head of
MPAAcan confidently say,
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It is in fact, blessedly confirmed, that the American movie is
affectionately received by audiences of all races, cultures, and
creeds on all continents; amid turmoil and stress as well as
hope and promise... .1 4
However, what Vanlenti did not realize or pretended not to realize in this remark is
whether the American movie is always “affectionately received” by global audiences.
Isn’t there any sacrifice or painful struggle whenever Hollywood expands into one
more sectors of its world markets? Such painful stories in relation to the “rosy dream
factory” Hollywood, can be witnessed in the Korean film industry’s struggle with
Hollywood since the 1980s.
Just like most other countries in the world, within the Korea domestic
film market, Hollywood has been the dominant force that occupied the largest
market share until the 1980s. Especially considering the Japanese colonization, the
Korean War, and the rigid regulations on the freedom of expression during
successive military regimes, the development of the Korean film industry had to be
relatively slower than other countries whose film industries were mostly freed from
such social and political influences. While the Korean film industry was struggling
to establish Korean cinema as an influential culture and industry to domestic
audiences, the far advanced Hollywood films easily stole the attention and money of
the Korean audience in the domestic market. To protect the Korean film industry
from such formidable foreign counterparts as Hollywood, the Korean government in
the 1960s implemented several film related laws. One of them regulated foreign film
importation by limiting the number of foreign films that can be imported to Korea
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4 8
per year, and also gave importation rights only to Korean film companies. Another
such protective policy is what is called “screen quota,” which obliged each Korean
theater to screen domestic films for a certain number of days per year. Although not
all of such policies were observed efficiently, such laws provided a basic platform
on which the Korean film industry could develop itself without fatal interference by
the influence of more advanced foreign films.
From the mid-1980s, however, the situation started to change. In 1986,
the Motion Pictures Exporters Association of America (MPEAA) filed a complaint
about the Korean film industry to the US Senate Finance Committee for its “unfair”
trade law that stipulates various regulations on the foreign films that are imported to
Korea. The MPEAA pointed out that as Korea’s economy had improved, the country,
especially its film industry did not need a protective system in its trade with the US
film industry anymore. As a result, there were talks between the US and the Korean
governments in both 1986 and 1988 in which the US strongly pressured Korea to
open its markets more widely and to give up its protective trade system. As a result,
the Korean government had to reform its Motion Picture, and had to allow die
unlimited direct import of films by US companies, not mediated by Korean film
companies. In 1988, the first US distribution company, United International Pictures
(UJP), opened its branch office in Seoul, Korea.1 5 The first film that was distributed
in Korea by UIP was Fatal Attraction (dir. Adrian Lyne, 1987), and it was released
in nine theaters at the same time in September in 1988. This period was especially
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politically charged with severe anti-US sensibility among leftist politicians and
college students. In such a situation, the operation of the US distribution company in
Korea fueled the antagonism against the US among Korean citizens. The protesters
saw this situation as the relentless cultural imperialism of Hollywood suffocating the
survival of local film industry. There were numerous public protests against the
release of the film, and a lot of protesters, including filmmakers, were arrested in the
process. The situation continued into the next year. One of the most dramatic
incidents during these protests occurred when somebody threw a bag of snakes and a
bottle of ammonia into Cine House, the theater that was screening another UIP
distributed film, Living Daylight (dir. John Glen, 1987). The police pointed at
several filmmakers and a novelist said to be involved in the incident, and arrested
them.
Despite such intense resistance against the infiltration of the US film
industry by way of direct distribution of their films in Korea, there was no way to
stop their operation once they set their feet in the Korean market. The success of US
film Ghost (dir. Jeny Zuker, 1990)1 6 seemed to declare that Hollywood won in spite
of all the protests of the nationalistic Korean filmmakers to protect their market The
following chart illustrates the increased number of foreign films imported to Korea
after 1988, compared to the number of films produced inside the domestic film
industry:
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17
Table 3: Domestic Film Production vs. Foreign Film Import Chart
Year Korean
Film
Production
Foreign
Film Import
Year Korean
Film
Production
Foreign
Film Import
1984 81 25 1993 63 347
1985 80 27 1994 65 382
1986 73 50 1995 65 358
1987 89 84 1996 65 405
1988 87 175 1997 59 380
1989 110 264 1998 43 290
1990 111 276 1999 49 297
1991 121 256 2000 59 359
1992 96 319
Among the imported foreign films, every year the number of US films overwhelms
the rest of the countries from which Korea bought films. Among the 84 (85) foreign
films imported to Korea in 1987, 59 films were US films. In 1988, the number
becomes 76 out of 175 (176) foreign films. In 1989, among 264 foreign films, 91
were US films and Hong Kong closely followed with 89 films imported to Korea. In
1990, the entire imported foreign films vs. imported US films became 276: 137,
whereas in 1991, the number became 256 (354): 172. Since 1989, Hong Kong films
became the country from which Korea imported the most films next to US.1 8
However, the US had always been the country from which Korea imported the
biggest number of films.
Theoretically, it could be argued that however many Hollywood films
are imported, if the patriotic Korean audience did not watch them, there is no way
that Hollywood films could succeed in Korea. However, the idea is purely theory,
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hardly with any realistic resonance. Such an idea could be realized only when you
completely deny the audience’ s desire to find pleasure in cultural experience. The
reason why Hollywood films can be successful all over the world is because of the
US industry’s ability to provide films that are more entertaining and more enjoyable
to audiences. And that ability comes not only from creative ideas, but also from
technological advancement, abundant material and personal resources, and also the
strong network through which to sell their products to the entire world. In almost
every aspect of such ability, the Korean film industry in the 1980s could not
compete against Hollywood.
First, the length of history in which each film industry has developed in
Korea and in the US simply cannot be comparable. The US is one of the countries
where the technology of cinema itself was bom in the late 19th century and
continued to flourish ever since. In Korea, however, independent domestic
filmmaking could only be stabilized in the industrial setting after the Korean War,
hence, in the 1950s. During the early stage of the industry, therefore, all it could do
was simply catching up with what had been already done in the more advanced
foreign film industries such as Hollywood. Therefore, technically and
technologically, Korean films always remained far behind Hollywood films.
Secondly, the budget that could be spared in making films in both
countries could not be compared. According to KOFIC statistics, the average budget
for a Korean film until the mid-1990s was US $1 million at the most. This was less
than each famous Hollywood movie star gets paid for their work in one film during
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the same period. Moreover, with the beginning of the direct importation of
Hollywood films, Korean audience more frequently saw Hollywood films rather
than Korean films in theaters. How can we blame them for enjoying what is more
enjoyable and more available to them? Therefore, once the direct distribution of
Hollywood films started, they were bound to win over the Korean audiences,
however hard they tried to resist at first. Considering all these factors, simply putting
the “small” Korean film industry up against the “giant” US film industry without
any protective system under the name of “free trade” may have meant free trade but
was not a fair trade at all.
However, the story of the Korean film industry’s struggle against global
Hollywood does not end there. With the operation of US distribution companies, the
people in the Korea film culture tried to find a way to protect the domestic film
industry from such harsh competition. One of the ways that they found was to
closely observe the screen quota system in Korean film theaters. Currently, the law
describes the screen quota from 146 maximum days to 106 minimum days per a year.
The purpose of screen quota was to protect die minimum screen space of Korean
films in competition with more advanced foreign films within the domestic
markets.1 9 When die system was initially established, both the production of
domestic films and importation of foreign films were done by Korean film
companies. In such a situation, the screen quota did not receive any special attention,
and was regarded as a “dead policy” that hardly had any serious realistic influence
on the industry. With the beginning of the direct importation of Hollywood films,
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however, the significance of screen quota surfaced as the primary protective system
of the Korean film industry from the influx of Hollywood films. In 1993, a civilian
organization, “the Screen Quota Observer Group”2 0 was established and closely
watched the observance of screen quota in Korean theaters. If there were any
violation, they reported it to the legal system. When the screen quota system became
more utilized than it had prior to the direct importation of US films, the US began to
pressure Korea to minimize the screen quota as well. In 1998, the president of
Motion Pictures Association (MPA),2 1 William Baker, visited Korea, and suggested
investing US $500 million into Korea on the condition that the Korean film industry
curtails the screen quota. Following this, during the Korea-US Bilateral Investment
Treaty talk, the US asked for the abolition of the screen quota in Korea, refusing
Korea’s suggestion to reduce it to 92 days. The situation raised more heated debates
in Korea, and provoked intense protests against die US cultural policy. In 1999, the
president of MPAA, Jack Valenti visited Korea with US Secretary of Commerce,
William Daley, and suggested that the quota be minimized to around 50 days per
year. With continued pressure from the US, the Korean filmmakers did not confine
their protests to inside the borders of Korea, but turned as well to the international
film circuit for support for their efforts. They circulated documents that described
the struggle to keep the screen quota in Korea in numerous international film
festivals. A short documentary about the screen quota, Shoot the Sun by Lyric: The
Fight For the Screen Quota in Korea [Norae ro taeyang ul ssoda] (dir. CHO Jae-
hong, 1999) was screened in the Berlin International Film Festival in 2000, and
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continues to be screened in other numerous film festivals. Also, numerous
filmmakers and cultural figures throughout the world showed their support for the
efforts to keep the screen quota.
Over the years, the struggle of the Korea film industry came to be
known as a model case of a local film industry’s persistent and intense battle against
the global hegemony of the Hollywood film industry. In the meantime, diverse
perspectives developed inside Korea about the screen quota system, although the
majority of them still support the system on the basis of protecting the national
culture industry and cultural diversity against the Hollywood monopoly over global
film markets. One of the major film critics in Korea, CHO Hi-mun suggests an
opinion, purely from the perspective of industrial analysis, divested of nationalistic
and patriotic rhetoric that surrounds the issue:
Before die free import of foreign films, film companies were
in charge of production and import of films, and therefore the
request to observe the screen quota was not that strong. The
reason why the issue became more sensitive and intense after
1988 when die production and import was clearly separated
was because most film companies were excluded from the
import business. Those film companies who did not have to
“protect” foreign films started to voice their opinions.2 2
In general, the issue over the screen quota is not simply the issue of the Korean local
film industry standing up against Hollywood. It reveals more complicated problems
as the situation unfolds, by splitting the Korean film industry according to their
different interests in the survival battle, and also by splitting the Korean government
and the Korean film industry or Korean people. Whenever the issue about screen
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55
quota was raised by the US government, it was not dealt with as a single deal about
minimizing the screen quota, but it was always considered alongside other economic
deals suggested in return for the sacrifice of the screen quota. Therefore, for the
Korean government, there was always a concern about how to juggle the screen
quota issue in a more favorable way for the larger interest of the national economy.
It was always a question of what to earn at the cost of the screen quota. Therefore,
while the demand of the people in the Korean film industry to protect the screen
quota system was vehement, the attitude of the authorities of the government
regarding the same issue could not be firm all the times, and was constantly
changing. From the first time that the screen quota became a serious issue in the
Korean society in the late 1980s, this hesitant attitude of the government became one
of the major sources of complaints and uneasiness that the industry and citizens had
toward the issue. The vigorous protests by so many civilians against the giving up of
the screen quota may be a protest against the relentless global ambition of US, but it
may also be pressure on the Korean government not to sacrifice culture for other
economic interests. For the Korean government, especially when it was trying hard
to recover the nation’s economic stability after the 1997 economic blow that led the
country to rely on a loan from International Monetary Fund (IMF), it is hard to be in
a favorable position in an economic deal with a global superpower like the US. The
situation is aptly explained in Toby Miller’s analysis:
The corollary of open markets is that national governments
cannot guarantee the economic well-being of their citizens.
The loan-granting power of the World Bank and the
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International Monetary Fund (IMF) has forced a shift away
from the local provision of basic needs...The IMF does not
have enough money of its own to function, so it frequently
relies on private banks. The result has often maximized profit,
rather than alleviating misery, such that the late-1990s
multimillion intervention in East Asia was in part a bail-out
23
of US financial institutions that had made bad investments.
In early 2006, the Korean government announced that the screen quota would be
curtailed to 73 days beginning in July of that year. With this decision the issue was
heatedly debated in Korea again, and countless people in the Korean film industry
made public demonstration against the decision, and had campaigns at international
film festivals such as at the Cannes Film Festivals in 2006. The efforts to keep die
screen quota in Korea are still an on-going struggle, which inevitably seems to give
its way to requests from the global superpower.
Overall, the issue of the screen quota in Korea provides a good case in
which a local film industry fights for survival against the dominance of cultural
markets by the global film industry, Hollywood. With the confrontation with
Hollywood, the control of military regimes, their regulations on the freedom of
expression, and the ludicrous “3S policies” that eventually prevented the Korean
film industry from developing in a balanced way, the Korean film industry of the
1980s and the 1990s, as well as Korean society in general, can be described as
severely repressive, within a politically charged period of turmoil. Confronting such
difficult circumstances created both by the internal and external forces, however, the
film industry and the people in it did not succumb to the situation.
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The following chapters will discuss in detail how the Korean film
industry overcame such harsh pressures coming from both domestic and foreign
forces, and eventually regained its prosperous state. Such external influences as
those coming from Hollywood, discussed above, were certainly regarded as a fatal
threat to the survival of the Korean film industry at one point. In the next chapter,
however, I will discuss how the Korean film industry survived such a harsh period
with the aid of yet another influence coming from a different foreign film industry,
the Hong Kong film industry.
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Chapter I Endnotes
1 From now on, “Korea” in this dissertation refers to “South Korea,” unless
indicated otherwise.
2 In 1971, a 20 year old labor worker in a sweatshop in Pyonghwa market in Seoul,
JEON Tae-il burned himself to death to protest the inhumane working conditions of
the working class in Korea. His story is well portrayed in director PARK Kwang-
su’ s film, Single Spark [Arumdaun chongnyon chontaeil](1996).
3 In feet, there is still a debate over the periodization of Korean film history. The
first Golden Age is generally regarded to be the 1960s. However, there are opinions
that the first Golden Age is the 1920s to the 1930s when film productions in Korea
prospered. However, personally I do not yet accept this opinion because I doubt the
independence of filmmaking of Korean filmmakers during this period of Japanese
colonization. In feet, most film productions during the period were co-productions
either with Japanese producers or filmmakers. Also, every step of filmmaking
activities was under severe surveillance of the Japanese colonial rule. This is
certainly a productive period in the Korean film history, but I still doubt the
“golden” aspect of it, under the circumstance of such political repression of Korean
people and society.
4 For better understanding of this “Golden Age” of Korean cinema, see Kathleen
McHugh and Nancy Abelmann, South Korean Golden Age Melodrama : Gender,
Genre, and National Cinema (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2005).
5 Young-11 Lee, The History o f Korean Cinema: Main Current o f Korean Cinema,
translated by Richard Lynn Greever (Seoul: Motion Picture Promotion Corporation,
1988), 188.
6 Seung Hyung Park, “Film Censorship and Political Legitimation in South Korea,
1987-1992,” Cinema Journal, 42/1 (2002), 124.
7 John A. Lent, The Asian Film Industry (London: Christopher Helm, 1990), 138.
8 As for the history of the independent films during the period, refer to Kyung Hyun
Kim, The New Korean Cinema: Framing the Shifting Boundaries o f History, Class,
and Gender, PhD Dissertation, University of Southern California, 1998, 1-92.
9 As for the “3S-policy” under Chun’s regime, I refer to numerous news sources
including the TV non-fiction program, Ichenun m alhalsu itta : supotsu ro
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chibaehara — 5-gong 3-esu chongchaek (Now we can say: rule with sports — the 5fih
regime’s 3s policy), broadcasted by MBC on 22 May 2005.
1 0 Ewha Woman’s University, established by Western missionaries in the late 19*
century in Korea, was the first University that introduced and taught the idea of
feminism in Korea.
1 1 On the contrary, adult men’s chastity was never been emphasized with the same
value in the society.
1 2 About the industrial history of production of such sexploitation films in the 1980s,
I refer to Kim and Chung, Uri Yonghwa 100-nydn, and the annual Korean Cinema
Yearbook, published by KOFIC.
1 3 Miller, Global Hollywood 2, 9.
1 4 Jack Valenti, Requoted from Ibid., 1.
1 5 UIP is an associated distributor of Hollywood studios, Paramount, MGM, United
Artists, and Universal. As for the history of die Hollywood direct distribution
company introduced to Korea, see Tong-mi Hwang et. al., Hangukyonghwa sanop
kujo punsok: haliudu yonghwa chikpae ihu rul chungsim uro (The analysis of the
Korean film industry: after the direct distribution of Hollywood films) published by
KOFIC, 2001, available at http://www.kofic.or.kr.
1 6 “Ghost” attracted 980,000 audience members to theaters in Seoul, not counting
theaters outside of Seoul. It was an incredible success by then standards, and was
recorded to be the box office top of the year. All the discussion regarding the
activities of MPEAand UIP in relation to film trade in Korea referred to Kim and
Chung, Uri yonghwa 100-nydn, 362-374, and Hwang et. al, Hanguk yonghwa sanop
kujo punsok..
1 7 The chart is borrowed from Hwang e t al, 18.
1 8 The statistics refer to the Korean Cinema Yearbook, published annually by
KOFIC. The same statistics are also available at http://www.kofic.or.kr.
Unfortunately, until recently, som e o f the statistics differ even in different pages o f
the same KOFIC publication. Therefore, the numbers in parenthesis “()” indicate
such differences in statistics in the KOFIC material. Despite the differences, it
clearly shows that US films occupy an incomparable percentage of the entire foreign
films imported to Korea. In a way, this inaccuracy of statistics indicates that the
improvement of the overall Korean film culture happened rapidly in recent years.
Even in the 1990s, the official statistics regarding the film industry
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were not quite reliable, due to the lack of attention to the importance of such
material in the society.
1 9 As o f2006, there are eight countries in the world that have a screen quota system,
although die actual practice of the system is varied in each country.
2 0 The organization later changed its official English title to “The Coalition for
Cultural Diversity in Moving Images” in 2000. The literal translation of the Korean
title is “The Cultural Coalition for Screen Quota.”
2 1 The former MPEAA that initially filed a complaint to the US senate regarding the
Korean film industry’s regulations on imported foreign films.
22
Hui-mun Cho, “Sukurin quoto ka pilyohanga (Do we need screen quota)?,”
dongA.com, 13 June, 2003, available at
http ://www. donga. com/fbin/moeum?n=screen$j_580&a=v&l=7&id=200306130213
2 3 Miller, Global Hollywood 2, 52.
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CHAPTER n
THE ENCOUNTER BETWEEN PERIPHERALS:
THE HONG KONG FILM SYNDROME IN SOUTH KOREA
1. The Period of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome (1987— 1994)
Despite the enormous popularity of Hong Kong films in the mid-1980s to the mid-
1990s in South Korea, a scarcity of documents makes this phenomenon difficult to
prove. As it is explained in the introduction of this dissertation, it is hard to find that
this specific phenomenon was mentioned in any academic publications on the
Korean film history either written in Korean or in English. If you do a keyword
search in the Korean internet, all you can get are some pieces of film or video
reviews where the phrases “Hong Kong Film Syndrome” and/or “Hong Kong Noir
Syndrome” occasionally appeared in passing, but are not systematically explained.1
Compared to the numerous academic and journalistic publications on issues
regarding the opening of the Korean film market to Hollywood, this knowing
negligence of this contemporaneous, cultural influence demonstrates an imbalanced
perspective. While the streets were filled with political demonstrations or protests
against toe launching of toe UIP office in Korea, some boys in their late-teens might
have bought simulated guns to imitate Chow Yun-Fat’s riveting ‘double revolver’
action scenes in A Better Tomorrow series or in The Killer, whereas some girls might
have entertained crushes on iconic Hong Kong male stars, Chow, Leslie Cheung,
and Andy Lau, etc. However, all these experiences leave behind no traces in toe
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public record of Korean society as time passes and memory fades. So far, the period
of “Hong Kong Film syndrome” has been commemorated as a personal memory of
individual audiences who lived through the time, rather than being mobilized as an
important part of the cultural history of Korea. And it seems to be completely erased
from the cultural memory of Korean society, when those fens can no longer
remember it. Much like the ephemeral nature of celluloid culture itself that needs to
be activated on a machine to exist, this specific part of the Korean film history also
needs to be conjured up by remembering activities by those who hold the memory,
to be imbued with due meanings. Therefore, this chapter revisits this overlooked or
even almost forgotten aspect of the particular period in the Korean film history
before it becomes too late. It reevaluates the significance of the presence of Hong
Kong cinema in the Korean film culture at that time. In the process of analyzing this
cultural phenomenon, the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome,” I want to argue how
popular culture, and especially that coming from a neighboring society, Hong Kong,
provided an alternative space in which Korean people could actively engage
themselves in the act of resistance and negotiation with the various challenges
coming both from the domestic social and political situation, entrenched in a larger
global politics of culture and economy.
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The Earlier Relationship between the Film Industries in Hong Kong and Korea
In actuality, the 1980s is not the first period of interaction between the film
industries in Hong Kong and Korea. As early as in the 1960s, the two film industries
had kept close collaborative relations. One of the most notable activities of such
collaboration is witnessed in the career of director CHUNG Chang-Hwa. Bom in
1928 in Korea, Chung started his career as an apprentice to director CHOE In-Kyu
in the late 1940s.2 While the Korean film industry fought hard to stabilize itself
right after the war, and produced fruitful product in numerous aesthetically and
critically acclaimed films in the 1960s, the Hong Kong film industry had already
widely expanded its markets to the areas of East and Southeast Asia. The Show
Brothers, one of the biggest studios in the Hong Kong film industry at that time,
pursued its ambition even further, by exploring markets in the West. It was during
this period when Run Run Shaw, the president of the Shaw Brothers, saw Chung’s
works, and invited him to work for his studio.3 Chung built a remarkable career in
the Hong Kong film industry from the late 1960s to the late 1970s, during which one
of his films Five Fingers o f Death (a.k.a. The King Boxer, 1972) was recorded to be
the first Asian film that ranked among the US top ten box office in 1973 4 Therefore,
Chung is remembered to be the “god-father” of the Hong Kong martial arts films.5
It is ironic to think that the now globally famous Hong Kong martial art films had a
Korean filmmaker as its early cinematic master.6
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Of course, Chung’s career alone does not account for the history of
collaboration between the Korean and Hong Kong film industries. There are
numerous other forms of collaborations,7 which, Korean film critics and film
scholars have only taken into serious consideration recently. For instance, the Pusan
International Film Festival started to pay attention to such transnational cultural
relations between Hong Kong and Korean film industries, by holding special
screening of Chung’s films in 2003 or that of 1950s -- 1960s Korea-Hong Kong co
production films in 2004. This is the period when Korean film culture began to
actively pay attention to transnational filmmaking engaged in by the Korean film
industry. As is mentioned in the previous chapter, during the 1960s and 70s, the
Korean government implemented a system in which the film companies were
required to produce a certain number of films per year to obtain an import right for
foreign films. With limited resources, most Korean film companies could not fill the
production quota. In such a situation, Hong Kong was the most “available” East
Asian neighbor that Korean filmmakers could often resort to cooperate with.
Korea, at that time, did not have a diplomatic relationship with socialist China, and
Japanese popular culture had been officially banned in Korea since the Liberation.
Hong Kong was the most geographically advantageous and culturally similar society
in East Asia, which the Korean film industry could have convenient trade
relationship in the 1970s. Therefore, as one of the ways to fill the production quota,
Korean film companies registered numerous Korea-Hong Kong “co-production”
films, some of which rarely constituted full-fledged co-production at all. If there
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were any Korean actor or crew included in Hong Kong films, they were introduced
as “co-production” films in Korea at that time. Undoubtedly, Chung’s Hong Kong
films were released as co-productions just because they were made by a Korean
director, although the other resources entirely came from the Hong Kong film
industry. Sometimes, some cheap Hong Kong films were bought and the Korean
filmmakers re-edited them inserting extraneous footage shot in Korea. In some cases,
such re-edited films were released in multiple versions and classified as two
different “co-production” films.8 The feet that such “misbehavior” of the film
industry was hardly regulated by law is quite interesting, compared to generally
strict regulation that was set to measure the content in Korean films.
Besides such collaborations or co-productions, another aspect that
proves the close relationship between the two industries is shown in the popularity
of Hong Kong martial arts films, mostly Bruce Lee’s films, in the early 1970s in
Korea. Considering that his films were internationally popular at that time, it is not
surprising that his films stirred a sensation in the neighboring country. The
popularity of Lee and his films in fact led to the prolific production of Korean action
films whether they were based on traditional martial arts just like Hong Kong’s kung
fix films or were simply featuring random fighting skills as the main plot. Although
Korean action film actors such as PARK Nosik, KIM Hira, CHANG Tonghui made
their names during this period, Lee always remained fee quintessential martial arts
star to most Korean audience.
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The infatuation with Lee’s films in the 1970s is demonstrated by the
way it is cherished in the memories of Korean youth of the time even several
decades later. In 2001, director KANG Lon made a film titled, Looking fo r Bruce
Lee [Yisoryong ul chajarat!]. Although the content of this rather experimental
independent film really does not address Lee’s legacy, the director confesses having
included Lee in the title namely because of his iconic cultural status to his
generation.9 More direct memory of Lee’s period is found in the works of YU ha,
who is a poet, novelist, and filmmaker. In 1995, Yu published a volume of essays,
titled, Yisoryong sedae ege pachida (Dedication to the Bruce Lee generation). In this
collection, he remembers Korea in the 1970s by the symbolic name none other than
Bruce Lee. One of the most impressive recallings of Lee is found in Yu’s 2004 film
Spirit o f Jeet Kun Do [Malchukgori chanhoksa], which portrays the love and school
life of Korean high school students in the 1970s. The film begins with a scene in
which the male protagonist, a high school student, imitates Lee’s martial arts action.
Throughout the entire film, the disembodied Lee exists as the central cultural icon
that the Korean teenagers admire. At the end of the film, the protagonist and his
friend, who are now in their early 20s, stand in front of a theater that is showing
Jackie Chan’s Drunken M aster (dir. Yuen, Woo-ping, 1978) the “new generation” of
Hong Kong martial art films. The film ends with them arguing over who is the only
“true” martial arts master between Lee and Chan. The image of Lee in the beginning
of the film and that of Chan at the end, metaphorically punctuate the passing of time.
In this film, the 1970s in Korea, the period of social and political commotion in the
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society, is remembered through the memory of Hong Kong films. It is as if to prove
that popular culture sometimes can bring more meaningful sense of history to people
than those social and political incidents recorded in the official history.
The strong popularity of Lee in Korea met an abrupt end with his
premature death in 1973. The Hong Kong film industry could not find a star who
could successfully fill the void, and a period of chaos and depression lasted long
until Jackie Chan arose as a new star who could continue the glorious legacy of Lee.
Although Chan was also labeled as a martial art actor, his action style was quite
different from Lee’s. Chan initially rose to stardom as a kung fu star just like Lee,
but he added his own unique brand of humor to his action scenes, which clearly
distinguished him from Lee. Not long after Chan made his name as a kung fu star,
he quickly moved on to a modem action genre, adding the most daring stunt actions
in almost every one of his films. If spectators were impressed by Lee’s superb
martial arts skill in his films, in Chan’s films, they are more amazed by audacious
stunt actions done by Chan himself
The first films that Korean audiences viewed with Chan in starring roles
were Drunken Master and Snake in the Eagles ’ Shadow (dir. Yuen Woo-ping, 1978),
both released in 1979. In their initial release in major theaters in Seoul, Drunken
Master sold a remarkable 898,561 tickets, which remained the best Korean box-
office selling record for many years standing. Snake in E agle’ s Shadow ranked top
second at the box office, selling 576,953 tickets in Seoul only.1 0 Chan’s drawing
power continued in the next year when his another film, The Young M aster (dir.
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Jackie Chan, 1980) held the top second place at the box office. Although such
sweeping success of Chan’s films ended at this point, his subsequent films ranked as
the top ten to fifteen best selling films in Korea for next several years.
Although fascination for Hong Kong films in Korea persisted
throughout the early 1970s and in the early to the mid-1980s, in actuality, with the
exception of the passionate reception of Lee and Chan’s films, this enthusiasm did
not translate into a general popularity of Hong Kong films. Except the two stars’
films, none of the other imported Hong Kong films during the same period drew
much attention, nor did other Hong Kong stars. Overall, until the mid-1980s, the
popularity of Hong Kong films in Korea was built up around two names, Bruce Lee
and Jackie Chan. Although the popularity did not expand much, the roles of these
two stars in the history of transnational trades between the film industries in Hong
Kong and Korea are significant. They were pioneers who set the foundation for the
later major trade relationship between the two film industries.
The Hong Kong Film Syndrome: The Influx of “Hong Kong Noir” and Martial
Arts films (1987-1994)
The new stage of popularity over Hong Kong films in Korea began in the mid-1980s,
with the influx of the new generation of Hong Kong films. Before I explain the
reception of such films in Korea, let’s consider what are these new Hong Kong films
and in what context they were created. The birth of new generation Hong Kong
cinema has a close relationship with the social condition of Hong Kong at that time.
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The 1980s was a transitional period both for Hong Kong society and eventually for
the Hong Kong film industry as well. Most of all, after the People’ s Republic of
China (PRC)1 1 and the United Kingdom agreed to the Sino-British Joint Declaration
in 1984, the return of Hong Kong to China on July 1, 1997, was confirmed. After
almost a century under the British rule, the return to the motherland created
ambivalent feelings for people in Hong Kong. It meant an end to the status of the
colonized citizens, but also signified an end to the affluent and liberal lifestyle that
the city enjoyed under democratic capitalism. Particularly after the Tiananmen
political massacre in 1980, Hong Kong people’s outlook regarding the reunion
proved less than optimistic. Therefore, both hope and anxiety permeated throughout
the society at the same time.
Besides such changing sociopolitical circumstance, the same period
witnessed a significant transformation in the Hong Kong film industry as well. First
of all, the industry saw the rise of a new generation of filmmakers educated in the
Western countries and/or were actively responsive to the changing social conditions.
These filmmakers include Ann Hui, Alex Cheung, Tsui Hark, John Woo, etc. This
new generation of filmmakers consciously created films different from the earlier
mainstay of the Hong Kong film industry. They wanted to make films that were not
just mass entertainment, but that contain meaningful messages, reflecting what the
contemporary citizens of Hong Kong were feeling about their volatile social
situations. The series of Hong Kong films that were produced by such new
generation of Hong Kong filmmakers during the period eventually ushered in a new
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phase in the Hong Kong film history, the “Hong Kong New Wave.”1 2 The “New
Wave” films does not only include the “serious” films, which the young directors
initially took efforts to make. In fact, the new trend was also formed in the area of
commercial genre films, centering the “New Wave’s action auteurs,”1 3 TSUI Hark
and John Woo. The films that launched the “popular New Wave” in Hong Kong
cinema were the modem gangster/cop action films, known as “Hong Kong Noir”1 4
especially to Korean audiences. The A Better Tomorrow series by the director John
Woo is considered to have heralded the genre in the 1980s. The longstanding genre
of the industry, martial arts films also changed their shape - instead of primarily
relying on die actors’ genuine martial arts skills, the genre vigorously adopted the
wired actions and the advanced technology of special effects into the filmmaking.
As a result, the genre could now provide wider scope of visual spectacles, often
combined with fantasy aspects. This is a notable departure from the traditional
martial arts films that were represented by Brace Lee or early Jackie Chan’s martial
arts films, which were known for their realistic presentation, rather than
representation, of the skills of the actors/kung fu experts. There are, of course,
famous actors who are also renowned martial artists even during the period, the most
famous one of whom is Jet Li. However, even in Jet Li’s films, we can often see
special effects or wired actions frequently combined with his genuine kung fu skills,
the cinematic effects of which being enhanced beyond realistic level. Although the
initial movement of the “New Wave” started with making socially conscious films,
the proliferation and huge success of New Wave action films soon stole the most
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attention from domestic and foreign audiences, and not long after, the Hong Kong
cinema in the New Wave period came to be recognized mostly by exploitive genre
films.
Despite being commercially oriented, many of the new generation of
Hong Kong genre films displayed an unique sense of fatalism that is easily
interpreted to reflect the political condition of the society, especially by many
foreign critics. As Ackbar Abbas called “a culture of disappearance,”1 5 the sense of
desperation exudes from many Hong Kong commercial films of this period as well
as from more “serious” art films, and the industry soon met the “paradoxical
phenomenon of doom and boom,”1 6 capitalizing on this particular emotional status.
The prosperity of the industry during the period is well illustrated in this Variety
account:
Hong Kong is the fourth largest film industry in the world, and
what is specific to Hong Kong film industry is that local
product has claimed almost 70% of a Hong Kong box office.
While a local blockbuster can gross HK $50 million (US $6.5
million), a typical US film will bring in only HK $10-12
million, almost one fourth of the local product”1
The same source says that the whole ticket sales in Hong Kong domestic theaters
reached HK $44.8 million in 1989, which is equivalent to nearly five cinema visits
per head each year. When Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park became the biggest
grossing film in Hong Kong, taking HK $61 million (US $8.8 million), this was the
first time that a foreign film had ever taken top place at the Hong Kong local box
office in more than 10 years.1 8
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“The Hong Kong Film Syndrome” in South Korea began during this
period of the “Hong Kong New Wave.” It is not surprising that such prosperous film
industry ambitiously expanded its markets overseas, especially in Asia. Korea, one
of the geographically closest neighbors of Hong Kong, could not be overlooked as
the target market, and the business in this particular neighboring market turned out
to be more successful than any one could expect The success of the Hong Kong’s
popular New Wave films began with the release of A Better Tomorrow (dir. John
Woo, 1986) and A Chinese Ghost Story (dir. CHENG Siu-tung, 1987) in Korea in
1987. Interestingly, these two films were not box office success at all in their initial
release in Seoul. A Better Tomorrow was ranked as the thirty seventh best selling
film in the Korean box office of the year, selling 94,604 tickets. A Chinese Ghost
Story proved even more disappointing only selling meager 31,639 tickets.1 9 Based
upon the box office take of these films, their achievements are anything but special.
However, their impact was proven belatedly in the next years, when the sequels of
both films were released in Korea. When A Better Tomorrow II (dir. John Woo,
1987) was released in 1988, it skyrocketed to the seventh best selling film at the box
office in Seoul, selling 260,486 tickets. It pulled in almost three times as much ticket
sales as that of the original. The same happened when A Chinese Ghost Story II (dir.
Ching Siu-tung, 1990) was released in 1990, selling almost five times more than its
original, 149,414 tickets in all. Significantly, following the success of A Better
Tomorrow II, two Hong Kong gangster/action films The Killer (dir. John Woo, 1989)
(fifth rank) and Casino Raiders (dir. WONG Jing, et. al, 1989) (sixth rank) entered
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73
the top ten at the Seoul box office. In 1990, the sequel to Casino Raiders, No Risk
No Gain (dir. Wong Jing, 1990) ranked as the ninth best selling film of the year in
Seoul. The rapid popularity of Hong Kong films, however, cannot be represented
with a few film titles. The striking increase of imported Hong Kong films in Korea
proves the existence of this phenomenon :
20
Table 4: The Number of Foreign Films Imported in South Korea
\ Y
c N .
1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991
USA 23 39 57 76 105 123 132
HK 6 4 17 46 88 79 65
Others 1 8 10 54 85 74 59
Total 30 51 84 176 278 276 256
c \
1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998
USA 168 180 198 202 238 258 197
HK 74 71 82 50 66 41 19
Others 77 94 102 107 99 132 73
Total 319 345 382 359 403 431 289
US=United States of America
HK=Hong Kong
Y=Year
C=Country
From the table above, we can see that the number of Hong Kong films imported in
Korea radically increased since 1988, representing almost 26% of the entire
imported foreign films. The imported Hong Kong films in 1985 also accounted for
almost 20% of the entire imported foreign films. It decreased in 1984 to 7.8%, but
again rose up to approximately 20% in 1987. However, in 1985, among six imported
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Hong Kong films, five were Jackie Chan’s, and the other one was a belatedly
released Bruce Lee film. The situation was similar in the years before 1984. In 1987,
although the percentage of Hong Kong films was almost 20% of the entire imported
foreign films, similar to that of 1985, the films were diversified, not simply relying
on the two big stars’ names. The significance of the year 1987 lies not only in the
variety of Hong Kong films that were released in Korea, but a wide reception of it at
various venues, creating enthusiastic fendom.
In feet, the currently available official statistics cannot fully account for
the films’ popularity during the period because they were collected mostly from the
major first-run theaters in Seoul only. Audience statistics for the films viewed in the
numerous smaller revival theaters or via home videos are excluded. This negligence
over various exhibition and distribution practices problematizes an accurate cultural
accounting of cinematic reception. The numerous imported Hong Kong genre films
were actually consumed in smaller and cheaper venues than the first-run theater,
because the bulk of these consumers were Korean youth in their late teens and
twenties. The huge gap in ticket sales between A Better Tomorrow and A Chinese
Ghost Story, and their respective sequels can also be explained in this light.
Although, these films featured actors who were initially unknown to Korean
audience in 1987, the later word-of-mouth expanded their viewership in revival
theaters and videoshops. This “invisible” popularization of these films eventually
materialized in the huge selling numbers of their sequels over the ensuing years, and
their success ushered in the zealous consuming of Hong Kong films in the following
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years, which was soon dubbed as the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome” in Korea.2 1
Therefore, despite die rather less than impressive selling number of the initial two
films that ushered in the new phase of popularity over Hong Kong films, I suggest
that 1987 is the hallmark year inaugurating the period of the “Hong Kong Film
Syndrome” in Korea.
The first two films which brought in h e “Syndrome” were in fact two
very different films, but basically represented h e two most profitable genres on
which Hong Kong’ s popular New Wave capitalized: one h e Hong Kong
gangster/cop movie, and h e oher, a technologically innovative costume martial arts
film. Among hese, I will especially look at h e values h a t A Better Tomorrow
delivers to audiences. This film not only heralded h e “Syndrome” in Korea, but also
announced h e advent of h e newly thriving genre, h e “Hong Kong Noir.” In fact,
the fatalism and desperation underlying the film makes it often regarded to be a
popular version of allegory of h e Hong Kong society in h e 1980s. After h e Sino-
British Joint Declaration, Hong Kong society experienced serious social and
economic unrest. The stock exchange drastically went downhill, making h e Hong
r y y
Kong dollar exchange rate against U.S. currency 25% below than before. An
increased crime rate, credited to h e operation of h e Hong Kong crime syndicate,
h e Triad, instilled greater paranoia into h e already tense climate. This prevalence of
instability aggravated h e Hong Kong people’s anxiety over h e impending political
change in heir society. This is h e world h a t John Woo portrayed in h e film. In an
interview about h e film, Woo says,
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Only one of my films, A Better Tomorrow, really reflects a
certain aspect of Hong Kong, specifically the underworld. At
the time that film was made, there was a lot of gangster
infiltration into all kinds of businesses—even the film
industry—and a widespread feeling that there were no morals
left, that many people would do anything to get ahead. So I
wanted to make a film that would emphasize traditional
values: loyalty, honesty, passion for justice, commitment to
your family. Things I felt were being lost. I wanted very
badly to make this picture.2 3
The film depicts the intertwining lives of three men, Ho, Mark and Kit. Ho and
Mark used to be former Triads members and Kit is Ho’s younger brother and a
policeman. Undoubtedly, the major selling point of the film is excessive yet
beautifully filmed violence scenes. Descriptions of Woo’s action scenes are often
24 25
complimented with phrases such as “the ballistic ballet,” “balletic violence,”
“melodious balletic style,”2 6 or “choreographed violence,”2 7 which all point to the
scenes being aesthetically pleasing. However, what makes the film more impressive
than other action films, especially to East Asian audiences, is the content of the film
as much as the violence of the scenes. Although structured in a rather conventional
story between a cop and criminals, the film emphasizes the homosocial friendship
and loyalty between the two Triad men, and the brotherhood between Mark and Kit,
who stand at the opposite sides of the law. Such male bonding, expressed by the
concept “yi,” is a kind of private loyalty between men in most traditional East Asian
societies as well as in Hong Kong.2 8 The loss of traditional values associated with
the furthering capitalist industrialization in die region was poignantly romanticized
in the film. Blending an universal concept of entertainment value with such
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particular emotion that can be shared by the regional audience, John Woo’ s films
developed a reputation beyond the realm of easily disposable entertainment:
His [John Woo’s] space and place motifs contain precarious
historical and geographic elements liable to disruption at any
time by violent situations initiated by alien, nontraditional
forces from both West and East. Despite their violent,
spectacular nature, every Woo film contains some quiet
moments, resembling Eisenstein’s lyrical tonal montage
sequences and providing his heroes with moments of
reflection.”2 9
Whereas Woo’s film is set in contemporary Hong Kong, portraying
people’s feelings towards the disappearing world and its values in a rather realistic
way, Ching Siu-tung’s A Chinese Ghost Story is a period costume martial arts drama
set in ancient China in which people travel into the netherworld. In feet, it is a
hybrid genre combining aspects of horror, ghost stories, martial arts, romance, and
fantasy. It tells the love story between a beautiful female ghost, Xiao-qian, whose
spirit is doomed not to be reincarnated, and a young tax collector, Tsai-sin.
Depicting several stages of dangerous battles with the Demon King who imprisons
Xiao-qian’s spirit in the netherworld, the romance between the two also grow.
However, their different existence as a mortal and as a ghost, eventually tear them
apart forever. Just like the Hong Kong Noir films of the same period, this film is also
permeated with the sense of desperation and despair felt by the individual unable to
fully control his fete, although the effect is quite diluted with the occasional humor
in the film. More impressive than the story, however, is the daring exploration of
genre hybridization and advanced special effects, which is not only monumental
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work in the Hong Kong film industry, but is quite inspiring to Korean film culture.
Regarding the effects of such experiment of the film, Esther C. M. Yau says,
The film’s juxtaposition of multiple references and
temporalities combines a seventeenth-century literary classic
by Pu Songliang and comic book horror with ghost films
from Japan—including Kenji Mizoguchi’s Ugetsu
Monogatari (1953)—and a Cantonese precedent, Li Han-
hsiang’ s The Enchanting Shadow [Qiannu Youhun] (1960)....
One may add that the fantastic or ghostly dimension as
rendered by special effects has benefited from George
Lucas’s Star Wars (1977) and Steven Spielberg’s Close
Encounters o f the Third Kind (1977), just as its mood and
visual imagery are inspired by King Hu’s wuxia or swordplay
film classic The Dragon Gate Inn [Longmen Kezhan] (1967)
and Legend o f the Mountain [Shanzhong Chuanqi]
(1979)..... 3 0
Demonstrating Ihe creative way of developing new type of entertainment by a local
film industry, the film has as much significant meaning in providing insights for
future filmmakers as the entertainment that it offered to audiences.
After the initial success of several Hong Kong Noir films and the
costume martial arts film, Korean audiences encountered countless similar films in
the next several years. Although these two films by Woo and Ching represent the
two most popular genres of the Hong Kong film industry, as time passed, Korean
audiences witnessed some variations of the each genre, too. The most popular genre
and therefore, the biggest number of films that were imported was male
gangster/cop films. However, as soon as this genre achieved enormous success, soon
a variation of this genre, female cop/action films were imported. The most famous
titles among these female cop films are the Yes! Madame (dir. Cory Yuen, 1985)
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series starring Michelle Yeoh, or The Inspector Wears Skirts (dir. Wellson Chin,
1989) series starring Sibelle Hu. In feet, the first Yes! Madame was produced in
1985, a year before A Belter Tomorrow was made, and was released in Korea in
1986. At that time, it did not create much fendom nor was it quite successful at the
box office. Once the male genre films caught popular interest, however, the number
of female cop films imported in Korea also increased. These films usually featured
beautiful women in the roles of cops or criminals, and present equally dangerous
tough action scenes done by the female characters. Although they did not receive as
much attention as the male cop films from Korean audience, these film presenting
“strong women” characters provided an important alternative perspective toward
gender roles in Korean film culture at that time.
On the other hand, A Chinese Ghost Story opened the way for similar
re-fashioned costume martial arts films to enter the Korean market. Although the
film combines numerous different genres, more action-oriented martial arts films or
sword films began taking the lead in the martial arts genre market. The Asia the
Invincible (dir. Ching Siu-tung, 1991) series created die androgynous martial artist,
Asia the Invincible, impressively played by Brigitte Lin, and the Once Upon A Time
in China (dir. Tsui Hark, 1991) series made Jet Li another international martial arts
star, following the footsteps of Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan. However, the legacy of
A Chinese Ghost Story does not end here. Another important trend that the film
launched in the Korean market is the introduction of fantastic love stories, spanning
over different lifetimes, based on die belief of transmigration of souls or
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reincarnation. Films like Rouge (dir Stanley Kwan, 1987), or A Terracotta Warrior
(dir. Ching Siu-tung, 1989) belong to this category. These films were not as popular
as the modem or traditional martial arts action films, but they left an indelible
impression on later Korean films, which will be discussed in the next chapter.
Although not a specific genre, another important group of films introduced
to Korea, rather by happenstance through the process of mass import of Hong Kong
films, were the “Hong Kong art films” of Wong Kar-wai and Stanley Kwan. Their
films were usually purchased by Korean distribution companies not necessarily
because of the aesthetic quality of the films, but mostly because of the stars’ names
attached to the films. Nevertheless, Wong’j Chungking Express (1994) and Fallen
Angels (1995) created another sensation over the director himself among Korean
cinephiles. Not as popular as Wong, Stanley Kwan’s films Rouge (1987) or Center
Stage (1992), which were available only at video rental stores,3 1 also left a
significant influence upon later Korean filmmakers. These are the real unexpected
byproducts of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome and, in fact, of the Hong Kong film
industry, in which the art film sector and the popular film sector are not clearly
divided. Overall, the Hong Kong film industry during the period, not only provided
various cinematic pleasures to Korean audiences, but also offered a significant role
model and insights for the Korean film industry to overcome an overall economic
and creative stagnation.
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Why Hong Kong Cinema?
The popularity of Hong Kong film started in 1987 and lasted almost a decade, till
the introduction of Wong Kar-wai’s art films in the mid-1990s. However, popular
passion for HK cinema began declining in 1995 when the imported number of Hong
Kong films suddenly decreased significantly from that of the previous year. The
percentage of Hong Kong films among the entire imported foreign film quota in
Korea also was drastically fell to 13.9%. Considering that the percentage constantly
remained between 20% to over 30% since 1987, the decreased rate of Hong Kong
film import in Korea clearly displayed its diminishing popularity. From then on, the
remaining popularity of Hong Kong films is rather individualized, following specific
stars or filmmakers. The local cinema hasn’t regained its full glory in the Korean
market ever since.
Even though the trend ended just like any other, what remains quite
impressive is how specific local films could have such long lasting popularity in
another local market, especially competing against Hollywood blockbusters
sweeping almost all global film markets. What makes Hong Kong cinema so
attractive for Korean audiences? Does it derive genuinely from the films’ quality or
is it more related to the situation that Korean people found themselves in at the
time? Or is it both? Here, I will speculate and analyze several factors that led to the
sensational reception of Hong Kong films in Korea.
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First, without doubt, those Hong Kong genre films were fully armed
with entertainment values, which firmly established their popular status not only in
Asia but even in the Western world. The violent yet lyrical visuality, the accented
emotion delivered in clear melodramatic narrative, celebration of masculinity
through the emphasis of male bonding, and a touch of nihilism often drawing from
the ephemeral life styles of protagonists standing at the edge of life all provided
audiences with not only an audio-visual feast but often deep emotional rapport with
the characters. Added to this is the beautiful yet melancholic music that usually
enhances the sorrowful mood of the films. As the ephemeral lives of gangsters and
cops are interpreted to symbolize the unstable, and shimmering fate of people in
Hong Kong in general, the genre transcended borders through its powerful, cultural
iconography and masterful entertainment value.
The Hong Kong martial arts films’ international reputation for superb
artistry was well-regarded already. Besides big names such as Bruce Lee or Jackie
Chan, Hong Kong director King Hu’s martial arts film Touch o f Zen (1969) received
both critical acclaim and prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1975, confirming the
industry’s indomitable status as unchallenged in genre filmmaking. During the “New
Wave” era, advanced special effects technology enhanced production values of
martial arts films. Besides the superior martial arts skills displayed on screen, the
special effects, the luscious color of the traditional Chinese costumes, and the
insertion of vast natural landscapes remain crucial elements contributing to the
unique cinematic experience of Hong Kong marital arts films.
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83
However, we may continue to ask why Hong Kong films? Actually as
far as gangster/cop action films were concerned, they were produced everywhere,
not just in Hong Kong. Especially those produced with Hollywood’s abundant
material resources and cinematic technologies ensured their dominance over global
film markets for a long time. Then, how could the small, local cinema of Hong Kong
steal Korean audiences away from the Hollywood “giant?”
The changing configuration of the Korean media industry provides
some answers to these questions. In Korea, the period from the late 1979 to the early
1980s saw the introduction of color TVs and VCRs to the domestic market.3 2 In
particular, the advent of VCRs changed the market topography of the media industry.
VCRs were first introduced in 1979 in one electronics exhibition in Korea. At first,
they were regarded as expensive luxury items and therefore, were allocated mainly
for an industrial usage. However, around the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games, the
demand for VCRs for a domestic usage rapidly increased, and by 1989,
approximately one per five households in Korea possessed VCRs. In 1994, almost
76.2% of the entire Korean home is said to have VCRs.3 3
Table 5: The Distribution of VCRs in Korea3 4
_______ (unit: 1,000)
Year 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992
Number 781 1,118 1,410 2,120 2,680 3,840 5,150 6,450
Just like TVs, the wide distribution of VCRs also made significant transformation in
the leisure activities of citizens in every society in the world, not to mention in
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Korea. Before TV was introduced, the experience of screen culture happened mostly
in public space.3 5 Therefore, going to the movies was a public activity that required
movement out of the domestic space, as well as presenting a certain public demeanor.
The introduction of TVs in the everyday lives of citizens brought such public
activities to private spaces. The visual experience of not only moving images, but
basically the outside world itself became possible within your private space.3 6
Such privatization of screen culture was further enhanced with the mass
production of VCRs in the 1980s. On the major changes that VCRs brought to the
consumers of screen culture, Mark R. Levy notes,
One of the great promises of VCR technology has been that it
will substantially increase the variety of media content
available to audiences. The VCR household, it is said,
becomes its own television programmer, picking and
choosing, from available messages, what it watches and
when}1
Fundamentally, VCRs not only furthered the privatization of screen culture
experience, but also personalized it. Now, people did not need to passively accept
what die broadcasting companies had to offer to them, but were able to select the
films of their own choice, and to view them in the comfort of their private space. In
Korea, one of the most affected sectors of media industry by this increased private
consumption of moving images afforded by VCR technologies was the “sex film”
industry. Encouraged by the government’s non-official “3S” policies which allowed
for generous representation of sexuality on screen, Korean society in the 1980s
witnessed a proliferation of sexploitation films, and accompanying outlets in late
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8 5
night movie screenings. In fact, one could aigue that the mass dissemination of VCR
technologies and the prosperity of the sexploitation film industry went hand in hand
during the period.
Next to this was the Hong Kong genre cinema that took the most
advantage out of this VCR boom. Unfortunately, official statistics regarding the
video rental record of each film are not available to us. However, feasible factors
attest that more Hong Kong films might have been seen through video rentals than at
theaters: not only most of the officially imported Hong Kong films for theatrical
release were re-introduced as videotapes soon after their release, but also those that
were not released were also available at video rental stores.3 8 In addition to this,
popular Hong Kong martial arts TV series became available through this home
video format.3 9 Even without the statistics, the wide availability of Hong Kong
media following the success of several Hong Kong films in theaters proves demand
for Hong Kong media was even higher at video rental stores than in theaters.
I attribute the third important factor of the “Hong Kong Film
Syndrome” to the personal attraction of the legion of Hong Kong stars in die 1980s
and in the 1990s. They included actors like Chow Yun-fat, Leslie Cheung, Andy Lau,
Maggie Cheung, Brigitte Lin, Joey Wong, etc. They were not only equipped with
superior acting skills, but also with picturesque physical beauty. The industry
presented stunning female beauties who appealed to worldwide audiences. What is
most interesting and important to analyze, however, is the changed standard of
beauty witnessed in Hong Kong male actors during the period. Here I especially
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focus on the physical features of the “three Hong Kong pretty boys,” Chow, Cheung,
and Lau, the three major stars legitimized the Hong Kong Film Syndrome in Korea.
These male stars provided a clear departure from the popular look of the Hong Kong
male stars of the earlier period and thus, presented a different masculine beauty
unfamiliar to Korean audiences at that time. They are known as “pretty boys” rather
than the “rugged, macho men,” who had typically been considered representative of
ideal masculinity in East Asia. Traditionally, both in social and cultural discourses,
physical strength rather sophisticated beauty took precedence in men, whereas the
opposite was emphasized in women. Until recently, this bias in gender imagery
dominated gender roles within the culture industry in East Asia,. If we look at the
faces that graced the film industries in Hong Kong until 1970s, it is generally
observed that the most important features of male stars were their physical strength
and action skills, primary elements for the making of a reliable patriarch of the
family or the society. Men needed to be first and foremost physically and mentally
strong to protect their community from outside influence. This physical quality was
even more important in the Hong Kong film industry in the 1960s and 1970s, the
mainstay of which were kung fu films. When such films focus primarily on the
presentation of the actors’ magnificent martial arts skills, the most important talent
required for actors were their physical action skills. Eventually, the word
“handsome,” unlike meaning associated with feminine qualifiers of “beautiful” or
“pretty,” denoted male attractiveness shown in the combined quality of physical
strength, leadership, and responsibility rather than that of physical beauty alone.
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From such a standpoint, these Hong Kong superstars in the 1980s could
be said to be even pretty, not just “handsome,” depending upon one’s point of view.
Such prettiness in men has often been associated with physical weakness, being
“sissy” or “girly” in both contemporary Eastern and Western societies. The advent of
a group of “pretty” male stars in the 1980 in the Hong Kong film industry signals
that such a standard of male beauty or masculinity changed over the period. In the
Hong Kong film industry, this change most likely came with advances in cinematic
technologies. While the earlier action films relied heavily on the physical ability of
the actors, the action films in the 1980s could rely on technologies to supplement
actors’ physical abilities. The proliferation of special effects and their enabling
powers meant freedom to cast actors based more on physical attractiveness over
physical prowess. Such changing circumstance presented attractive male stars
plentiful opportunities as leading players in the industry. The situation not only set a
new standard for male attractiveness, but also provided cinematic pleasure
previously ignored in genre filmmaking. If the visual pleasure presented by the
earlier Hong Kong films with male stars came mostly from the spectacle of the
actors’ physical skills, appreciation of many 1980s males stars derived from the
spectacle of actors’ physical presence itself. The stars themselves became the
spectacle of cinema.
Chow and Cheung’s initial introduction to Korean audiences in the A
Better Tomorrow series and Andy Lau’s in the Casino Raiders series, made
especially females spectators awestruck by these actors’ astounding beauty. Until
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8 8
then, the major Korean male stars were those who were chosen from the
“traditional” standard of strong and tough masculinity. What was more thrilling to
the female audience was how the stars’ beauty did not detract from accepted
standards of traditional masculinity. Mostly featured as cops or gangsters in the
films released in Korea, these male stars were able to present outstanding physical
beauty balanced with traditional masculine strength. They depicted delicate physical
beauty as complementary to physical and mental strength and not in any opposition.
Similarly, Michelle Yeoh and a slew of Hong Kong female action stars proved to
Korean audiences that great beauty and great strength in women could also represent
complementary, realistic attributes. These screen images of strong and independent
women offered yet another new perspective on gender roles unfamiliar to Korean
culture.
Overall, the representation of strength combined with beauty shown in
the group of Hong Kong actors and actresses in the 1980s provided Korean
audiences not only visual pleasure but also an alternative perspective toward gender
rarely familiar in Korean media. These extremely beautiful male actors, additionally,
provided a different kind of cinematic pleasure for Korean female audiences. Until
then, the main gender discourse in Korean media repeatedly reinforced Laura
Mulvey’s classicist notion of the cinematic gaze whereby, the on screen male gaze
constantly objectifies the on screen female, and whose gaze is adopted by both male
and female audience.4 0 In such relations of looking, only the on-screen female body
is presented as an aesthetically pleasing spectacle in cinematic experience. However,
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8 9
these beautiful Hong Kong male stars provided spectacles by their own physical
presence. Their characters were objectified by the on-screen female gaze and female
desire. Therefore, in viewing those male stars on screen, Korean female audiences
were not simply reproducing a male gaze, but were creating their own gaze of desire
toward the actors. This was an empowering experience for the Korean female
audience, in which they were allowed the pleasure of looking back at the opposite
gender as well as enjoying the autonomy of their own gaze, which, until then, were
approved mostly for men both on and oflF-screen.4 1
The fourth, and what I think is the most significant reason for the
popularity of Hong Kong films, can be attributed to the level of affect that the city
and people of Hong Kong, not only Hong Kong cinema, created for Korean people.
Even in ancient times, China and Japan have always had close diplomatic relations
with Korea, together comprising what is known as “East Asia” on the global map of
geopolitics. Therefore, geographically, Hong Kong, originally an island belonging to
the territory of China, has always been a close neighboring society to Korean people.
Because of such close contact over long span of their histories, the cultures and
development of the three countries in East Asia have often been interestingly
intertwined. Memories of cooperation and disputes or conflicts such as the numerous
territorial wars among the three countries, and in particular, the history of the
Japanese colonization of East Asia in the early twentieth century, are not only
remembered by people of each individual country, but are simultaneously shared by
people of all three, although in different ways. Also, linguistically, the Korean and
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9 0
Japanese languages have been heavily influenced by the Chinese language since
ancient times. People in these three countries share similar physical features. Most
of all, especially for Hong Kong and Korea, both have experienced the colonization
of imperial powers, the common experience of which connects the people in the two
political entities even more closely. With such geographical proximity, historical and
cultural commonality, and physiological affinity, people and culture represented in
Hong Kong cinema are naturally felt “less distanf ’ to Korean audience than cinemas
from other areas on the globe.
This feeling of “closeness” or cultural bond was especially significant
for Korean audiences at that time, on two different accounts. First, the melancholic
atmosphere and prevailing sense of doomed fete for the characters in many Hong
Kong Noir films spoke of experiences shared by Korean people. Traditionally,
Korean people are well known for their unique emotion, which is called “han.” The
“han” is well explained in the following definition:
Taken by Koreans to be the essential national experience, han
is constituted from sentiments of loss and rage at the
severance of wholeness and continuity between self and
history. The accumulated emotion of sufferers (and,
inevitably in a strict Confucian patriarchy, especially of
women), han may be projected onto any political ordeal, but
in this century it has been especially the lived response to
devastating colonization and political division.4 2
“Han” is considered to be generally understood by Korean people of all generation
as a form of stoic suppression of suffering. Even though you have never experience
any social or personal trauma that generates “han,” it passes on in the collective
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91
memory and consciousness of Korean people, by the recounting of the historical and
personal trauma inflicted upon Korean people either by individual oral transmission
or through numerous forms of media.
In contemporary Korean history, Korean people’s experience of
suffering persists and such sad emotion cannot easily be uprooted from their
memory. Even after Korea established its own independent political state after the
Korean War, the nation has experienced social crisis whenever the society met a new
political leader. The dawn of the 1980s greeted citizens with a horrible civil
massacre before the ascension of a new president, whose new military regime
constantly oppressed the freedom of speech. Under such a reign of terror, the
citizens of Korea needed an escapist outlet from their distressful social and political
situation. It is not surprising that many Hong Kong Noir films, mostly saturated with
gloomy and sorrowful mood, could easily appeal to the emotionally repressed
Korean audience. The feeling of helplessness and deep despair which are presented
both in the general atmosphere of Hong Kong Noir films and also the specific
Korean emotion of “han” cannot easily be imitated by other culture that did not have
similar experience of collective trauma. In particular, the reflection of the instable
social and political situation of Hong Kong in those films provided vicarious
experiences of relevant social commentary on the plight of Korean people
undergoing similar tumultuous social unrest at the moment, but whose own films
could not fully address social criticism because of censorship restrictions. Therefore,
the dark and gloomy Hong Kong Noir genre provided an alternative outlet for
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9 2
Korean audience to tender their repressed feelings under the specific political
situation, as well as being a source of popular entertainment. Gina Marchetti
explains this point succinctly:
Particular genres tend to be popular at certain points in time
because they somehow embody and work through those
social contradictions the culture needs to come to grips with
and may not be able to deal with except in the realm of
fantasy. As such, popular genie often fimction in a way
similar to the way myth functions... 4 3
The second ground on which the Hong Kong genre films appealed to
the affect of the Korean people can be found in the specific situation that the Korean
film industry were experiencing at that time. It was a critical period for the domestic
film industry as it confronted die economic pressure from Hollywood to change the
trade relations in their own favor. The situation in fact placed Korean audiences in
quite an ambivalent state between their own patriotism and their desire for quality
culture. Despite the initial, harsh resistance, US film companies’ direct business in
Korea began thriving. While harboring a feeling of strong hostility toward
Hollywood’s ever encroaching infiltration upon the domestic cultural economy,
many Korean people also simultaneously gave in to the dazzling entertainment value
of Hollywood fere, hr such circumstances, the appearance of newly reinvigorated
Hong Kong popular cinema to the Korean market certainly provided a welcoming
alternative to Hollywood films. As time passed, reportage of Hong Kong cinema’s
global success coming from both inside and outside of the Korean media impressed
upon Korean people the understanding of the Hong Kong film industry as a
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9 3
formidable East Asian colleague and potential model. By the late 1980s, the Hong
Kong commercial genre films gained popularity among Western cinephiles, while
Hong Kong New Wave genre filmmakers John Woo and Tsui Hark, Hong Kong-
based actors Jackie Chan and Chow Yun-fat were courted by Hollywood and began
embarking on their transnational careers.
Overall, the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome” is not simply a random and
temporal cultural trend created by erratic fans of popular culture. In fact, it is an
important moment in the Korean cultural history, whereby, numerous social,
political, cultural, and economic factors intersected with one another. Confronting
the ever expanding economic pressure from global capitalism and the oppressing
domestic political situation, Korean people needed the means to endure the period
and make progress toward the future. This excessive infatuation over a globally
aspiring but non-threatening, enviable yet compatible neighboring local cinema, in
feet was the site of struggle manifested in such cultural behavior. Korean people’s
patronage of these Hong Kong genre films formed one important aspect of
witnessing the resistance, compromise, negotiation, and eventually the effort for
survival of Korean people through the cultural and social conditions placed upon
them in the 1980s and 1990s .
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2. The Sino-Effects in South Korean Cinema
The previous chapter discussed the enthusiastic reception of Hong Kong films in
Korea, popularly called the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome.” However, if the ardor
over Hong Kong cinema just ended as vigorous consumption of a foreign culture,
the meaning of it would have been temporal and minimized. The significance of the
“Hong Kong Film Syndrome” in feet lies more in the traces, visibly left on later
Korean cinema as much as in the zealous reception of the films. In this part of
discussion, therefore, I will analyze the numerous aspects that prove the influence of
Hong Kong films on the texts of later Korean films.
In feet, the popularity of Hong Kong commercial genre films is not a
unique phenomenon in Korea. For decades, both Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan were
familiar with Western audiences, just like they were with Korean audiences.
Although they did not make films directly with the Korean film industry, once they
rose to stardom, they did with Hollywood.4 4 The legacy of the two stars continued
in the new generation of Hong Kong gangster/cop action movies produced during
the mid-1980s, and the technologically-mastered Hong Kong martial arts costume
dramas. Numerous works have been devoted to the discussion on the international
reception of Hong Kong cinema. The works of David Desser, Jinsoo An, Bhaskar
Sarkar, and S.V. Srinivas4 5 among others, explicate the popular reception of Hong
Kong cinema in the US, Korea, and India. Such works illustrate the gamut of
international feme afforded by Hong Kong cinema that went beyond the confines of
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the neighboring Asian countries. These studies on the international reception of
Hong Kong films verify the centrality of genre conventions in the success of Hong
Kong films. Therefore, such studies so far discussed Hong Kong films primarily
within the framework of genre studies. The discussion of the reception of Hong
Kong films in this dissertation, although following strongly the tradition of genre
studies, tries to move beyond it. The primary focus of this discussion is to position
the transnational popularity of Hong Kong films as the site of the cultural contention
between global Hollywood and a local cultural market, such as that of Korea. The
Hong Kong cinema, as catalyst for a global vs. local confrontation in the Korean
film market, as we shall see, leaves an indelible influence on later Korean films.
By looking at such influence, I would like to see Hong Kong cinema’s
significant role in the history of Korean cinema, in terms of hybridization of
different cultural influences providing variation to the theme and subjects as well as
to the look of the domestic films. Also, I want to discuss the influence of Hong Kong
cinema from the perspective of a nation’s cultural autonomy, especially in relation to
Korea’ s then conflicts with the Hollywood film industry. In this case, what is
interesting is that such pursuit of independence of a national culture was sought not
through holding on to “things Korean,” but rather “things Asian,” that is, the
regional identity of culture. By analyzing the effects of Hong Kong films on Korean
films like such, I argue that the influence of Hong Kong films, or what I call the
“Sino-effects,” demonstrates the work of a survival strategy adapted by the Korean
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film industry, in response to the violently expanding power of global capital that was
threatening local cultural industries.
The “Sino-Effects,” or the Traces of Hong Kong Cinema in the Korean Film
Industry
Of course, one of the significance of the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome” in Korea is
the feet that the enormous popularity of Hong Kong films during the given period,
posed a serious challenge to the dominant position of Hollywood films in the
Korean market, However, the more important meaning of the introduction of
popular Hong Kong films, in terms of the Korean film history, lies in the textual and
thematic influence left on subsequent Korean films. What is notable about the
situation is that such cinematic influence from Hong Kong is distinguished from that
of Hollywood films or any other foreign films introduced to Korea at that time.
Although the influence of Hollywood films prevails throughout global
film markets, it remains quite difficult to clearly define what the contemporary
“Hollywood film style” is. According to David Bordwell, Kristin Thompson, and
Janet Steiger’ s monumental study on Hollywood films of the studio era, the so-
called “Classical Hollywood style” up to the 1960s, is defined by its linear narrative,
continuity editing, etc..4 6 Such style was promulgated by what can be called the
“cultural assembly line” of the Hollywood studio system in existence over several
decades. Since then, however, even Hollywood films could not ignore the influence
of the major film movement and newer styles offered by various other cinemas,
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most notably those of post-war Europe and Asia. Therefore, one of the most
challenging tasks for current film scholars or critics involves attributing any specific
filmmaking style to a specific national film industry, as we witness greater
heterogeneity across the board. Just like the film styles of other countries, the
Hollywood film style is also the combination of the various influences from
numerous cultures. The only difference is that Hollywood has the economic and
political clout to disseminate their products to the rest of the world. However, as
ubiquitous as the influence of Hollywood style is in the world, it is rarely unique,
and therefore is hard to define.
At the moment, the most distinctive feature of Hollywood films
revolves around astronomical budgets and high production values, as evident in the
blockbuster film. Blockbuster films are defined mainly by the material abundance
that is present in the production of a single film. Although the production of the
blockbuster started in Hollywood, ambitious local film industries are vying to
imitate this Hollywood creation. Therefore, now we can sometimes hear such
phrases as the “Korean blockbuster” or “Chinese blockbuster.”4 7 However, the scale
of the blockbuster coming from Hollywood usually cannot be emulated by these
other local film industries. Therefore, other than the recent increased expenditure in
filmmaking by smaller local film industries, no other Hollywood influence is so
conspicuously locatable.
Unlike the influence of Hollywood films which now exists almost as an
abstract concept rather than in the realm of practice, the influence of Hong Kong
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films that I want to indicate here is quite conspicuous and concrete because of its
reliance on the shared cultural assets between Korea and China, on the unique
conventions and practices introduced during the period of the “Hong Kong Film
Syndrome.” Most of all, they represent distinguishable features of Hong Kong
cinema because the immediacy of some of these influences materialized in Korean
films, on the heels of the popularity of Hong Kong films. Here, I want to discuss
several most distinctive traces of Hong Kong films, prominently present in later
Korean films. I call them “Sino-Effects.”
The first newly fashionable tendency after the popularity of Hong Kong
cinema is the proliferation of Chinese style titles of Korean films. Historically,
Korea borrowed and appropriated Chinese characters in its linguistic system for
centuries, mostly in its written language. This situation lasted even after unique
Korean characters were invented in the fifteenth century. The way Chinese
characters are used in Korean society is often more supplemental than essential. As a
logogram, each Chinese character carries an individual meaning. However, Korean
is an agglutinative language system in which each word is formed by combination of
morphemes, the smallest meaningful units. Therefore, to Korean people, things
written in Chinese convey meanings more implicitly rather than things written in
Korean, which are perceived to be descriptive. In feet, it is not easy to tell Chinese
style words from what are not in the Korean lexicon, because considerable part of
the Korean language is Chinese in its origin already. Most of all, most Korean
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people’s names consist of three Korean characters, and in most cases, these
characters have Chinese equivalents, which denote the meaning of the name.
And there is Sino-Korean, which originally comes from Chinese words,
but is completely appropriated and adapted as a part of the Korean lexicon. In fact,
many words used in everyday Korean language are Sino-Korean rather than pure
Korean. Each Sino-Korean word is originally derived from the combination of, or a
single Chinese character, and constitutes a single meaning. These words might not
be used in contemporary Chinese language. Even though the same combination of
characters is used in die Chinese language, they are pronounced differently. For
example, the Sino-Korean word meaning “newspaper” is written as in
Korean, and is pronounced as [shin-mun]. This word is originally from Chinese
“IfrPol,” pronounced in Mandarin as [xin-wen]. Although the word is originally
Chinese, there are no other words in Korean language that can substitute
Therefore, it is considered as an essential vocabulary in Korean.
However, the usage of these various Sino-Korean words in the Korean
language system is all different. While there are words that are completely adopted
in the colloquial Korean vocabulary, there are Sino-Korean words that have pure
Korean equivalents and are used less frequently. Some others remain as extremely
formal or antiquated vocabulary, almost obsolete for contemporary usage. Overall,
during the latter part of the twentieth century, great efforts were made by progressive
Korean politicians and intellectuals to reduce the pervasiveness of Chinese language
in the linguistic habits of Koreans. As a result, the mandatory education of Chinese
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in Korean pre-collegiate classes and the use of Chinese characters in Korean
newspapers have been abolished. Since then, the unnecessary use of Chinese-origin
words has been remarkably reduced, although it is almost impossible to completely
eradicate the essential Sino-Korean words from the Korean vocabulary.
Because Chinese characters take up such a huge part in the Korean
language system, there were numerous titles of Korean films that used Sino-Korean
characters, whether they were colloquial words, people’ s names, or literary words.
The kinds of Chinese style film titles that I analyze here, however, are distinguished
from those frequently used Sino-Korean words. These Chinese style words used in
film titles that I focus on here hardly appear in Korean language. They are
specifically coined to serve their purpose as film titles, usually consisting of
implicative and poetic four or three letter words. Such titles include Pok-su-hyol-jon
(A Bloody Battle for Revenge, dir. YI Kyong-kyu, 1992), Kui-chdn-do (literally
meaning, A Picture about Returning to Heaven, dir. YI Kyong-yong, 1996), Chi-
sang-man-ga (Lament, dir. KIM Hui-chSl, 1997), Yon-pung-ydn-ga (Love Wind
Love Song, dir. PARK Tae-yong, 1999), Pi-chon-mu (Out Live, dir. KIM Ydng-jun,
2000), Si-wd-rae (Q Mare), Saek-juk-si-gong (Sex is Zero, dir. YUN Che-kyun,
2002), Chong-pung-myong-wol (Sword in the Moon, dir. KIM Ui-sok, 2003), Nang-
man-ja-gaek (Romantic Assassin, dir. Yun Che-kyun, 2004), etc.4 8 Most of these
titles’ meanings do not come instantly to most Korean adults, and the meaning of
each word needs to be deciphered to define the whole meaning of the phrase.
Although some of their meaning is understood more easily than others due to
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combinations of frequently used Sino-Korean words, the three or four letter phrases
seen above do not belong to the general Korean lexicon. They are instantly
perceived to be Chinese-style to most Korean people whether they sound familiar or
not These titles evince the direct influence of Hong Kong films which usually had
titles of such four or three letter words as seen in Yong-ung-bon-saek (A Better
Tomorrow) Chon-nyo-yu-hon (A Chinese Ghost Story), Chop-hyol-ssang-ung (The
Killer), or Ok-bo-dan (Sex and Zen), etc.4 9
Some of the Korean films that use such Chinese style titles insinuate the
films’ direct influence from Hong Kong genre films, by following the convention of
popular Hong Kong genre films. For example, A Bloody Battle fo r Revenge is a
modem martial arts action movie, whereas Sword in the Moon falls into costume
swordplay. Some others do not have such association with Hong Kong films either
in their genre or cinematic style, but simply used the Chinese-style titles. Love Wind
Love Song and Lament are romantic love stories, without displaying other
connections to Chinese culture except their titles. Such Chinese-style titles make the
films look more exotic and fashionable because of their obvious association with
popular Hong Kong cinema, and furthermore Chinese language cinemas in general.
To some Koreans, they might look intellectual and poetic because of their implicit
meanings, which cannot be understood without a certain degree of knowledge in
Chinese characters.
While die frequent appearance of the four or three letter words title
shows the influence of Hong Kong films on several Korean films on a paratextual
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level,5 0 another aspect of Korean cinema that is ostensibly affected by its
neighboring film culture is the so-called “Wong Kar-wai style,” frequently adopted
by numerous Korean filmmakers. It is risky to define what “Wong Kar-wai style” is,
because it includes numerous different cinematic aspects. Also, it is not correct to
call some styles as Wong’s own simply because he uses them a lot, considering that
he was also influenced by numerous filmmakers before him. Even so, some
cinematic styles were made memorable to Korean audience and filmmakers only
when they were efficiently used in Wong’s Chungking Express and Fallen Angels. In
fact, the two films, which made Wong internationally famous, also launched the
“Wong Kar-wai Syndrome” in Korea, a kind of sub-trend under the “Hong Kong
Film Syndrome”. Then what is the unique Wong’s style?
One of Wong’s cinematic characteristics celebrated by Korean
audiences and filmmakers is the highly accented visual design, characterized by a
manipulation of color, camera speed and angles. Stephen Teo summarizes some of
Wong’s crucial visual techniques as follows:
The technique of slow-shutter-speed photography and step-
printing creates the recurrent sense of objects in mid-motion
or a series of static shots in arrested movement (...). Such a
technique creates a distortion of movement, a sense of false
speed, which paradoxically has the effect of dynamically
heightening velocity.5 1
Wong’s styles represent the world that was perceived by the highly subjective point
of view of an individual observer, rather than put it in a “realistic” frame of
reference. By emphasizing die different perspectives of looking at the world, he
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questions what is a truly realistic style in cinema. His style challenges the idea of
mimesis or the “mirroring” of the world in filmmaking that we have been long
familiar with. Such emphasis on experimentation in visual style was quite unfamiliar
to Korean audiences. Until then they were mostly accustomed to the natural tone of
color and linear development of temporality based on the principle of “realistic”
aesthetics with which the majority of Korean filmmakers worked. While most
Korean filmmakers, especially those who are considered to be “serious” artistic
filmmakers, focused on delivering stories and themes, which challenged audiences
intellectually, Wong’s unflinching cinematic techniques came to them as a certain
cultural shock, by strongly stimulating the senses with his bold audio-visual
statement. His films delivered messages and ideas not only through the literal
content of films, but also through the exploration of non-literal elements such as
audio visual elements.
Another signature aspect of Wong’s films that impressed Korean
audiences is the omnibus format of his films, in which a single film consists of
several different yet related episodes. In Chunking Express and Fallen Angels, such
compartmentalization of a story is done by following the different viewpoints of
numerous characters who occupy the same city space, but are not necessarily related
to each other. Until these two films were introduced, this kind of exploration of
multiple perspectives in observing the world was hardly witnessed in Korean films.
The synchronic observation of multiple spaces in Wong’ s films was quite innovative
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to Korean filmmakers who worked in the tradition of the singular linear narrative,
recounted mostly by one individual perspective.
His inspiration and influence to the Korean film and TV directors
manifested almost immediately in the numerous Korean TV dramas and films of the
period. M otel Cactus [Motel soninjang] (dir. PARK Ki-yong, 1997) or Holiday In
Seoul [Holidei in soul] (dir. Kim Ui-sok and KANGU-sok, 1997), not only adopted
this omnibus structure of story telling, but also were not afraid to mimic the similar
visual designs used by Wong. In the case of M otel Cactus, Wong’ s frequent
collaborator and his cinematographer for Chungking Express and Fallen Angles,
Christopher Doyle was hired on as the cinematographer for this production. In fact,
with the increased popularity of Wong’s films among Korean cinephiles, Doyle’s
fame arose in Korea as well. Wong’s signature camera and editing techniques, the
use of a wide angle camera lens and step printing technique to manipulate the spatial
and temporal perception, were also soon popularized in films such as Beat [Pitu] (dir.
KIM Song-su,1997) or Nowhere to Hide [Injongsajong pol got opta] (dir. YI Myong-
se, 1999). The multiple perspectives or compartmentalization of a film, shown in
The Day a Pig Fell into a Well [Twaeji ka umul e pajinnal] (dir. HONG Sang-su,
1996) or The Power o f Kangwon [Kangwondo ui him] (dir. Hong Sang-su, 1998)
were also not familiar in the Korean film industry before Wong’s films were
introduced. It is doubtful whether all the Korean filmmakers mentioned would admit
Wong’s influence on their works. Nevertheless, they cannot avoid being part of the
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trend influenced by Wong, simply because their similar techniques did not precede
Wong’s.
Wong’s style, indeed, promulgated similar techniques in later Korean
films. However, most importantly, Wong’s everlasting influence on Korean film
culture remains his calling to attention the importance of styles to Korean
filmmakers and audiences. In the past, Korean films focused mainly on delivering
storylines rather than exploring the means of cinematic delivery. Whenever
questions regarding technical improvement of films were raised, Korean filmmakers
would use an unfortunate, yet convenient excuse regarding the unavailability of
glamorous cinematic techniques seen in Hollywood and various foreign films. When
they considered Hollywood to be emulated, the task seemed to be almost impossible.
However, when they saw the successful technical and aesthetic exploration by a
filmmaker from a compatible neighboring culture, it provided them with inspirations
and aspirations. One Korean journalist, therefore, said that “Korean cinema in the
1990s had to deal with Wong Kar-wai complex. But none of them could surpass
him.”5 2 Whether or not any individual director surpassed Wong in utilizing the
cinematic techniques that he frequently used, Wong’s legacy became an impetus for
the more innovative cinematic techniques in Korean films from the mid-1990s
onwards.
The third influence of Hong Kong cinema on Korean cinema is found in
the proliferation of the martial arts costume dramas in the Korean film industry since
the 1990s. The influx of period martial arts dramas, starting with the fantastic
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martial art romance A Chinese Ghost Story series, and continuing with the Asia the
Invincible series or the Once Upon A Time in China series, stimulated several
Korean filmmakers to explore the genre in the Korean context. The martial arts films
were once also popularly produced in the Korean film industry in the 1960s and 70s,
but later the tendency declined and became almost invisible in the domestic film
production by the 1980s. Therefore, it would be more accurate to say that such
popularity of Hong Kong martial arts costume dramas rekindled the passion for such
a genre in the Korean film industry. Films like Pichonmu, The Legend o f Ginko Tree
[Tan jok bi yon su] (dir. PARK Che-hyon, 2000), Musa (dir. KIM Song-su, 2001),
Saulabi [Ssaulabi] (dir. MUN Chong-kum, 2002), Sword in the Moon, and etc.
evidence this revival. The makers of these films not only borrowed and adapted the
martial arts techniques and choreography from the HK martial arts films, but
sometimes hired experts in this field directly from the Hong Kong film industry, as
Christopher Doyle was hired for another type of film in Korea. For example, the
film Pichonmu boasted the same martial arts choreographer of the Asia the
Invincible series, and as expected, some of the scenes show clear resemblance to
those in the earlier Hong Kong films.
The fourth influence can be found in the frequent appearance of trans
temporal romance in Korean films. The film that became first popularized with such
type of story was, the A Chinese Ghost Story series. This sad story of two lovers
existing in two different temporal spaces, while based on the Buddhist belief of
transmigration of souls and told as a fantasy, left a tremendous impression upon
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Korean audiences, because the Buddhistic themes spoke directly to one of the most
influential religions in the country. Soon after the success of the film, the sequel as
well as numerous similar stories was introduced in Korea. Although different in
genre, the pure romance Rouge, which was not released in theaters but was available
in video stores, also featured the love story between a ghost and human being. Soon
after, the theme of human bodies and/or spirits migrating across different temporal
worlds, embodying the various religious beliefs of reincarnation, rebirth, or
transmigration of souls, started to appear in Korean films, beginning with the revival
of the popular Korean ghost story, Kumiho (Nine-Tailed Fox, dir. PARK Hon-su,
1992/ Kumiho was a Korean ghost story about a young female ghost who disguises
herself as a human being in order to fulfill her wish to become a real human being
by subsisting on human blood for a thousand years. This story had been adapted in
various incarnations during the 1960s, and was made into a TV drama several times
up to the early 1980s. It has been several years since the fed over such supernatural
ghost stories began diminishing in the Korean media, that is, until Kumiho was
remade into a film version in 1990s. Although the earlier forms of the same title
always set the film in ancient Korea, the 1992 version transplanted the story to
modem Seoul, focusing on the romance between the female ghost and a naive young
man, quite similar to A Chinese Ghost Story. The concerted attempts at special
effects and wired stunt actions clearly displayed the film’s strongly influences from
the popular Hong Kong ghost film of the late 1980s.
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More impressive adaptation and appropriation of such fantastic romance
spanning different lifetimes is found in The Ginko Bed [Unhaengnamu chimdae] (dir.
KANG Che-kyu, 1996), the highest grossing Korean film of that year. Based on the
belief in reincarnation, this film features a story about two lovers, whose love could
not be consummated in their former life a thousand years ago. They meet again in
contemporary Seoul as a reincarnated human being and a ghost, respectively.
Featuring a sword wielding ancient warrior who tries to interrupt the reunification of
lovers, the film demonstrates high production value, special effects-aided action
scenes for a Korean film. While Guichondo similarly feature ancient swordsmen
moving across different temporalities to the modem world, there are also films like
2009 Lost Memories [2009 Losutu memoriju] (dir. YI Si-myong, 2001), in which
contemporary Korean man and woman move back to the early twentieth century
altering the history of colonized Korea. In films like II Mare, the lovers are only
separated by temporal gap of two years, and they are eventually united. Overall,
from the early 1990s, the theme of the possible encounter between two different
temporal spaces was featured prominently in several high-profile Korean films.
Although this is not the first time the Korean film and media dealt with such a theme,
as attested by the frequent remake of a Korean ghost story throughout the early
1980s, the fashionable revival of such themes after a considerable hiatus, in more
diversified settings than just a ghost story, accounts for the influence of Hong Kong
cinema in the 1980s and 1990s which had persistently explored the theme.
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The fifth influence can be found in the later proliferation of gangster
films or “Chopok yonghwa” in Korea, following the popularity of the Hong Kong
Noir films. Although the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome” refers to the passion over
numerous Hong Kong genre films, Hong Kong gangster/cop action movies
remained the center of this phenomenon. The story of hopeless destiny and
desperate lives of Hong Kong’ s underworld society and the law-enforcers portrayed
in this genre of films soon began to be readapted into numerous Korean action films.
Again, you cannot say that this action genre suddenly appeared in the Korean film
culture in the 1980s. In the 1960s and 70s, numerous action movies flourished in
Korea. However, like the Korean martial arts genres, these movies gradually
disappeared from the memory of Korean audience to the point that the blood-
splattering action and gun-fighting in A Better Tomorrow series were looked upon as
newly exciting to young Korean audiences of that period. Within a few years of the
initial success of the A Better Tomorrow series, The Killer, and the Casino Raiders
series, prolific production of Korean action films became evident. Some of the
notable titles, especially because of the intense media promotion during the release
period, were Son o f a General [Changgun ui adul] (dir. Im Kwon-taek, 1990),
Kkojitan (dir. KIM Yong-nam, 1990) and A Bloody Battle fo r Revenge. In particular,
the tremendous success of Son o f a General, coming in third in the annual box office
with 678,946 ticket sales, and that of its two sequels, firmly set the trend of making
action films in the Korean film industry. The trend continued, showing improved
action choreography and cinematic techniques year by year. Some of the memorable
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titles of the genre are The Rules o f the Game [Keim ui pochik] (dir. CHANG Hyon-
su, 1994), Terroists [Terorisutu] (dir. KIM Yong-bin, 1995), Born To K ill [Pon tu kil]
(dir. Chang Hyon-su, 1996), Beat, Anarchists [Anakisutu] (dir. YU Yong-sik, 2000).
Such Korean action genre films soon gave birth to its unique trend of “Chopok
yonghwa,” literally meaning “organized-gangsters films.” The phenomenal success
of such Chopok film came in 2001, when Friends [Chingu] (dir. KWAK Kyong-taek,
2001) topped the box office receipts in Korea by attracting 2,678,846 people in its
initial release in Seoul. This record surpassed the record of both Shwiri [Shwiri] (dir.
Kang Che-kyu, 1999, 2,448,399) and Joint Security Area [Kongdong kyongbiguyok
jeiesuei] (dir. Park Chan-wook, 2000, 2,513,540), both of which were noted to be
the biggest box office successes in the history of Korean cinema up to the years of
their release. Although the action genre prospered since the early 1990s, the huge
commercial success of Friend firmly stabilized the long trend of “Chopok” films in
Korea in the following years. Although Chopok films work in one of the most
famous contemporary action genres in Korea, they are still one category of
numerous other action films popularly made in Korea. Also, as the genre evolved,
Korean action genres started to set its own unique trend, not only producing serious
and gloomy action films much like the Hong Kong Noir, but also popularly
produced comedic action films, hi fact, all three Chopok films that sold more than a
million tickets in Seoul since Friends, M y Wife is a Gangster, M y Boss M y Hero
[Tusabu Uche] (dir. YUN Che-kyun, 2001), Hi! Dharma [Talmaya nolja] (dir. PARK
Chol-kwan, 2002), belong to such comic action films.
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Ill
There are other influences that do not necessarily come directly from
Hong Kong films, but of which Hong Kong films are definitely an important part.
One such trend is the frequent appearance of gourmet films in Korea. This genre of
films features food as the main subjects or an important motif. The influence of such
gourmet films cannot be said to directly come from Hong Kong films because the
first of such films that was popularly received in Korea was in fact Taiwanese film
Eat, Drink, Man, Woman (1994) directed by Ang Lee. The Hong Kong film industry
gave this viable genre their attention, and produced many gourmet films
immediately following the success of Lee’s films. Famous films like The Chinese
Feast (dir. Tsui Hark, 1995) and similar Hong Kong food films were soon made and
they were also introduced to Korea. Although none of them garnered as much
critical and box office success as Lee’s film, but altogether, they certainly ushered in
the period of gourmet films in Korea. Soon after, the critically acclaimed Korean
film 301/302 [Samgonil samgongi] (dir. PARK Chol-su, 1995) featured food as the
main subject matter* and featured the elaborate process of creating several splendid
dishes in a manner intent on stimulating the audience visually, aurally, and
gastronomically. Recent films such as The Great C hef [Pukkyongpanjom] (dir. Kim
ui-sok, 1999) and The Opening [Shinjanggaeop] (dir. KIM Song-hong, 1999),
which are set in Chinese restaurants in Korea, or the hugely successful TV drama
Jewel in Palace, a fictional story about a Korean royal cook/pharmacist during the
Chosun Dynasty, all seem to be influenced by the gourmet film made fashionable by
these 1990s Chinese language films.
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It is still arguable whether all these influence are solely coming from
Hong Kong cinema. They might come from other films, and each individual director
might have been affected from various different sources in creating their own films.
The important aspect of the Hong Kong film industry, however, is that once a film is
successful, the market is bombarded with countless films of the same genre. As the
main consumers of such genre films, Korean filmmakers and audiences cannot
completely deny the influence of such mass dissemination of similar ideas on both
conscious and unconscious levels. These Hong Kong genre films themselves might
have combined various influences of other foreign genre films. However, it is them
that popularized such genres in Korea.
Cultural Hybridization and the Issues of Cultural Autonomy
As we have seen so far, the influx of Hong Kong films in Korea since
the mid-1980s not only achieved commercial success but also left indelible marks in
the later Korean cinema. The significance of such influence of foreign films lies in
how it transforms, reformulates, and reconfigures the overall operation of Korean
cinema. This question is most important especially when we think about the
changing situation of Korean cinema before and after the “Hong Kong Film
Syndrome” period. Korean cinema had always been under the influence of foreign
films, mostly Hollywood films. However, the Hollywood film industry was always
at such a far distance from the Korean film industiy, which makes like hiring
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Hollywood film personalities for the production of Korean films highly unlikely.
Moreover, in terms of the reception, films in the 1980s were created primarily for
domestic consumption, rather than for foreign export. Therefore, in terms of
reception and filmmaking process, Korean films up till the 1980s could fit
categorically into the discourse of national cinema, which supposes the exclusive
sets of quality, displayed by a large corpus of cinema from a single country. In his
essential essay on the subject, Andrew Higson says,
To identify a national cinema is first of all to specify a
coherence and unity; it is to proclaim a unique identity and a
stable set of meaning. The process of identification is thus
invariably a hegemonising, mythologizing process, involving
both the production and assignation of a particular set of
meaning, and the attempt to contain, or prevent the potential
proliferation of other meanings. At the same time, the concept
of a national cinema has almost invariably been mobilized as
a strategy of cultural (and economic) resistance; a means of
asserting national autonomy in the face of (usually)
Hollywood’s international domination.5 3
If Post-War Korean cinema by the 1980s can be accounted for within the framework
of a national cinema, it is mostly because of the lack of opportunity for encounter
and collaboration with foreign cultures. Until then, other than those films available
at theaters, other experiences of foreign films as well as foreign culture in general
were only available for select few people. Naturally, most films had to focus on the
issues familiar to the Korean situation, simply because they did not have enough
knowledge about the other societies or cultures. Even though a Korean film was
influenced or even imitating a foreign film, it was hardly discemable by Korean
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audiences and such activity was rarely disclosed, because of audience’ s lack of
contact with the supposed original works. Therefore, even such imitated works
sometimes could easily pass as original.
However, since the 1990s and after Korean film culture experienced the
immense popularity over Hong Kong films, the situation changed. From this period
onwards, Korean cinema started to mix distinct foreign influences besides that of
Hollywood’s. The influence is not only distinct because of their more obvious
textual resemblance to some of the Hong Kong genre films, but also because Korean
film audiences became more “knowing” cultural consumers than before. With the
mass dissemination of VCRs, most Korean people, if they wanted to, could have
gained similar knowledge of media on par with Korean filmmakers who usually
represented the more culturally privileged segment of society. With such increased
accessibility to countless films from diverse cultures, more Korean audiences could
make distinctions about filmic influence in media products they consumed regularly.
Regardless of what filmmakers say, each audience could form their own opinion
regarding what is familiar and what is original about a film. Therefore, from this
period, the hybridizing nature of a majority of Korean films became conspicuous not
only because of the frequency of such cultural hybridization but also because of the
promulgation of discemable eyes. In particular, the influence came from Hong Kong
films, which were popular in the country for almost a decade, was undeniable in that
regard.
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Therefore, from this period, it could be said that there was a significant
change in the general cultural topology of Korean cinema, especially in terms of the
discourse of Korean national cinema. The Korean films in this period can no longer
be categorized within the homogenizing framework of a national cinema, because it
is a period of hybridization. Most significantly, Korean cinema began developing
along different yet distinctive paths. While the Korean popular cinema developed
showing strong influences from Hong Kong genre films, the Korean art cinema
during the same period delved more vigorously into Korea’s own unique cultural
and social attributes. The works of Im Kwon-Taek were particularly representative
Korean art films that continuously probed the Korean traditional culture featured in
them, and earned critical acclaim at international film festivals during the period.
This phenomenon marked a transitional period in Korean cinema. By
the late 1980s, even within East Asia, the Korean film industry remained the least
prosperous film industry in the region. It was a period when the Chinese fifth
generation directors such as Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige, the New Taiwanese
filmmakers such as Hou Hsiao-Hsien and Edward Yang, and Japanese filmmakers
Kitano Takeshi, etc. already won big awards in prestigious international film
festivals. On the side of art films, Korean film culture was inundated with their news,
and on the side of commercial films, it was impressed and envious of the way that
their neighbor, the Hong Kong film industry could produce profitable commercial
films, emulating die popularity of Hollywood’s products. Confronting such
challenges from every direction, the Korean film industry had to devise a way to
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improve its quality in both commercial and art film sectors. Such ambition is
materialized in following the most successful and accessible role models: in art
cinema, by exploring the traditional culture because it “sold” well in the
international film festival circuit as evident from the Chinese-language cinemas.5 4
In commercial cinema, they followed the most successful genre formulas derived
from Hong Kong cinema. The strategy worked rather successfully, and the fruitful
result started to be shown in the achievement of Korean cinema both at international
film festivals and at domestic and foreign box offices from the late 1990s onwards.
The significant meaning for the enthusiastic reception of Hong Kong
cinema remains its challenging of and its function as the impetus for Korean cinema
to move forward to its prosperous future. The fact that it, instead of Hollywood,
served as the primary model for this local cinema success diffuses the cultural threat
posed by Hollywood. The discourse of globalization almost automatically sets the
once imperial power holder Western to modem and global, and the once colonized
states to the primitive and local. This is an inarguable top-down process in which the
power always flows from the global to local. This is especially true with the media
culture, because of the rapid dispersion of information through media technology.
Regarding the relationship between media and globalization, Aijun Appadurai
observes,
Electronic media give a new twist to the environment within
which the modem and the global often appears as flip sides of
the same coin. Always, carrying in the sense of distance
between viewer and event, these media nevertheless compel
the transformation of everyday discourse. At the same time,
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they are resources for experiments with self-making in all
sorts of societies, for all sorts of persons.5 5
In fact, in the global power structure of electronic media just like the other areas, the
sector that has more power to widely disseminate their messages always takes the
dominant position. In terms of cinema, it has always been Hollywood that has the
most power to disseminate their products than any other national film culture in the
world, therefore constantly remaining the most influential. The issue of how to deal
with the Hollywood’s monopolizing power is always the dilemma that most national
film cultures in the world are preoccupied with.
The reason why Korean film culture was so sensitive about the direct
import of Hollywood films is not simply because of the increased amount of
Hollywood films released in Korea with the changed cultural policy, but because of
their potential to impress and inculcate the general Korean film culture with an
unattainable production standard. Eventually, it is an exact reproduction of the
imperial power structure in cultural forms. The detrimental aspect of such cultural
imperialism is that they come in a more advanced and fashionable cultural forms.
Therefore, regardless of what kind of enforcement is done, such “higher'’ cultural
power arrives to the local sector. Once it is introduced, it usually prospers on its own
attraction, which immediately makes the existing local culture less sophisticated and
less interesting. Arif Dirlik comments,
Global capitalism represents a further deterritorialisation,
abstraction, and concentration of capital. In a fundamental
sense, global capitalism represents an unprecedented
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penetration of local society globally by the economy and
culture of capital: so that the local understood in a
56
“traditional” sense may be less relevant than ever.
When Korean film culture was confronting such a keen crisis opposing the global
cultural hegemony of Hollywood, the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome” came in as a
significant alternative cultural force that can considerably difluse Hollywood’s
influence in the domestic Korean film culture. And the resultant effects of it on
Korean cinema leaves an important legacy proving that the transformation and
advancement of local culture does not always come from the direct influence of the
global hegemony holders. The period of the “Hong Kong Film Syndrome,” therefore,
shows how the influence of more accessible and closer local cultures can be stronger
and more efficient aid in the transformation of a nation’s cultural output. The
neighboring culture’s influence, as is shown in the Hong Kong cinema’s influence
on Korean cinema, is more visible and efficiently adopted because it provided more
feasible model for the nation’s culture to emulate and adapt to. In other words, the
cultural and economic intervals between compatible local cultures were much
smaller than that of the global and the local, and such reduced distance to the
cultural role model provide a national culture industry with more confidence and
motivation to follow the model.
In feet, in the discourse of globalization, the importance of such local
collaborations is suggested as an important survival tactic for a local society under
the formidable influence of global capitalism. In particular, Kuan-Hsing Chen
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emphasizes the importance of choosing the right object of identification for a
colonized subject to decolonize itself:
...the formation of colonized subjectivity has always been
passive, reactive and imposed, and the colonizer has been its
object of identification. In the decolonization movement,
nativism and identity politics shift the object of identification
towards the self. This can also be seen as a reaction against or
a disidentification with the colonizer although it presents
itself as a multicultural or multiple subject To break away
from the frame of colonial identification, a decolonization
movement has to move on, actively searching out multiple
objects of identification. The critical question becomes: who
and what are the objects?5 7
The case of the Sino-Effects in Korean cinema shows a clear case in which the
Korean film culture decided to identify with its local neighbor during its period of
struggle against the cultural hegemony of the “Hollywood Empire.”
There are, of course, problematic issues that require further questioning
such as the consolidating of local cultures as a form of resistance against the
massively infiltrating global hegemony. The main question is where we can find the
cultural autonomy in such hybridization of local cultures. If the rash identification
with culture and ideologies disseminated through Hollywood films is an issue to be
worried about in Korea, on what grounds can we perceive that such similar influence
coming from Hong Kong is safer? As is seen in the earlier discussion of the
influence of Hong Kong genre films in Korea, some of the Korean films
appropriated well die positive qualities of Hong Kong films and created a unique
Korean form of the similar formula. However, numerous others simply remained as
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reckless and rash imitation of the successful titles. The fact that most of the Sino-
Effects are seen in the popular cinema, and that Korean art cinema stuck to the
traditional Korean culture as a selling point at international markets, also leaves an
important question regarding how to define “national cinema.” How do we define a
national culture when it is hybridized with other influences? Is hybridization less
“pure” and therefore has less value?
In light of this, we should also consider the feet that during the same
period when Korean popular cinema evidenced these strong Sino-effects, there was
also an active criticism built against the promulgation of East Asian art house
cinema that parades the traditional culture under the name of “authenticity.” It was a
period that both cultural authenticity and cultural hybridization were perceived to be
ambivalent and suspicious practices. The Sino-effects during the transitional period
in Korean cinema, as the results of a local culture’s strategy to survive the
infiltration of the global cultural super power, therefore, left more questions than
answers regarding the issue of “disjuncture and differences”5 8 in the process of
cultural globalization.
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Chapter II Endnotes
1 The examples of such mentioning include: Tae-hyun Nam,“Hongkong yonghwa
paeu changgukyong tushinjasal (The suicide of Hong Kong actor, Leslie Cheung),”
Supotsu hanguk (Sports Korea), April 01 2003, available at
http://sports.hankooki.com/lpage/entv/200304/ds2003040122365314290.htm;
Ton-jin Yi, “Hongkong yonghwa oship-nyon/chungguk e panhwan aptun ‘tongbang
ui haliudu’(The 50 Years of Hong Kong cinema/the impending takeover of the ‘East
Asian Hollywood’), ” Chosun Ilbo (Chosun Daily), 05 April 1997,27; “Hanryu
yolpung ul tasi saenggak hamyo (Rethinking Hanryu),” Soul kyongje (Seoul
Economics), 02 Feb 2005, available at
http://economy.hankooki.com/lpage/opinion/200502/e2005020218571048120.htm;
Ko-un Yun, “‘Yongung ponsaek’ han, il, hongkong, kongdong limeiku (Remake of
A Better Tomorrow by Korea, Hong Kong, and Japan),” Yonhap nyusu (Yonhap
News), 25 May 2006, available at
http://www.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/20060525/090201000020060525170556K1 .htm
1 , etc.
2 This is where he met another apprentice Shin Sang-ok, who later became another
monumental name in the history of Korean cinema.
3 The above history of Chung’ s career with the Shaw Brothers are collected from
my own personal conversation with Chung, Chung’s Q & . A at UCLA special
screening of his films in November 2005, and Mun-young Huh et al., Chung Chang-
Wha: The Man o f Action!, published by the Pusan International Film Festival, 2003.
4 Law Kar, “Chung Chang-Wha: Can Direct, Will Travel,” available at
www.asianfilm.org.
5 Although Chung insisted to keep his name in its Korean pronunciation, Chung,
Chang-wha, the Shaw Brothers arbitrarily spelled his name to sound like a
Cantonese name, Cheng Cheng-ho or Mandarine name, Jeng Cheng-woh on the
theatrical credits of his films.
6 It is interesting to know that despite such remarkable career of Chung in Hong
Kong, he has hardly been remembered in the history of Korean film until the early
2000s. According to Chung, from my personal interview with him in November
2005, it was due to his criticism of the Korean journalism and the film industry that
his unfavorable relationship with Korean media started. From that moment, he was
treated like an outsider in Korean film culture. Only after the special screening of
Chung’s films in the Pusan International Film Festival in 2003, the significance of
his transnational career started to be re-illuminated not only by the contemporary
Korean film critics and scholars, but also by the international film circuit.
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7 I appreciate prof. David James for indicating the partial shooting of King Hu’s
film, Touch o f Zen in Korea, as an evidence of such collaboration. In an interview
with a Korean media, Jackie Chan also admitted that he used to work as a stunt
action man in Korea for a couple of years, before he rose to stardom.
8 For information about co-production in the 1970s, I referred to Sung-uk Oh,
Hanguk aekshydn yonghwa (The Korean action cinema), (Seoul: Salim chisik
chongso, 2003), 58-63. Although written in the form of a cinephile’s memoir rather
than as an academic publication, this small book is one of the very few important
references available about the history of such pseudo co-productions of Korea and
Hong Kong at the moment.
9 In special features, included in the DVD of Looking fo r Bruce Lee.
1 0 Unfortunately, the box office records in 1980s were only available on major
theaters in Seoul. The records are available at the KOFIC website, at
http://www.kofic.or.kr, and The Korean Cinema Yearbook.
1 1 In most cases, I prefer using the abbreviated term, “China” or “mainland China”
to refer to the country in this dissertation.
1 2 As for the history of the “Hong Kong New Wave,” see Stephen Teo, Hong Kong
Cinema: The Extra Dimension, 137-206; Law Kar, “An Overview of Hong Kong’s
New Wave Cinema,” & Hector Rodriguez, “The Emergence of foe Hong Kong New
Wave,” both of which are included in Esther C.M. Yau ed, A t Full Speed: Hong
Kong Cinema in a Borderless World.
1 3 I borrowed the term from Stephen Teo.
1 4 In feet, although the name “Hong Kong Noir” was quite commonly used in Korea
to indicate such modem action genre, the origin of the name remains vague until
now. Some say that the first Japanese distribution company that imported A Better
Tomorrow used the name in their advertisement. Also some others say that Korean
journalists used the name the first time in the 1980s. See Un-ju Park, “Hyondae ui
‘kodokhan yongung’ chang chul/ hongkong nuaru Ion (The Modem Lonely Hero:
On Cheh Chang and Hong Kong Noir),” Hanguk ilbo (Hanguk Daily), 17 Jan 1997,
23.
1 5 Abbas, Hong K o n g : Culture and the Politics o f Disappearance, 7.
1 6 Ibid, 5.
1 7 Variety, 15 May 1995, 5.
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1 8 Ibid.
1 9 All statistics are from The Korean Cinema Yearbook and the KOFIC website.
2 0 I created this table based on the combined statistics in The Korean Cinema
Yearbook 1995,102 and Munhwa yesul tongye (Culture and arts statistics in Korea)
2001, published by the Korean Ministry of Culture and Tourism, 403.
2 1 The phrase “Hong Kong Film Syndrome [Hongkong yonghwa sindurom]” just
like “Hong Kong Noir Syndrome [Hongkong nuwaru sindurom],” does not have a
clear origin although it was popularly used in Korea since the late 1980s. I
personally surmise that it is rather unconsciously coined by the Korean media. In
fact, it is a common practice in the Korean media to use the English word
“syndrome [sindurom]” to refer to any popular trend in the society. For example,
“Pae Yong-jun Syndrome” points at the popularity of the Korean actor Pae Yong-jun
in Asia in recent years. Considering this, the expression “Hong Kong Film
Syndrome” might have been created following such a customary coinage of the
Korean media. Putting one of the initial efforts to academically analyze the
particular cultural phenomenon in Korea, I could not find any systematic definition
or origin of the phrase in any form of Korean publications, except several casual
usages of the word in internet media. However, the most important proof of the
existence of the phrase is the memory of fens who lived through the cultural
sensation, including myself.
2 2 “Hong Kong Rejoins China in ’97, but Will Linger Under Capitalism, So Industry
Remains Unruffled,” Variety, 01 May 1985,395.
2 3 “Things I Felt Were Being Lost”, interviewed by Maitland McDonagh, Film
Comment 29/5 (October 1993), 50.
2 4 Logan, Hong Kong Action Cinema (Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook Press, 1996), 115.
2 5 Teo, Hong Kong Cinema: The Extra Dimension, 176.
2 6 “Home Video,” The New York lim es, 26 November 1992,19.
2 7 “A Specialist in Esthetics o f offbeat Violence,” The N ew York Times, Jun 30 1997,
9.
2 8 See the discussion about “yi” and “yiki” in Teo above, 178. Interestingly, such
male relationship often used to be misinterpreted as “homoerotic” relationship
especially at the early years of the introduction of Hong Kong popular New Wave
films in the West. See “Hong Kong: Hollywood of the Far East,” M irror (Spring,
1991), 4.
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2 9 Tony Williams,“Space, Place, and Spectacle: The Crisis Cinema of John Woo,”
Cinema Journal 36/2 (Winter, 1997), 76.
3 0 Yau, “Introduction,” A t Full Speed, 10-11.
3 1 I personally discovered Stanley Kwan’s films and Wong’s unreleased films like
Ashes o f Time in Korean video stores in the early 1990s, while simply looking for
films of my favorite Hong Kong stars. This is largely credited to famous Hong Kong
art filmmakers’ common practice of hiring popular mainstream stars, therefore
always combining die “art” with “entertainment.” Many Hong Kong people say that
Wong’ s films are always considered to be mainstream entertainment in Hong Kong
rather than art-house films.
3 2 Jong-hun Choe, “Chusikhoesa dijital taehanminguk (7): kuksanhwa yolpung kwa
chonja sanop ui shiryon (Digital Korea, Inc. (7): The fever over domestic products
and die faltering electronic industry),” ETNEWS [Chonja sinmun], available at
http://www.etnews.co.kr/news/detail.html?id=200510110042.
3 3 The information regarding the introduction and distribution of VCRs in Korea is
based on Hyong-tak Hwang, Hanguk yongsang sandplon (On the Korean screen
industry), (Seoul: Nanam, 1995), 87-92.
3 4 This table is borrowed from Ibid, 91.
3 5 See Miriam Hansen, Babel and Babylon: Spectatorship in American Silent Film
(Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1991), for further discussion
of this in the early silent cinema era.
3 6 For the discussion of TV’s role in negotiation the public and private spaces, see
Raymond Williams, Television: Technology and Cultural Form (London: Fontana
Original), 1974.
3 7 Mark R. Levy, “Why VCRs Aren’t Pop-Up Toasters: Issues in Home Video
Research,” The VCR Age: Home Video and M ass Communication (Newbury Park,
London, New Delhi: Sage Publications,1989), 15-16.
3 8 These are films that were not released, mostly because they were deemed lack of
commercial values. As I mentioned earlier, some of Wong Kar-wai’s and Stanley
Kwan’s films were available only at Korean video rental stores for such reasons.
3 9 During my college years, I personally remember seeing a stack of rented Hong
Kong TV martial arts series, such as Chi Liu Xiang ( ^ ® # , 1979) or New Heaven
Sword and Dragon Sabre 986) with my brother who was also a
college student. Those series were pretty popular among Korean youths, and it was a
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regular routine for my friends to exchange our opinions about those series dining
our leisure time.
4 0 Laura Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Film Theory and
Criticism: Introductory Readings, 5th ed., eds. by Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen
(New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).
4 1 The changing trend regarding male beauty emerged in Korea, too, starting in the
late 1990s. From then, the new coinage, “kkotninam” became popular in media
designating good-looking men. The word “kkotminam” is the combination of “kkot”
(flower) and “minam” (handsome man), and is used to indicate a man whose facial
attractiveness is thought to be almost comparable to that of a beautiful woman.
4 2 David E. James, “Im Kwon-taek: Korean Cinema and Buddhism,”
Im Kown-Taek: The M aking o f a Korean National Cinema (Detroit: Wayne State
University Press, 2002), 55.
4 3 Gina Marchetti, “Action-Adventure as Ideology,” Cultural Politics in
Contemporary America, eds. by Ian Angus and Sut Jhally (New York and London:
Routledge, 1989), 187.
4 4 The San Francisco-bom Chinese-American Bruce Lee had his career in the US as
an extra stunt actor before he was famous. Jackie Chan’s Hollywood career started
as soon as he rose to the stardom in Hong Kong and through his participation in
Hollywood films, Battle Creek Brawl (dir. Robert Clouse, 1980) and The
Cannonball Run (dir. Hal Needham, 1981). For Jackie Chan’s Hollywood career, see
his biographies: Jackie Chan and Jeff Yang, I Am Jackie Chan: M y Life in Action
(New York: Ballantine Books, 1998); Clyde Gentry III, Jackie Chan: Inside the
Dragon (Dallas, Texas; Taylor Publishing Company, 1997); John R. Little and Curtis
F. Wong eds., Jackie Chan: The Best o f Inside Kung-Fu (Chicago; Contemporary
Books, 1999), and a documentary, Jackie Chan: M y Story.
4 5 David Desser, “The Kung Fu Craze: Hong Kong Cinema’s First American
Reception,” in The Cinema o f Hong Kong;, Jinsoo An, “The Killer Cult Film and
Transcultural (Mis)Reading,” in A t Full Speed', S.V. Srinivas, “Hong Kong Action
Film in the Indian B Circuit,” Inter-Asian Cultural Studies, 4/1 (April 2003).
4 6 David Bordwell, et al, The Classical Hollywood Cinema : Film Style &Mode o f
Production to 1960 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985).
4 7 Chris Berry, “What’s big about the big film?”: “de-Westemizing” the blockbuster
in Korea and China,” M ovie Blockbusters, ed. By Julian Stringer (London and New
York: Routledge, 2003).
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4 8 For the purpose of a better understanding of the four or three letter characteristics
of these Korean titles, I punctuated each syllable with a hyphen.
4 9 These are Korean pronunciation of the Chinese titles. The Mandarin or Cantonese
pronunciation of each title is different from these.
5 0 Here, I am borrowing Gerard Genette’s concept of “paratext” He defines
paratexts as “a certain number of verbal or other productions, such as an author’s
name, a title, a preface, illustrations” that “ensure the text’s presence in the world.”
Gerard Genette, Paratexts: Thresholds o f Interpretation, translated by Jane E. Lewin
(Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 1
5 1 Stephen Teo, Wong Kar-Wai, 62.
5 2 Dong-chol Nam, “Saeroun yonghwa ono rul mandunun saramdul (People who
make new film language),” Sindonga, Feb 2000, available at
http://www.donga.eom/docs/magazine/new_donga/200002/nd2000020410.html
5 3 Andrew Higson, “The Concept of National Cinema,” Screen, 30/40 (Autumn,
1989), 37.
5 4 I would not say that Im Kwon-Taek or other director’s works on traditional
Korean culture soley followed the model of the internationally acclaimed Chinese
directors of the period. Even during the early 1980s, there were Korean filmmakers
showed films at international film festivals, despite not garnering as much attention
as fin did. Such films mostly set in the “old” feudal Korea, usually portraying the
inhumane suffering that Korean women had to undergo in the feudal patriarchal
society. Im’s works can be said to follow such tradition of Korean “festival-
oriented” films, and therefore is not a new attempt. However we can speculate that
international achievement of Chinese -language filmmakers proved that such
formula or parading “authentic” Korean theme works well in the international film
festival, and gave Im and other Korean filmmakers confidence to keep pursuing the
way.
5 5 Appadurai, Modernity at large, 3.
5 6 Arif Dirlik, “Global in the Local,” in W ilson and Dissanayake eds., Global/Local,
28.
5 7 Kuan-Hsing Chen, “Introduction,” Trajectories: Inter-Asian Cultural Studies, ed.
by Kuan-Hsing Chen (London and New York: Routledge, 1998), 25.
5 8 I adopt the words from the chapter title, “Disjuncture and Difference in the
Global Cultural Economy” from Appadurai, M odernity at Large.
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CHAPTER HI
TRAVELING STARS, SHIFTING BOUNDARIES
1. Transnational Popular Culture and the Tension of Regional Identity:
A Ban on Happy Together in South Korea
The previous chapter discussed the direct influence of Hong Kong cinema in the
textual and industrial practices of Korean cinema. Shifting focus a bit, the following
two chapters observe how two film stars of the Hong Kong film industry became
significant agents in provoking a new level of cultural imagination in Korean society.
In the 1990s Korean society started to recognize the cultural and
economic significance of popular culture more than ever before. The reason why the
realization was delayed until then lies partly in the conservative social tradition of
Korea that still strongly supported the idea of cultural hierarchy. From this
perspective, popular culture was always considered to occupy the lower part of the
hierarchy, associated with unsophisticated and immature taste. Cinema, which has
also been regarded as an essential part of popular culture, therefore, also had to
suffer such undue prejudice for a long time. The situation changed in the early 1990s.
This was the period that the issues of cultural autonomy and economy of culture
started to form one of the major social discourses of Korea, stimulated by
Hollywood’s pressure on the domestic film markets. With such crisis, it suddenly
occurred to Korean people that popular culture is in feet a critical part of the national
economy. At the same time, suddenly the people with the unheard of job title,
“cultural critic” appeared on TV screens and in magazines to talk about the “lesser”
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form of culture in an intelligent tone. The academic trend of “cultural studies” began
to be imported into the society in this period. News about the achievement of
neighboring film cultures such as China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan in the
international film markets was also pouring into society during the time, and posed a
serious challenge to the Korean film industry to move forward. Coincidence or not,
the increasing cultural traffic between Korean and the neighboring societies,
particularly with the Hong Kong film industry, simultaneously happened in this
transitional time period in Korea culture, and added a force that propelled the
transition and transformation of Korean popular culture. All these factors as a
conjoined force provided an impetus for Korean society to change itself.
In this part of the discussion, I pay special attention to the important
function of the Hong Kong film industry in the transformation of Korean society as
well as Korean film culture. I especially look at the relations of the two societies,
Hong Kong and Korea, centering on one cultural incident, the ban on the Hong
Kong gay film, Happy Together (dir. Wong Kar-wai) in 1997. By looking at the
ways in which Korean film culture responded to the specific transnational cultural
encounter during this moment of post-Hong Kong Film Syndrome in Korea, while
the memory and the influence still remains, I will discuss how the status of popular
culture in Korea was changed during this period and, more importantly, how Hong
Kong popular culture functioned as a catalyst in such change.
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Irregular Regulation: Who Is Not Happy With Happy Together?
Happy Together, directed by the famed director Wong Kar-wai was
denied a public screening in Korea during its initial import in 1997, because of its
homosexual theme. The debates over the cinematic freedom of expression have
never ceased in the Korean film industry, no matter how the film evaluating system
has changed its forms. In this cultural context, the significance of Happy Together
has been reduced to just one case of numerous controversial decisions made by the
rigid Korean film censorship. I, however, think that the meaning of this incident
looms much larger than that, especially when we consider that what happened in
relation to censoring Happy Together had a close connection to the particular social
and cultural history of Korea at that time.
Hong Kong films offered the Korean film industry important models for
its own reform. At the same time, they offered Korean audiences enough excitement
and attractions that had not been found in Korean films until then. While their
neighbors’ achievements provided Korean filmmakers and audiences with strong
incentives to renovate their own film industry, many obstacles generated by
particular social and political conditions in Korea often counteracted those efforts.
One of the most difficult tasks for filmmakers during this period was to fight for the
freedom of expression against severe official censorship. In fact, the official
organization that has been in charge of film censorship in Korea during this period,
the Public Performance Ethics Committee (Kongyonyuli wiwonhoe, PPEC), was a
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semi-civil organization. However, Korean people regarded PPEC as not free from
the control of the Korean government because the PPEC members were appointed
by the Minister of Culture and Sports,1 and the censoring standards were heavily
influenced by government policy. Consequently, resistance to film censorship in this
period often reflected a desire beyond the protection of artistic creativity. More
significantly, it was a protest against the long-standing oppressive measures
embedded in the political and social structures of Korea. Although debates over film
censorship or any restrictions on the freedom of expression were not at all new to
Korean film culture, the protests against the official ban on Happy Together merits
special attention, not only because it was a vehement campaign against the
persecution of a non-Korean film, but also because its scale and effect reached a rare
extent for an activism that ostensibly protected a single commercial film.
In 1997, Korean society was still too conservative to publicly embrace
homosexuality. The particular sexual identity was hardly mentioned explicitly in the
mainstream of the Korean media at that time unless it was dealt critically as a
“deviant subject” in news or TV documentaries. Happy Together, a love story
between two Hong Kong gay men, was imported in this social atmosphere. The
main characters are played by two Hong Kong superstars, Leslie Cheung and Tony
Leung. Apprehensive of the conservative and harsh principles of Korean film
censorship, die distribution company excised die graphic sex scenes in the opening
sequence of the film when they initially applied for the release rights for Happy
Together in Korea. Nonetheless, the PPEC announced that Happy Together could not
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be released within the country because it dealt with homosexuality as a main theme,
not just as a sub-plot, and thus was not agreeable to the general moral sensitivity of
Korean society.2 This episode became so controversial that it even caught the
attention of major western entertainment journalism such as Screen International
and Variety. Through the reports, Korea, the “Hermit Kingdom” of Asia, reinforced
its image as a “repressed, ultraconservative country”3 to the world.
This unforeseen ban shocked Korean audiences more than anyone else.
The decision greatly disappointed many Korean audiences, who had long been
expecting to see the film, the winner of numerous international film festival awards,
including the Best Director’ s Award at the Cannes International Film Festival in
1997. To them the ban was hard to accept especially because they vividly
remembered the previous release of several foreign films with homosexual themes
in Korea, such as The Crying Game (dir. Neil Jordan, 1992), Farewell M y
Concubine (dir. Chen Kaige, 1993), The Wedding Banquet (dir. Ang Lee, 1993),
Priest (dir. Antonia Bird, 1994), and Erotique (dir. Monica Treut et al, 1994), etc.
Ironically, the American lesbian film Bound (dir. Andy Wachowski et al, 1996) had
received a release right in Korea just a couple of months before Happy Together was
denied one.4 Even though homosexuality was still an uncomfortable issue for the
relatively conservative mainstream of Korean society, the previous release history of
several homosexual films demonstrates that Korean film audiences were not
completely averse to seeing films with such themes. Therefore, they demanded a
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more plausible reason for the PPEC’s decision. Unfortunately, they did not hear any
further from the PPEC.
In the meantime, despite the ban on his film, the director of Happy
Together, Wong Kar-wai proceeded to visit Korea, meet his frustrated fens and hold
press conferences. The Tongsung Cinematheque held a photograph exhibition of the
film and sold various marketing products for Happy Together such as CDs, posters,
and T-shirts. Wong donated all the profits from this occasion to the Committee of the
Pusan International Film Festivals, the annual cultural event, ambitiously launched
by the Korean film industry just a year earlier.5 As a result of his visit, Wong’s
image was enhanced: on top of his already enormous feme in Korea, he had now
become a persecuted artist, who, no matter what, assured his sincere comradeship to
his neighboring film culture and its fens.
The Korean fens’ complaints against the PPEC’s decision increased day
by day and they started to arrange more systematic protests. Not long after they
heard that Happy Together would not be released in Korea, enraged film fens started
to organize several guerrilla screenings of this film, mostly in universities and
various small cultural venues. Initially, the rage against the ban fermented among die
“innocent fans” of Hong Kong popular stars and cinephiles who were frustrated not
to be able to see their favorite artists’ work. However, diverse interest groups began
to join in the protest, and eventually the nature of the activism began to change from
pure fen cultural activity to a political manifestation. This was a significant moment
in the cultural history of Korea when popular culture, under the strong influence of a
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global cultural trend, began to reestablish itself as an essential and effective social
power. Then, what are the social and cultural meanings of this transcultural incident
in Korean society?
Popular Culture and Its Menace: Are You Afraid of Leslie Cheung or What?
Why should academics care about movie audiences or the
ways in which they respond to film? It is clear why producers,
distributors and exhibitors care: favourable audience
reactions can mean millions of dollars to a company. But why
should scholars worry about the nature of reception? The
answer is not money, but power....
-Steven J. Ross, “The Revolt of the Audience:
Reconsidering Audiences and Reception during the Silent
Era”6
No one can deny the power and influence of pop cultural stars in contemporary
society. However much their public images are manufactured or disguised, the
public wants them, and willingly gives in to their charms. In most societies, however,
the passion over popular stars is considered to be immature and temporary. It is
assumed to naturally fade away as individual fans grow. Also, popular stars’
relationship to their fens is ultimately defined to be as that between products and
consumers rather than that between leaders of opinions and their followers. The
products’ status in the society is secure only as far as they keep being purchased.
The moment they lose their selling power, however, they cease to exist.
The subordinate status of popular stars in the hierarchy of social power
seems evident because their function is always under the supervision and
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surveillance of the dominant institutional power of society. If they violate significant
social codes of conduct, they are instantly regulated and punished in front of public
eyes to be made an example of.7 Therefore, they often become scapegoats when a
society is in urgent need of reestablishing its moral standards. Hence, although
most people assume that the life styles of most popular stars are more liberal and
sometimes morally dubious than the rest of citizens in the society, at the same time,
ironically, they are expected to be a symbolic carrier of the dominant social norms.
This, however, does not mean that the star system operates only to reinforce the
status quo. Richard Dyer says that because of the belief that stars are “politically
insignificant and unimportant,” their ideological significance is “masked or
discounted.” However, he continues, “One might then suggest that just because it is
so masked its real political power is all the greater for being less easily resisted.”
The ban on Happy Together can be considered to be a manifestation of this constant
tension among popular culture, the public’s desire of it, and the regulation and
containment of the two by the institutional power in a specific social and historical
context of Korea.
The Korean censors announced that they could not grant a release right
for Happy Together because the film features homosexuality as its main theme rather
than its sub-plot Interestingly, the director himself never claimed that this film has a
gay theme: “I don’t want to call it a gay story. It could happen between any two
people. It just happens that in this story, it happened between two men!” 9
Nonetheless, the original intent of the filmmaker was deemed secondary when the
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Korean censors evaluated the film. In fact, it is true that audiences do not have to
fully accept what the filmmaker said his film to be. It does not necessarily mean that
filmmakers are not reliable authors, but suggests that the meaning of their works can
be automatically proliferated and expanded through interactions with their audiences.
John Fiske says:
Popular texts are inadequate in themselves - they are never
self-sufficient structure of meanings (...), they are provokers
of meanings and pleasure, they are completed only when
taken up by people and inserted into their everyday culture.
The people make popular culture at the interface between
everyday life and the consumption of the products of the
cultural industries.1 0
Therefore, the meanings of popular cultural texts are constantly in the process of
being made and remade. In this regard, the ban on Happy Together in Korea should
also be observed from a larger perspective that goes beyond die filmmaker’s original
intent and the text itself. In a sense, the real significance of the incident might lie in
the Korean censors’ unspoken reason for the ban which can be found in the potential
influence of this film on its Korean audiences in a very specific cultural and social
moment in Korea at that time.
One of the reasons that might have strongly affected the censors’
decision can be explained in relation to the general social atmosphere in Korea in
1997. At that time, the traditional moral values of Korean society were being
seriously challenged, especially in response to a series of adolescent crimes.
Increases in the incidents of teenage pornography and school violence shocked
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Korean society, already depressed by rapid economic recess. As a result, more
conservative concerns arose regarding the pedagogical obligations of society and the
need to refurbish cultural and moral norms. Within the same month that Happy
Together was banned, in July 1997, the PPEC severely censored the Korean graphic
novel, Chonguk ui Shinhwa (the Legend of the Heaven) by YI Hyonse, one of the
major Korean graphic novelists. This book depicts graphic sexual intercourse
between human beings and animals in the prehistoric era. The semi-documentary
Bad Movie [Nappun yonghwa] directed by controversial director CHANG So-nu
was also requested to excise a considerable part of its content. The film portrays
various delinquent activities of a group of Korean teenagers who are engaged in
violence, gang rapes, drug use, etc. In light of the feet that Korean film censorship
historically has been quite sensitive to the contemporary social atmosphere and has
adjusted its rigidity accordingly, the persecution of Happy Together can be seen as
the effect of what happened in the Korean society around the same period.
However, we can speculate upon more important and specific reasons
for the ban from the special relation that Hong Kong films and their stars have with
their Korean audiences in recent Korean cultural history. This period is not only
marked by the sudden and enormous influx of Hong Kong films in Korea, but also
by the popularity of essential Hong Kong popular stars among Korean audiences. In
the center of this legion of stars was Leslie Cheung Kwok-Wing, the star of Happy
Together. To Korean viewers, these stars not only shared familiar East Asian
sentiments, but had sophisticated good-looks that were strongly appealing to them.
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Moreover, at that time, the Hong Kong entertainment industry was equipped with a
far more advanced operating system than that of their Korean counterpart.
Undoubtedly, Korean fans who first saw Leslie Cheung or Andy Lau’s Hong Kong
concerts through video tapes, were fascinated by the much more exquisite and
glamorous performances and stage settings than those of the Korean entertainment
industry at that time. When the news about Happy Together first reached Korean
audiences, it was certainly toward the “final moment of glory” of the “Hong Kong
Film Syndrome” in Korea. After Hong Kong’s take over by China in 1997, the
golden age of the Hong Kong film industry seemed to decline, not only within the
domestic industry itself, but also in its major regional markets in East Asia. Not
surprisingly, the film created a lot of anticipation among Korean fens bringing back
deep nostalgia for Hong Kong films of the past era.
One important factor that should also be noted, is that this period
roughly coincides with the time when the real-life homosexuality of the main lead of
the film, Leslie Cheung, had just been publicly confirmed. Since his realistic
enactment of a gay Chinese opera singer in Farewell M y Concubine, rumors had
been spread about his sexuality throughout East Asia. Nonetheless, it had never been
confirmed until his Hong Kong concert in 1997. During this concert, he made an
extravagant dance performance in which he played a man with a dual sexual identity,
symbolized by two pairs of shoes worn by him alternately, one a pair of red high-
heels and the other a pair of black male boots. In the same concert, he also
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introduced his real life male partner as his “good friend.” 1 1 Since then, the
knowledge of his homosexuality has spread out from his loyal fans to a larger public.
The suspicion that the coming out of an influential star of the film might
have affected the censoring of the film becomes more plausible when we consider
that Farewell M y Concubine did not encounter any problem when it was released in
Korea in 1994. It is another film in which Cheung was also featured as a
homosexual character, yet it came out before his homosexuality was publicly known
to many Asian fens. His role as a homosexual Chinese opera singer, then, was
regarded as no more than purely fine acting in 1994. In 1997, his role as a
homosexual could no longer be contained by that summation. Cheung’s personal
charm could have mystified the socially yet unacceptable homosexuality to the
Korean public.
Of course, such social apprehension over star power does not just exist
in East Asia. Lea Jacobs’ study of the Hollywood “fallen women” films from 1928
to 1942 provides some historical insight into how Hollywood censors at that time
were also concerned about glamorous stars’ influence in leading audiences into
sympathizing with the morally questionable content of films:
...in The Content o f Motion Pictures, one of the Payne Fund
Studies, Edgar Dale noted: “Colorful and attractive stars are
commonly given roles depicting women who lose their virtue,
who are ruined by men, lead profligate lives. Dale found this
a “dangerous situation” because the use of stars in such roles
made the violation of the “current moral code... desirable or
attractive.”1 2
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As we can see here, the real star power and the subsequent social apprehension over
it result from the way stars offer a desirable image that the audiences are likely to
identify with. To some star followers, a star’s on-screen persona and off-screen
person are indistinguishable, and everything about the star is beautified. John Street
says, “Popular culture’s ability to produce and articulate feelings can become the
basis of an identity, and that identity can be the source of political thought and
action.”1 3
The political potential of popular culture and its stars is significantly
determined by the feet that the stars’ influence easily connects the public and private
realm of their fens’ lives. Annette Kuhn provides the following definition of the
two dimensions of social existence:
If there is any general ground for distinction between public
and private spheres, it might be that the public constitutes the
domain of legitimate social regulation while the private fells
outside, or inhabits the fringes o£ that domain.1 4
Popular stars, created in public space, operate in the public and private domains of
fans’ lives simultaneously, because of their identifiable roles in the heart of their fens.
Therefore, popular stars’ bodies sometimes function as interfaces where the public
and private desires of a society meet. Stars are a rare social group whose very
personal lives are sometimes under public scrutiny. If their life styles are deemed to
seriously transgress the general social conventions, they are likely to be punished.
However, this punishment sometimes does not end as a regulation of one individual
star, but sometimes poses a symbolic threat to the anonymous mass who have
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assimilated themselves to such life styles. Therefore, the attack on stars, often can
affect their fens as a social power’s indirect interference into their personal lives.
Especially in East Asia, which is considered to be conservative relative to the West,
you can often witness tension created between the institutional power and fens over
the official regulation of popular stars’ behaviors.1 5 In such a circumstance, even
popular stars’ personal lives are re-read and attributed with new social meanings
because of their liminal status between the public and private spheres of the society.
In this context, Cheung’s coming out in late 1997 undoubtedly created a
big shock not only in Hong Kong but also in the general East Asian popular cultural
arena. In her discussion of the film Happy Together, Denise Tang says, “Queer Asian
sexuality is such a taboo in mainstream Asian communities that even mouthing the
words on one’s lips is a political act”1 6 Likewise, Cheung’s revelation of his gay
lover in public, an act of a purely personal nature, was immediately vested wife
political implication because of his position in and his influence on the public.
In feet in Korea, one of the striking aspects of the reaction to the ban on
Happy Together was the joining of political activists in fee initial protests of film
fens. When it was publicized feat this film was prohibited from theatrical release,
endless unofficial and illegal screenings of Happy Together were organized in places
like college cinematheques, cafes, and gay bars.1 7 It is important to note fee
significance of fee illegal screenings at fee universities, especially when we consider
the scale of some of fee events. In one of the first such illegal screenings organized
at the central plaza of Ewha Woman’s University, thousands of spectators, most of
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141
whom were presumably college students or film aficionados, gathered to see the
film. To most Koreans, the huge size of the public gathering was reminiscent of the
political demonstrations that swept Korean society dining its period of political
turmoil during the past three decades. During this period, films with explicit political
messages that were often made outside of the mainstream industry, were mostly
shown on college campuses as part of political activism. Such screenings as well as
the political demonstrations were usually cracked down by the police and the main
figures involved in the screenings were arrested. As Kim Kyung Hyun puts it, under
the special circumstance, “the putatively apolitical innuendo of “going to the
movies” had its leisurely signification dissipated when the film viewing activity
itself exhibited an indisputable political subversion against the state that reacted with
excessive force against the non-industry films.”1 8
In many ways, the illegal college screenings of Happy Together seemed
to follow the tradition of political activities on college campuses in Korea. Not only
the scale and energy invested in these screenings, but also the symbolic participants
of the screenings align the incident surrounding Happy Together with political
protests of the previous era. In most cases of the guerilla screenings of this film on
college campuses, the student representatives of the host universities made opening
speeches about the significance of such events, with a harsh tone of criticism against
the Korean state power that infringed on people’s freedom of expression.1 9 Since
the 1960s, most student representatives of Korean universities were selected among
the leftist political leaders of student communities. Therefore, their appearance in
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the screenings of Happy Together immediately imbued such events with a strong
political nature.
What should be noted about the activities supporting Happy Together is
that the film is not the kind of film that is made with a strong political agenda. That
is, the film is made within die mainstream of the Hong Kong film industry, using
some of the most successful commercial stars in East Asia. Although the subject
matter is provocative die story does not explicitly attempt to criticize the existing
social norms. In other words, it was a film made to be enjoyed by mass audiences
rather than to be instructive. The seemingly disparate encounter between a popular
film and its support coming from political groups, in fact, reveals the significance of
this moment in the Korean cultural history.
The whole incident surrounding Happy Together in the summer of 1997
indicates that this was a moment when Korean society was wide alert to the
influence of popular culture. The most important goal of any popular culture is to be
consumed by as many people as possible and to generate maximum commercial
profits. Because of its commercial drive, its influence was always discounted as not
being serious, but being superficial, and readily dismissible. The Happy Together
incident marks a moment that the Korean authorities came to realize die impact of
popular culture. By being simply popular, it easily crosses the boundary of the
public and private realm of people’s lives, and subsequently sustains a strong
connection with people. Just like the state power, the political protest groups were
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equally aware of the capacity of popular culture. They obviously tried to take
advantage of the popularity of Happy Together as a path to reach wider citizens with
their political messages. It is certainly an overstatement to say that the film Happy
Together single-handedly brought such a different recognition of popular culture to
Korean society because the atmosphere was long being brewed in society.2 0 Happy
Together provided the momentum for an awareness of the power of popular culture.
Suspicious Intimacy: AIDS, Pop Culture, and Regional Identity
While globalization processes have drastically facilitated the
transnational cross-fertilization of popular cultural forms in
many parts of the world..., this boundary-violating impulse
of cultural flow is nevertheless never free from nationalizing
forces.
-Koichi Iwabuch2 1
If one of the groups that strongly politicized the ban on Happy Together was young
political activists, another group that also added a strong political aspect to this
cultural incident were gay activists. During the same July the film was banned, there
were several silent demonstrations by homosexual communities protesting the
PPEC’s decision outside fire theater Tongsung Cinematheque, where Happy
Together was originally planned to be released. They regarded the ban of the film as
a symbolic threat to the status of homosexuals in Korean society. To them, the denial
of this film’s public exhibition represented Ihe state power’s attempt to regulate their
private life style. SO Tong-jin, one of the leading demonstrators and the director of
the Queer Film Festival in Korea, which had been scheduled in the same summer,
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showed his utter disappointment and dissatisfaction with the PPEC’s decision. He
said that the ban on Happy Together was a serious threat to the Queer Film Festival
itself and announced that if the Festival were to be banned, they would have illegal
screenings of the participating films, too.2 2
One of the reasons why die ban on Happy Together was never made
sense to Korean audiences was that it was not the first film with explicit homosexual
content that was imported in Korea. As was mentioned earlier, there were numerous
other cases of films with homosexuality being released in Korea before Happy
Together. The censor’s official reason for the ban, to protect and respect public
sensitivity, therefore, lost its credibility for Korean audiences. One important thing
that we should note from this discriminatory release of films with homosexual
themes in Korea in the 1990s, is that only Farewell My Concubine, The Wedding
Banquet, and Happy Together were films made by East Asian directors with East
Asian casts. The other previously released homosexual films such as The Crying
Game, Priest, Erotica, and Bound were all Western films. From the profile of these
films, we can sense that the films’ regional identities may have been a factor that
affected the censors’ decisions. Homosexuality as a strange and immoral behavior of
Western people, that is “others,” would have been tolerable to conservative Korean
social authority. The image of Asians like themselves being homosexuals, however,
might have been difficult to accept
The question then becomes why only Happy Together was banned, and
not the other two East Asian films? The Wedding Banquet made by Taiwanese
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director Ang Lee features a relationship between two men with American nationality,
an Asian-American and a white American. The film deals with the conflict that a
Taiwanese-American young man’s homosexuality causes to a traditional Taiwanese
family. However, because the main Asian character has “converted” into an
American, and therefore can be assumed to be “contaminated” by the Western
culture, Asian audiences were not obliged to identify with him. Moreover, the casts
of the film were barely known to Korean audiences at that time. In the case of
Farewell M y Concubine, where Leslie Cheung again played the gay protagonist, the
film is set in the very special context of a Chinese Opera troupe. The Chinese Opera
featured in the film has traditionally been comprised of all male casts. The
containment of the narrative to such a remote circumstance makes it easy to control
the film’s influence. The narrative structure itself already presupposes the
relationship as being extraordinary or abnormal. Moreover, as was previously
indicated, the film was made years before Cheung’s homosexuality was publicly
confirmed. In various ways, The Wedding Banquet and Farewell M y Concubine
were equipped with elements that can easily distance the majority of Korean
audiences from the homosexual characters in the films. The distance could ease
audiences’ emotional stress in seeing such an “uncomfortable” subject.
Therefore, we can consider that the East Asian regional identity formed,
based on die geographical, cultural, and historical proximity of the regional
communities, might have significantly affected the PPEC’ s decision making.
Although such a regional identity is an efficient parameter from which a sense of
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146
belonging is created, we should keep in mind that a regional identity never surpasses
a national identity. As much commonality as a regional identity assumes, it also
includes irresolvable differences among members of different nationalities in the
same region. Therefore, a regional identity is constantly redefined, renegotiated, and
reinforced with certain agendas, but it is always ready to yield to a national identity
that binds people together with a stronger sense of solidarity. The question then
becomes at what occasions is this regional identity more rigorously mobilized than
usual? When do East Asians claim that they are East Asians as much as they are
individually Chinese, Japanese, or Korean, etc? To pose the question in direct
relation to the cultural episode that we are dealing with: what was the cultural and
historical setting that required a reinforced sense of the East Asian regional identity
to keep Happy Together away from Korean theaters?
To answer the above question, I find the circumstances of the AIDS scare
that swept the entire globe during the latter years of the twentieth century influential.
Borrowing Ien Ang and Jon Stratton’s discussion of globalization, Koichi Iwabuch
explains the nature of cultural globalization as follows:
One corollary of the phenomenon of ongoing asymmetrical
cultural encounters in the course of die spread of Western
modernity, as Ang and Stratton... argue, is that we have come
to live in “a world where all cultures are both (like) ‘us’ and
(not like) ‘us,’” a world where familiar difference and bizarre
sameness are simultaneously articulated in multiple ways
through the unpredictable dynamic of uneven global cultural
encounters.2 3
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The discovery of the AIDS in the West in the early 1980s and its fast spread to the
rest of the world initially imparted to the globe a sense of a unified single human
community confronting the “last disease of the twentieth century.” The entire global
community was sharing the same fear and destiny, helplessly facing this incurable
disease. However, as AIDS rapidly dispersed, this massive terror gradually brought
in the attitude of emotional self-defense among different groups of people. This was
mostly done by isolating and excluding the infected groups from the rest. By
pointing fingers at those who were already suffering from the disease, the yet
unaffected groups could temporarily survive the horror and anxiety caused by this
amorphous fetal threat. Therefore, during the early period of the AIDS epidemic, a
lot of effort was made to identify the demographic of the initial groups of patients.
In East Asia, the groups who were pointed out as the source of this fatal disease
were homosexuals, heterosexuals with promiscuous life styles, and Westerners in
general. In their study of the media coverage of AIDS in Taiwan between 1985 to
1999, Mel-Ling Hsu and co-researchers illustrate how the Taiwanese media
emphasized the exotic nature of this particular disease:
The foreign connection of AIDS prevailed in the news reports
during this period. An AIDS ‘suspect,’ though later tested
negative, was made to admit that he was a gay and had had
‘abnormal’ sex abroad .... The press went into details about
his sex life, emphasizing that he had had one hundred or so
sex partners, of whom at least ten were foreigners .... When
the first local AIDS case was reported, the press still stressed
the foreign connection by stating that the patient had lived
abroad for a long time and that half of his sex partners had
been foreigners .... At this initial stage of the AIDS epidemic,
gay men and foreigners were the two major groups identified
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and consequently stigmatized as ‘Others’ in the news
discourse.2 4
They say that especially in the early period of AIDS reporting, the “foreign” mostly
means the West,2 5 since it is where die disease was first spotted. The accusation that
foreigners in general or the West in particular, were the origin of AIDS seemed to be
shared by most East Asian societies. A similar type of exoticization and
marginalization of AIDS patients can be found in the media reports of the early
history of AIDS in Korea, too. According to one Korean newspaper report on AIDS,
the first Korean AIDS patient was reported in November 1985 and was identified to
be a Korean construction worker working in a Middle Eastern country. In addition,
the next five patients, discovered in 1986, were all announced as infected from
abroad. The first Korean female AIDS patient located in the same year, and the
following 13 female patients discovered within the next three years were all
prostitutes dealing with foreigners around the US Army base in Korea.2 6
From these two media reportages on AIDS in East Asian societies, we
can see that there were similar efforts in national media to appease people’s paranoia
about AIDS by isolating the source of disease as alien, deviant, and morally corrupt.
In marginalizing the sources of disease that have already been rapidly spreading
throughout the globe, it is witnessed that the West or the foreign are sorted out as the
origin of the disease just like the homosexuals, and must therefore be kept at a
distance; whereas East Asian patients were portrayed as only careless victims
infected by contact with the dangerous sources of disease. Such an attitude naturally
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creates an illusion that as long as you do not go near the “exotic and immoral”
sources of the disease you are safe.
1997, the year that Happy Together was internationally released and
banned in Korea, is more than a decade later than when AIDS was first discovered.
Nonetheless, to many conservative Korean people, the first period of the AIDS scare,
immediately associated with the West and homosexuals still held a strong
impression in 1997. While people were associating AIDS with such alien status, a
high-profile Asian film about two Asian gay men’s love undoubtedly intimidated
those who still wanted to believe that they kept a safe distance from the disease.
When one of the main leads of the film, an East Asian super star who had a huge fan
base in the society had just come out, they felt even more intimidated. Welcoming
the film into Korean society would have meant breaking down the distance between
East Asia and the diseased culture, and therefore, to admit that Korea was also a part
of the region that contained and grew the disease inside it. In Korea, it was a time of
crisis. While more progressive groups of people tried to accept the presence of AIDS
in Korean society and devised constructive ways to deal with the newly developing
situation, conservative groups still wanted to delineate the line between Korea and
the fast spreading AIDS culture and to claim “cultural cleanness. ”
Therefore, the ban on Happy Together is not only a simple act of
censorship of a single film, but can also be understood as a symbolic act of asserting
and aspiring to a “pure” national culture. It demonstrates die effort of protecting the
society from unfavorable global cultural trends. When such a cultural trend was
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introduced through the form of “distanf ’ cultures such as western films, they could
be overlooked as a minority culture in the society. But when the global cultural trend
was laundered and delivered through the neighborhood cultural product, Happy
Together, the impact of the new cultural trend was felt more immediately and
stronger. In this situation, the rejection of the Hong Kong film Happy Together
suggests Korean society’s denouncement of its bond with the rest of East Asia
because the overall regional culture was also “infected.” In fact in doing so, the
Korean authority ironically revealed the long lasting cultural intimacy between
Korea and Hong Kong. Hong Kong culture was too close to Korean people, and the
contamination of Hong Kong culture could signal an impending danger to Korean
culture, too. Society needed to come up with an efficient measure of prevention.
Benedict Anderson, in his definition of a nation, says, “... it [nation] is
imagined as a community, because, regardless of the actual inequality and
exploitation that may prevail in each, the nation is always conceived as a deep,
horizontal comradeship.” 2 7 In the same way, a region is also an imagined
community that creates an imaginative bond among people within the regional
boundary. The “deep, horizontal comradeship” is most vigorously mobilized when a
certain self-protection of the region from outside influence is impending, as is
witnessed during the period of early AIDS scare of East Asia. Nonetheless, just like
a national identity, a regional identity also contains fractures and gaps that
differentiate die members inside the boundary. The relative intimacy among regional
communities, therefore, does not guarantee a stable and fixed solidarity. In the rapid
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reconfiguration of the economic and cultural structure caused by globalization, the
regional identity is also constantly (renegotiated. The intimacy among communities
sharing the same regional identity not only creates strong camaraderie but also poses
a great challenge and competition among the regional constituencies. Such an
intimacy, therefore, is a suspicious relationship that lies in constant tension rather
than on a permanent trust among the communities sharing it. A regional identity,
hence, is constructed in the process of balancing such tension. The Happy Together
incident in 1997 shows the moment when contemporary popular culture played a
central role in creating and testing such a regional identity in East Asia.
Since 1997, when the ban on Happy Together and subsequent reactions
to it caught the attention of the concerned public, Korean society has gone through a
great transformation. First of all, the same film was finally released in Korea in 1998
with the advent of a new government.2 8 For such a popular cultural product, it was a
rare victory in a political sense, which unfortunately cost it commercial gains.
Despite the loud publicity of the previous year, the film was not a box office success
at all. Interested fens had already seen the film through various “illegitimate” venues.
However, it was not a meaningless commercial loss. The film opened another whole
new creative path for Korean film culture. Since then, the Korean film industry
started to deal with homosexuality as a serious subject. Homosexuality, now, might
still be regarded as deviant to some, but it is not as shocking or new to the society as
it used to be several years ago. This is not the only change in Korean film culture.
With the lift of the ban on the Japanese popular culture in Korea in 1998, many
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sensory-stimulating, sometimes morally debatable, Japanese cult films began to be
introduced to the Korean public. Numerous Korean films started to challenge the
limit of cultural expression in its ideas and in its graphic representation too. More
and more films are being made in the mode of co-production among East Asian
countries since the late 1990s. In such multiplicity and expansion of cinematic
representation, the ideas of freedom of expression and national sensibility began to
be tested on new levels.
Society also tended to treat popular culture differently. In 1998, Korean
society welcomed its first actor-turned cabinet member, SON Suk as the Minister of
Environment. In 2002, another figure from popular culture, current film director, Yi
Chang-dong, followed Son by being appointed to be the Minister of Culture and
Tourism. In the presidential election in 2002 and in each presidential campaign, the
rigorous political activities of Korean popular stars were more visible than ever.
In such a massive transformation and restructuring of Korean society
and its film culture, the incident surrounding Happy Together, which happened right
before such cultural and historical changes, was almost forgotten by many Korean
people, without any proper efforts paid to examine its cultural significance. The
effort paid to rediscover the meaning of such experience is meant not to exaggerate
or to lionize the influence of a single cultural product or cultural figure in a society.
Rather, it is an effort to examine the way in which the significance of a cultural
product is defined and negotiated in the specific context in which it is produced and
consumed. In that sense, it is important to acknowledge the noticeable changes in
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Korean society after Happy Together. But, it is more important to know what kind of
circumstances brew the desire for change and what impetuses bring such desires into
action. By knowing the momentum of a social change, we can predict and properly
react to the next one. In this regard, examining Korean society’ s reaction to Happy
Together is important because it stood right in the center of such momentum. By
preceding all such important symptoms of the social and cultural transformation of
Korea, the Happy Together incident provided an opportunity in which the belittled
popular culture could prove itself to have a huge potential as a “legitimate” social
power, the influence of which could reach other social structures as well. The
phenomenon also revealed to Korean society that it first needed to emulate as well
as to cooperate with its regional neighbors before confronting the massive trend of
cultural globalization coming from a far distance. If there was gradual desire for
social and cultural transformation within society, then the Happy Together incident
made such aspirations visible. It is a milestone that demarcates an important moment
in Korean cultural history.
2. Hybrid Identity and die (Un)Settling of Borders: Hailing Takeshi Kaneshiro,
East Asian Style
If the aforementioned cultural incidents surrounding Leslie Cheung and his film
demonstrate the way popular culture from Hong Kong tested not only the cultural
policy of the Korean government but also the existing social norm of sexuality in the
society, this chapter focuses on a rather less visible but equally significant case of
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cultural intervention made by a transnational star, Takeshi Kaneshiro. Takeshi
Kaneshiro is another important cultural figure introduced to Korean audiences
during the period of Hong Kong Film Syndrome. In fact, he was introduced at the
last stage of the cultural trend through Wong Kar-wai’s films, Chungking Express
and Fallen Angels. Both films were released in Korea in 1995, only three months
apart His similar roles in both films, lovelorn young men with quirky personalities,
made him an instant star in Korea, just like in other East Asian societies. As a
Taiwanese-Japanese, his hybrid ethnicity and multicultural background enabled him
to build not only his feme but his career across borders of East Asia, gradually
making him the quintessential icon of “Pan-Asian” popular culture.
This chapter looks at the career of this hybrid transnational Asian actor
Kaneshiro, and analyzes the issues and problems that are raised through Kaneshiro’s
presence in multiple Asian pop cultures. By particularly analyzing the way his
national identity is negotiated in the Korean media industry as well as in other East
Asian film industries, I first want to question the popular way in which the concept
of “transnational” is received. Being transnational is primarily understood as a status
seemingly open to cultural differences, and therefore is considered to be a
reconciling and harmonizing position. The discussion of Kaneshiro’s career will
reveal how this popular idea of transnationalism can be considered from a different
perspective; as a boundary-setting rather than a boundary-blurring idea, when tested
in a specific East Asian context The significant issues regarding transnational
quality raised through Kaneshiro’ s career will then be discussed in relation to the
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contemporary situation of Korean popular culture that has entered the stage of active
transnational cultural collaborations via the period of Hong Kong Film Syndrome.
Hybridity, and Guaranteed Fluidity
The release of Memoirs o f a Geisha (dir. Rob Marshall) in 2005
inspired enormous controversy within Chinese and Japanese audiences. Chinese
audiences were offended because one of their favorite stars, ZHANG Ziyi played a
Japanese geisha, which is misconstrued to be a prostitute in many countries outside
of Japan. For those Chinese people who still painfully remember the national
suffering inflicted by the Japanese imperial expansion at the dawn of the twentieth
century, for a representative Chinese actress to play a role perceived as
compromising to national pride was not acceptable. Although it was only her screen
persona, the feet that Zhang plays a role in which her job is to please Japanese male
clients for material compensation greatly aggravated them and the debate over this
film exploded on the internet for months. The initial debate was ignited over a
Chinese male fen who claimed to have seen a nude sex scene with Zhang and a
famous Japanese actor, Ken Watanabe, who is senior to Zhang by more than twenty
years. The anonymity of the virtual space allowed harsh personal comments to be
thrown to the actress, Zhang, for taking a role of that allowed her to be “toyed” with
by a Japanese man.2 9 Zhang, who has been regarded as a “proud fece of China” in
the international film circuit for years since her career took off in Hollywood with
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Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), was suddenly condemned as a
national traitor. The film was eventually banned from release in mainland China,
although it is assumed that interested people can still manage to see it via various
illegal means of file sharing.
Japanese audience’s dissatisfaction with the film was expressed in a more
subdued way, or at least was seen such in comparison to the response of their
Chinese counterparts. Japanese audiences were displeased by the film because their
own traditional culture was severely distorted by “ignorant” Hollywood
craftsmanship, and by the enactment of “alien” Chinese actresses who were not
knowledgeable of the culture at all.3 0 Instead of blaming those actors involved in it,
they directed their discontent toward the famed Hollywood producer Steven
Spielberg, and the director Rob Marshall, who dared to attempt to portray someone
else’s traditional culture about which they have only superficial knowledge.3 1
The whole incident made a deep impression on me. First, obviously,
because of the sympathy that I could feel for the East Asian audiences. Growing up
in East Asia, the region where the colonial trauma still lingers with numerous
unresolved issues, and the region that has witnessed the replacement of their own
culture with Western ones in the process of modernization, I could clearly see why
they were so sensitive about representation of their own culture; and where the pain
comes from. However, what was more interesting to me, is that I could see the sign
of struggle among contemporary East Asian people in relation to national pride vs.
national promotion through culture. The situation interestingly presented to me the
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ambivalent position that East Asian people are in at this period. Living in a period
when national interests often require collaboration with other countries, they can no
longer be blindly nationalistic nor thoughtlessly unbigoted. Therefore, I interpreted
the situation as representing the frustration of Chinese people caught in the dilemma
of ambitiously exporting their culture to global markets (in this case, the cultural
product being Zhang) and still feeling uneasy toward an earlier national enemy who
now functions as their cultural collaborator. Japanese people also had to deal with
their feelings about how their traditional culture was illuminated by the more
globally influential cultural handlers of Hollywood for wide distribution to the
whole world, and the condition that such gain would only be given when hard-to-
accept compromise is done. Therefore, this is a period when the directions to which
national pride and national interests are heading do not often accord, and therefore
need to be negotiated. In fact, this controversy over Memoirs o f a Geisha became
big news all over Asia, and was brought to the attention of the Korean media, too.3 2
What is always accented in the Korean media’s reportage of this issue is the fact that
one of the roles was rejected by Korean actress KIM Yun-jin when it was offered to
her early on in the film’s production. Seeing the Korean media quote some of the
random Chinese audience posts complimenting Kim’s patriotism, vis-a-vis Zhang’s
recklessness, I could sense both the relief and the anxiety of the Korean media and
people over their future cultural negotiations. They could avoid being caught in such
a controversial cultural situation this time, but there might be other cases in the
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future in which they will be required to make similar difficult negotiations in the
33
process of transnational cultural transactions.
I have provided a long description of the controversy over the geisha
film in order to compare this situation to the transnational Chinese film production
of The House o f Flying Daggers (2004), in which Takeshi Kaneshiro, who is
Japanese by nationality, starred alongside the same actress Zhang. Directed by an
internationally acclaimed filmmaker Zhang Yimou, House o f Flying Daggers was
released all over Asia a year before Memoirs was. The film centers on the love
triangle of three ancient Chinese warriors, played by Zhang, Kaneshiro, and a Hong
Kong superstar Andy Lau. There are a couple of explicit love scenes between Zhang
and Kaneshiro. Considering the controversy over a possible bed scene between
Zhang and another Japanese actor in Memoirs a year later, Chinese audience should
have been equally uneasy about the paring of Zhang and Kaneshiro. However, not
only did they not express uneasiness but Kaneshiro was warmly welcomed by the
mainland Chinese audience when he participated in the extravagant promotion of
this film in Beijing during the summer of 2004. Let’s assume that the Japanese actor
Kaneshiro’s role was condoned by Chinese audiences because the film is a Chinese
production, directed by a renowned Chinese filmmaker, and at least Kaneshiro’s role
in the film was Chinese. In such a situation, Chinese audiences might have easily
suspended their knowledge of Kaneshiro’s real life citizenship, which is Japanese,
and might have been able to temporarily accept him as a Chinese at least on screen.
However, what is more interesting is the next year when there was such a
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controversy over Memoirs among Chinese audience. Coincidentally, Kaneshiro was
on a promotional tour of another film, Perhaps Love (2005), directed by Hong Kong
filmmaker Peter Chan. There was another Chinese actress, ZHOU Xun playing
Kaneshiro’s love interest When the overall negative reaction toward Japaneseness
was at its height because of Memoirs, again hypothetically, it could have easily
affected Kaneshiro’s reception by the Chinese public. However, according to media
reportage of the promotion of the film, he was again enthusiastically received by
Chinese people; completely detached from the situation happening on the other end
of the Chinese film culture in the same time period. What could possibly make
Chinese audiences’ attitude toward Kaneshiro more tolerant and generous than
toward other actors (or the other actor) of the same nationality? The most important
factor might lie in his hybrid ethnicity and multicultural upbringing and career
which do not allow one to easily designate him to any one national identity,
regardless of his nationality listed on his passport. Now I will briefly look at
Kaneshiro’ s personal and career background.
Bom in Taiwan in 1973 to a Japanese father and a Taiwanese mother,
Kaneshiro first visited Japan when he was 18 years old.3 4 Until then, he was raised
in Taiwan, although he was able to encounter multiple cultures within the country.
His experience as a person who was situated in between different cultures does not
sound terribly pleasant. He initially went to a Japanese school and later transferred
to the Taipei American school where students from multiple nationalities study
together. He moved to the school because he could not stand constant bullying by
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his friends over his mixed blood. "When I went to Japanese school, everybody told
me I was Taiwanese. But when I hung out in the neighborhood, people told me I was
Japanese," says Kaneshiro at an interview.3 5 The unpleasant childhood memory and
teenage identity crisis are not the only inheritance he received from his parents.
Because of his multiple cultural backgrounds, he is able to speak five different
languages -- Taiwanese, Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, and English. This
multilingual ability turned out to be the biggest asset for his career in popular culture,
later enabling him to build his careers across East Asian borders, working with
Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Chinese, Japanese, Korean-American directors. He was
scouted by a Taiwanese talent agency when he was merely a high school student,
and started his career following the typical path through which Taiwanese young
idols were created at that time, combining both a singing and acting career. Since the
mid 1990s when his celebrity status in Asian film industries was radically elevated
with his successful roles in the Hong Kong production of Chungking Express and
Fallen Angles, and the Japanese TV mini series, God Please Give Me More Tim in
1998, he moved his career bases to the Hong Kong and Japanese media industries,
which were able to provide him with more convenient platforms to be promoted
across Asia. Around this time, he also quit his singing career to be a more seriously
devoted actor. From this period, his mixed ethnicity is no more a burden to him,
allowing him to easily adapt to and be welcomed by different national media
industries in Asia.
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As his career expanded across different Asian countries, he began to be
called by multiple names. Because of the deep-rooted cultural influence of Chinese
characters in the linguistic system of East Asia, they are an essential part of the
languages of both Korea and Japan, although they do not exactly function in the
same way in each language. Most people’s names in Korean and Japanese consist of
Chinese characters, from which usually the meaning of the names come. The
pronunciation of these Chinese characters are nationalized over a long time, and
therefore the same Chinese character has different pronunciations depending on the
language you use it in. Therefore, although written as (as a Japanese name,
is the surname and is the given name) in Chinese characters, each
pronunciation of his name in different languages can be phoneticized as Kaneshiro
Takeshi (Japan), Jincheng Wu (Mandarin), Kamsing Mo (Cantonese), Kumsung Mu
(Korean). And these are all legitimate ways of pronouncing his names in each
language, not simply simulating foreign sounds in it. Not surprisingly, these multiple
way of nationalizing the pronunciation of his name sometimes cause problems for
him. Most confusion comes from the different structure between the Japanese name
and the rest Most Chinese and Korean people have one-Chinese-1 etter surnames,
pronounced in a single syllable, except in a very few cases. However, the majority of
Japanese surnames consist of two Chinese letters with a few exceptions. Therefore,
often times, Kanershiro’s surname is confused to be instead of in Chinese
or Korean language cultures. In fact, there is a popular Korean surname that is
written with the same Chinese character sfe, but is pronounced as Kim, 36 not Kum.
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When it comes to the Japanese surname it is pronounced as Kumsung rather
than Kimsung. Because of such difference in adapting the Chinese language in the
Korean, Japanese, and Chinese name system, people like Kaneshiro whose career
requires him to often cross national borders encounter not a few confusions. He
confesses, “I feel weird sometimes. When people call me Mr. Kam, I'm like, who is
Mr. Kam? Or they call me Mr. Kim, and I have to remind them that I'm not
Korean." 37
Certainly such a chaotic situation over his name is caused mainly
because Kaneshiro is a transnational star, who, more often than others, crosses
national boundaries to promote himself in different countries. Is he the first and only
Asian actor who is able to offer insights about a transnational career in popular
culture? Certainly not In fact, there are numerous names in the history of East Asian
popular culture, that are remembered to have worked in more than one country.
Most notably, Bruce Lee is such a transnational star, who was bom in San Francisco
and extensively worked both in Hong Kong and in the US. Later generations such as
Jacky Chan, Chow Yun-fat, or Jet Li all followed in his footsteps. However, the
lineage of such transnational careers in East Asian film industries has a longer
history than that. During the silent film era, we find Japanese-American actor Sesue
Hayakawa, Chinese-American actress Anna May Wong, and Korean-American actor
Philip Ahn, actively working either in their transplanted land, Hollywood, or across
national borders. In almost the same period in Asia, there was a Korean actor KIM
Yum and a Japanese actress LI Xianglan, both of whom worked in the Chinese film
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industry. 38 These are only a limited number of names that are prominently
illuminated either in the industries that they worked for or in recent academia. The
list vastly expands over history, especially if you also consider those less recognized
non-principle actors.
If there were so many cases of transnational actors in East Asian film
history, then why do we need to pay attention to Kaneshiro? What makes his case
different from the rest of his predecessors? One interesting aspect that distinguishes
Kaneshiro from the earlier group of transnational Asian actors is that his hybridity as
a real life person is freely accepted and is often adopted to his on screen personae.
However, this was not the case with most transnational stars, whether they crossed
the regional boundaries of East and West, or simply crossed the national borders
within East Asia. When most Asian actors crossed the Pacific Ocean and were
transplanted into Hollywood - whether they moved there later in their career or
started their career there as diasporic actors - their screen personae are constantly
localized to represent a certain fixed type of “Asianness.” For example, male actors
are mostly cast for the role of almost asexual martial artists whereas female actors
are asked to play subordinate sexual objects like geishas. Even those few
transnational stars who crossed the borders within East Asia also tended to go
through a similar molding process. The Korean actor Kim Yum and the Japanese
actress Li Xianglan, also mostly played Chinese characters in the Chinese film
industry. Actually Li Xianglan, with her Japanese nationality, makes a good
comparison to Kaneshiro. One of the most controversial figures in early Chinese
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film history, Li, was bom in Manchuria, China, to Japanese parents during the
occupation period. Although she started her career in the Chinese film industry and
became a big star, during most of her career prime, she had to hide her real
nationality because of Chinese audiences’ hostility toward the imperial colonizers.
Therefore, her on-screen nationality was always Chinese. Later when her Japanese
nationality was revealed, there arose a controversy among Chinese audiences
regarding whether she was a “puppet” politically operated by Japan to infiltrate into
Chinese popular culture. During this period, mostly due to the political situation of
East Asia, hybrid or alien identity was not quite welcomed, and had to be subdued to
represent a singular national identity.
This pressure of assimilation seems to have almost disappeared for
Kaneshiro with the changed geopolitics in East Asia in recent years. In fact, having
started his career when most of the Asian film industry was vigorously invested in
regional collaborations, his hybrid ethnic and cultural background became one of his
biggest advantages and made him unique among his colleagues. The Chinese
public’ s lack any hostile response to his presence in the Chinese film circuit during
the controversy over the pop cultural encounter between China and Japan in
Memoirs o f a Geisha can be understood in light of his hybridity. It allowed him to
belong to nowhere and everywhere at the same time. About such flexibility that is
given with hybridity, Iwabuch says,
The concept of “hybridity,” ... brings to light the doubleness
and in-betweeness of national/cultural identity formation.
Hybridity usefully counters exclusivist notions of imagines
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community, as well as the essentialism and “ethnic
absolutism” involved in ideas of cultural “purity” and
“authenticity.”... The concept fruitfully displaces our
conception of clearly demarcated national/cultural boundaries,
which have been based upon a binary opposition between
“us” and “them,” “the Westf’ and “the Rest,” and the
colonizer and die colonized,... ,39
Although he was Japanese by nationality, he was familiar to the Chinese
language media for more years than he was to the Japanese or any other media
industries. And the reason he was able to smoothly partake in the Chinese language
media from the beginning may be because he is ethnically Chinese as much as he is
Japanese.40 His hybrid identity temporarily disables East Asian audience’s judgment
based on binary oppositions forming from their colonial memory of Japan versus the
rest. And his fluid movement across East Asia is guaranteed to take advantage of
such a moment of suspended judgment.
His hybridity not only allows him convenient access to both Chinese
language territories and Japan, to which his career has a direct connection, but to
Korea, as well. In fact his introduction, or rather entrance to the scenes of Korean
popular culture may have more significance than his transnational careers in other
East Asian countries. The unique meaning of his occasional presence in Korean
popular culture is derived from the fact that Japanese popular culture has been
officially banned in Korean from liberation until 1998. During the period, the only
officially allowed Japanese pop culture on Korean media was the Japanese
children’s animation series on Korean TV. Despite this national policy, since
Kaneshiro’s fame grew in Korea with the two Wong Kar-wai films, he was actively
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promoted as a new foreign star in numerous Korean media. He not only participated
in a Korean TV show during his promotional visit to Korea in 1996 and 1997, but
also made a TV commercial for a Korean company during the period, following the
paths of the earlier generation of stars of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome, Leslie
Cheung, Chow Yun-fat, Andy Lau, and Joey Wong. Until 1998, when the ban on
Japanese culture was lifted in Korea, Kaneshiro was the only pop cultural figure
with Japanese citizenship who was allowed not only to officially promote his works
in Korea but also to participate in the Korean media. His popularity grew, and he
later even collaborated with a Korean-American filmmaker JIN Won-sok and
famous Korean actress KIM Hye-su in the film Too Tired to Die (1998). He also
worked with popular Korean actors PYON U-min in Hong Kong director, Johnny
To’s film The Odd One Dies (1997). The reason his popularity and career were able
to smoothly launch in Korean pop cultural territory is because he was introduced
through Hong Kong films as a part of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome, rather than as
a Japanese actor. Although his nationality was known to Korean audiences from the
beginning, it seemed to be overshadowed by the ardor for the popular culture
coming from Hong Kong.
In feet, since the period, whenever Korean actresses talk about their
possible transnational career, they always mentioned Kaneshiro’s name. Although
there were numerous such cases over the years, none of the projects that I heard
about in that regard, except Too Tired to Die, has been materialized so fer. In most
cases, they just borrow his name to promote themselves, pretending feat they are in
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high demand, being invited to collaborate with such fashionable young stars of the
Hong Kong film industry. The feet that Kaneshiro’s name is so frequently and
sometimes recklessly exploited by Korean actresses in a way demonstrates that,
despite his nationality, he was and is regarded to be a quite accessible, and desirable
cultural figure in the Korean pop cultural circuit Considering that it was mostly
Kaneshiro’s name, not other Hong Kong stars’, which was taken advantage in that
way gives us a significant insight about the flexibility and accessibility that
Kaneshiro’s hybridity suggests to people. Although there were numerous Hong
Kong stars who built their feme in Korea before Kaneshiro, their names have hardly
been exploited in die way that Kaneshiro’s has. The reason might be that despite
their popularity and familiarity in Korea, they are still guarded with their clear
national and linguistic identity, which generally them limited accessibility to people
in Korean pop culture. In the case of Kaneshiro, his multiple cultural and career
backgrounds, and especially his multilingual ability (despite his incapability of
commanding Korean) generally make him a more flexible figure who is more aptly
adaptable to any transnational situation than other stars from Hong Kong. Such
impressions of accessibility are exploited by some part of Korean pop culture.
Although the random use of Kaneshiro’s name in the aforementioned
way can be understood in a negative way, nevertheless, this situation gives us
interesting clues about what Kaneshiro was able to offer to Korean pop culture at
that time. The period of Hong Kong Film Syndrome, when Kaneshiro entered the
cultural imagination of Korean people, was a transitional period in Korean popular
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culture in every way. Developing its ambition to move from an import-oriented to an
export-oriented industry and shifting from its inward perspective to an outward one,
the Korean pop cultural industry was actively seeking a means to broaden its
networks with collaborators from outside. However, the collaborators needed to be
located within a proximate range. The active adoption of the influence of Hong
Kong films, and the building of relations with the Hong Kong film industry in
general can be understood as a part of such attempts to form transnational relations
with other industries. However, there still was a significant limitation on the Korean
pop cultural industry’s ability to develop its outward ambition, especially coming
from the blocked pop cultural traffic with Japan, one of its closest neighbors in both
geographical and cultural terms. Kaneshiro’s liminality, situated in between the
Chinese language cultures and Japan, and his symbolic and literal movement
between the spaces suggested the direction that the culture industry of Korea, which
is also located between the two territories, could take for it its future progress.
Commenting on African-American artist Renee Green’s insight about the stairwell in
a museum building as a liminal space, “a pathway between the upper and lower
areas,” Homi Bhabha says,
The stairwell as liminal space, in-between the designations of
identity, becomes the process of symbolic interaction, the
connective tissue that constructs the difference between upper
and lower, black and white. The hither and thither of the
stairwell, the temporal movement and passage that it allows,
prevents identities at either end of it from settling into
primordial polarities. The interstitial passage between fixed
identifications opens up the possibility of a cultural hybridity
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that entertains difference without an assumed or imposed
hierarchy41
The potential of liminal space, the undecidedness and the indefinite possibility
derived from it, was suggested to the Korean pop cultural industry through the
prominent presence of Kaneshiro in the East Asian cultural markets at that time.
Therefore, Kaneshiro performed a symbolic function to widen the imagination of the
Korean film industry regarding its position and future direction, from the perspective
of its own in-betweeness of being situated between China and Japan, between local
and global ambition. There is no direct or obvious relation noticed between the lift
of ban of Japanese popular culture in Korea in 1998, and Kaneshiro’s entrance into
the Korean popular cultural space immediately before that. However, whatever
factors may have affected the official decision making, the coincidental and timely
presence of Kaneshiro may have prepared the general imagination of Korean pop
cultural consumers for the immanent influx of the popular culture of another
neighbor.
The Persistence of National Identity on a Hybrid Space
Kaneshiro’s multicultural background seems to guarantee his relatively
fluid movement among different Asian film and media industries, compared to
others who are constrained by their cultural and linguistic limitations and the
complicated historical imaginaries that linger in East Asia. However, this does not
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mean that the media industries that he collaborates with are relatively indifferent to
any national sensibilities in the works in which he stars. In feet, quite ironically, the
opposite seems to be true.
When he started to actively build his career in Japan, as well as in
Taiwan and Hong Kong, his career prospered and capitalized on his real life hybrid
identity. As his career flourished, however, the works created with him reinforced
the sense of national identity more than it compromised or mitigated it Now I will
look at Kaneshiro’s career in Japan and Hong Kong between 1998 and 2004 to show
the divergent way that each national media created and preserved his screen images.
Observing his career, we can witness that the way in which each national media
industry mobilized his star quality is underlined by their nationalistic positions. Such
tendencies become more clear when you compare his career before and after 1998.
Before 1998, when he was mostly regarded as a celebrity of the Chinese
language media industries, especially in Taiwan and Hong Kong, there was nothing
about his career trajectory that was different from his colleagues. In Taiwan, not to
mention pursuing his singing career, he also played in numerous cheap Taiwanese
comedies, just like any other Taiwanese young idol routinely did. In the trendy
military-based films like No Sir (dir. CHU Yin-ping, 1994) or Forever Friends (dir.
Chu Yin-ping, 1995), Kaneshiro, who has a Japanese passport, and is exempt of the
mandatory military service for Taiwanese adult male citizens, even played the roles
of a young Taiwanese soldier, with some of his fellow Taiwanese “Four Little
Heavenly Kings.” 42 It seems like that there was hardly any controversy over this
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multiethnic star, who was then regarded to be the product of the pop cultural
industry in Taiwan, posing as a patriotic Taiwanese solder on screen. When his
screen career almost migrated to the Hong Kong film industry in the mid-1990s,4 3
he then followed the path that popular Hong Kong stars usually take, participating in
numerous genre films of similar content. During this period, we can see him in two
distinctive movie genres. One is a romantic love story in which Kaneshiro usually
played the roles of soft-hearted, yet quirky lovers, the character type that made
Kaneshiro famous in Wong Kar-wai’s two films. Films such as Lost and Found (dir.
LEE Chi-Ngai, 1996), First Love: The Litter on die Breeze (dir. Eric Kot, 1997), or
Anna Magdalena (dir. YEE Chung-Man, 1997) show Kaneshiro’ s in such roles.
Another is the genre that foregrounds action as the main attraction. We can see
Kanershiro in action scenes in Dr. Wai and the Scripture Without Words (dir. Ching
Siu-tung, 1995), Downtown Torpedoes (dir. Teddy Chan, 1997), the Odd One Dies,
or Hero (dir. Corey Yuen, 1995). Some of these films, of course, combined the two
character types.
Just like in 1995, when he rose to a bigger stardom with Wong’s films,
the year 1998 was a turning point for him. His career impressively launched in the
Japanese media industry with the phenomenal success of foe TV series, God Please
Give Me More Time. In this TV series, Kaneshiro plays a famous Japanese pop
music composer, who falls in love with a HTV-positive teenage girl, and develops a
faithful love despite her fatal disease. With foe success of this TV series, he was
virtually promoted as foe epitome of foe “Pan-Asian ism” in East Asian pop culture.
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In her detailed analysis of Kaneshiro’s career in the Chinese and Japanese cultural
territories, Eva Tsai talk about Kaneshiro’s changed celebrity status during this time:
Toward the late 1990s, especially after the synchronized
showing of the smash hit serial Kamisama, Mosukoshi Dake
(God, please give me a little more time), Kaneshiro acquired
a new image—international, irresistible, slick, and grown up.
According to director Sylvia Chang (...), following his
success in Japan, he had become almost too good-looking,
too gorgeous, and too cool.44
Since then, the demand for Kaneshiro in the Japanese film industry has rapidly
increased. The Chinese language media was also attracted to his refashioned
image of an international star. However since his career took off in Japan, we can
hardly witness his eclectic character roles in Hong Kong films any more. Instead,
two different types of masculine images were created and maintained for him in
Hong Kong and Japan respectively. One is a naive and angelic lover, and the other
one is quite opposite, a rugged and dangerous type that is often perceived to be
traditional masculinity.
The first film that he made in Hong Kong after his Japanese career was
actively launched is Tempting Heart (1999), directed by Sylvia Chang. In this film,
Kaneshiro plays another romantic Hong Kong lover, who faithfully keeps his
teenage first love for more than twenty years even after his whole life is transplanted
in Japan. The film was one of the biggest Hong Kong box office hits and the
repressed and gentle lover that Kaneshiro played almost laid the foundation for the
character type that he plays in the next few Hong Kong films. In fact, such a
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subdued and rather feminized masculine image that Kaneshiro played is furthered by
the next two films which connect his roles to angels in one way or another.
In 2000, the previously “fallen angel,” Kaneshiro, came back to the
Hong Kong screen as an Angel in the film Lavender. This time he played a real
angel character who literally fells from heaven to a young woman’s apartment in
Hong Kong. While staying with this woman until his broken wings get healed, this
fallen angel gradually develops love for the young woman who feels devastated by
her boy friend’s death. At the end of the film, after the angel returns to heaven, a
young male neighbor who looks exactly like this angel, also played by Kaneshiro,
accidentally encounters her, and starts a new love with her. His name is Michael
Angelo, and owns a neighborhood restaurant with his name. The last scene of the
film shows the two couple having first dinner out together at the restaurant Michael
Angelo.
This angel imagery comes back again in the Hong Kong films
Kaneshiro made in 2003, Turn Left Turn Right (dir. Johnny To). Here, Kaneshiro’s
character, an aspiring violinist with an angelic soft-heart, works part time at a
restaurant, the name of which is no other than “Fat Angelo.” To the audience who
remembers the last scene of Lavender, this name creates an interestingly narrative
link to his previous film. One could imagine that Michael Angelo grew old to
become “Fat Angelo.” There are no other connections between the films, except die
fact that both of them feature Kaneshiro. Through the presence of real life actor
Kaneshiro and of the angelic images that are associated with him, the two films, set
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in Hong Kong and Taiwan respectively, make not only an interesting narrative
connection, but also a spatial connection between the two cities.
While he mostly plays such angelic and gentle masculine images in
Hong Kong films, his roles in Japanese TV dramas or films during the same period
forge his on-screen persona in a completely different light. At this time, his career in
Japan was built around two distinct trajectories. One revolved around a traditional
masculinity implying toughness, strength, and danger, and the other revolved around
an almost out-worldly superhero type. Although God Please Give Me More Time,
which made his initial success in Japan, portrays his character growing into a
devoted lover, who stays with his AIDS infected lover/wife, in the earlier episodes
of this series, he is depicted as a chauvinistic male celebrity, who is domineering,
cynical, and cold to people around him. His character also a non-stoppable
womanizer who does not mind having a one night stand with a high school girl.
When such chauvinism is characterized to be one of the traditional
masculine traits, his roles in his next few films also followed such traditional
masculine images. In his next work in Japan in 1999, the Sleepless Town (dir. Lee
Chi-Ngai), he is a Chinese-Japanese gangster, who cannot belong to either the
Chinese Triad or Japanese Yakuza during their territorial war over Japan’s
entertainment district, Kabukicho. A quintessential cold-hearted gangster with
toughness and edginess, his character basically does anything that will guarantee his
daily survival in this turmoil, even killing the woman he seems to love at the end.
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In 2000, in a Japanese TV series Love 2000, he plays a secret agent and
a trained assassin who eventually kills his own father and brother for his country. In
the last episode, he even has to kill his own lover to save the public from imminent
bomb terror. In the same year, he played an orphaned bank robber armed with rifles
in the film Space Traveler (dir. Katsuyuki Motohiro). Although comical in its overall
atmosphere, the film ends with tragedy. He and his fellow colleagues in a bank
robbery are killed by the police force. His next film was Returner (dir. Takashi
Yamazaki) in 2002, the Japanese amalgam of M atrix and ET, and he again is an
independent assassin on-call, who grew up in China and came to Japan. In the
next TV series Golden Bowl, he plays an ordinary salary man with almost
unbelievable skills in bowling. Hailed as a hero by his neighbors, he saves the
deteriorating local bowling alley time and time again. However sinister and ruthless
his characters are in these films or TV series, the negative aspect of each character is
mostly compromised to a different degree; mixed with some positive humane
qualities such as showing sympathy for others or falling in love with women. Even
so, the general character type he played in Japanese media is clearly distinguished
from the overall angelic character that he played in Hong Kong films in the same
period.
However, Eva Tsai sees more commonalities than differences in the
character types that he plays in Hong Kong and Japan:
Since 2000, the borderless contruction of Kaneshiro in Japan
has increasingly derived more from the aesthetics and
technology of mediation than from the blending of national or
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cultural origins. Like the post-1997 Hong Kong directors who
cast Kaneshiro as fantastical characters, the Japanese media
workers experimented with the same performing tension in
the movies Space Travelers (2000) and Returner (2002) and
the TV drama Golden Bowl (2002). Specifically, they turned
to the existing media resources and aesthetic traditions in
Japan—sci-fi, animation, and manga—for constructing
Kaneshiro’s out-of-this-worldness.4 S
This explanation is true to his career, yet seems to overlook the obvious differences
among the masculine types that he is molded into in each national media industry.
Nevertheless, her emphasis on the “fantastical” and “out-of-this-worldness” qualities
imbued in Kaneshiro’s characters during this period is quite significant. In feet, such
fantastical characters built around Kaneshiro’s image reached their height when a
computer-generated manga character was created based on Kaneshiro’s look and
voice for the Japanese video game series, Onimusha I and III in 2001 and 2003. The
main character of this videogame, Samanouske Akenouchi, is a traditional Samurai
in 18th century Japan with death-defying fighting skills. In fact, his good looks were
constantly compared to manga characters almost from the beginning of his show
business career by his fans and media, mostly with the implication that there is no
comparison to him in real life figures. Considering that, the creation of manga
characters based on him seems to the defining moment of Kaneshiro’s hybridity
which not only crosses the boundaries of different human cultures, but even crosses
the boundaries of human and non-human. Even so, what is noticed in this Japanese
production is that he is again, a warrior, the epitome of traditional masculine
strength and bravery.
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As we have seen so far, his career in his mid to late 2 0 s is follows these
distinct dual trajectories of masculinity that were seemingly insisted on by the two
national media that he primarily works for. This situation is interesting because what
seems to be struggling in this situation surrounding this transnational and hybrid
figure Kaneshiro is not only Kaneshiro himself as an individual sometimes dealing
with identity confusion, but also the national media industries that deal with this
desirable male star. In the particular circumstance I’ve discussed, we see that the
hybrid star Kaneshiro offers an imaginary space in which these two national media
industries strive to leave their own marks by constantly ascribing distinct type of
heterosexual masculinity on his screen images. I am not saying that either the
romantic angelic male type or the rugged and tough traditional masculine type
represents any one specific nation’s typical or desired masculine image. Here,
instead of asking what kind of masculine image was created by different national
media for him, I pay attention to how different national media utilize masculine
images to manifest their close relation to the transnational and therefore hybrid body
such as Kaneshiro at its most desirable stage. In other words, in this contestation of
national media on Kaneshiro’ s masculine body, hybridity becomes the center of
productiveness, generating a variety of images. However, this productiveness is
interestingly marked with unique national characteristics: in this case, the distinct
heterosexual masculine types that each national media consistently desired to see in
Kaneshiro. Therefore this productiveness does not only signify the production of
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multiple screen images of Kaneshiro, but also the creation of a unique presence of
the each national media through Kaneshiro’s images.
This projection of the national identity by East Asian media becomes
clearer when we consider the way the Korean media dealt with his career during the
period. Although most of Kaneshiro’s Hong Kong films were released in Korea, but
interestingly none of his Japanese films so far have been released in Korea.46 This is
an ironic situation considering that Japanese pop culture began to be freely imported
in Korea when Kaneshiro’s career in Japan flourished; and he was already made
familiar to Korean audience even before that Since he was the first Japanese actor
to collaborate with the pop cultural industry of Korea, it would make more sense if
the first Japanese films that came to Korea had been his. However, this did not
happen. This situation is even more interesting considering Kaneshiro became a
“bigger star,” the “Pan-Asian sensation” 47 since his Japanese career prospered in the
late 1990s. Then, what could be the reason for such a selective and almost
discriminatory release of Kaneshiro’s works in Korea?
Not being able to access the possible multiple hierarchy operating
behind the Korean pop cultural industry in such decision-making, I still think that
the fact that Kaneshiro was not accepted in Korea provides significant insights about
the Korean pop cultural/film industry’s way of negotiating with hibridity and
transnationality. Just as the Hong Kong and Japanese film industries’ national
positions are reflected in their manipulation of Kaneshiro’s image, the Korean
industry’s attitude toward Kaneshiro is shaped by their own national identity. He
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was fully and warmly accepted when he was introduced through his works made in
Hong Kong; when he was primarily a the product of Hong Kong pop culture. When
he suddenly was reshaped into a “dangerous” and “threatening” Japanese male
personae, the Korean industry was reserved about accepting him in roles that
reminded them of the intimidating image of the former colonizer Japan. This might
explain why he was constantly cast in angelic roles in Hong Kong during the period.
Borrowing Dominic Pettman’s analysis of the presence of angles in the local cinema,
Tsai comments,
Writing on the ontology of angels in Hong Kong cinema,
Pettman comments that they are “tropological figures through
which we can rethink conceptions of identity, abandonment,
alterity and belonging, in an age of unprecendented
unsettlement”. Displaced or blissful, Kaneshiro’ s “angelic”
roles in Hong Kong films also speak to many real conditions
and as such create for the spectator the poignancy and bliss of
unsettlement. 48
Detached and alienated from human existence, Kaneshiro’ s angel characters not
only project the condition of unsetdement but also signify the divesture of masculine
threat and virility from Kaneshiro, who is now conspicuously Japanese as well as
Taiwanese in his public presence. The virtual rejection of Kaneshiro’s potent
masculine image reinforced through the Japanese media by the Korean and Hong
Kong media industries can be understood as a symbolic rejection of Japan’s
resurfacing, with dominating and perilous image on the scenes of transnational
cultural exchange of East Asian countries.
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Hence, although Kaneshiro seemingly works freely crossing the
national borders in East Asia due to his hybrid identity, he, as a symbolic space of
cultural imagination, always carries the distinct traces of contestation and conflicts
among the national cultural industries that his career is involved with. Roger Rouse
says, “the transnational has not so much displaced the national as resituated it and
thus reworked its meanings.” 49 This idea best describes Kaneshiro’s relationship
with different national media in East Asia. Transnational hybridity, in essence, points
to the co-existence of multiple national and cultural characteristics in one space
rather than the disappearance of them. Therefore, as we see in this case of
Kaneshiro’s transnational stardom, the imaginary space of transnational hybridity
itself sometime provides an opportunity for the multiple positions of different
identities to become visualized as much as they are subdued.
So far, the different attitude toward the transnational star Kaneshiro by
different cultural industries in East Asia has displayed the process of their
negotiation with the star’s career in its transitional moment. Now entering into his
thirties and especially with the international success of House o f Flying Daggers,
Kaneshiro seems to face another turning point in his career. He is transitioning
from a fashionable youth to a mature man, from a transnational local star to an
international star. The next phase of Kaneshiro’s career will present another
significant insight and will also suggest issues to be considered tor the Korean film
industry, which also is undergoing a similar transitional period, since the Hong Kong
Film Syndrome.
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181
Chapter in Endnotes
1 The name of the government department was later changed into the Ministry of
Culture and Tourism in 1998.
2 Tae-ho Kwon, “Taejung munhwa chippamnun kdmchal, kongryun ui manyo
sanyang” [The Public prosecutors’ and PPEC’s witch-hunting tramples down
popular culture]. Hangydre Sinmun. 07 August 1997.
3 Zachariah Coffinan, “Image Overhaul in the Works.” Variety, November 1997,
17-23.
4 Fionuala Halligan, “UnHappy Korea bans Samsung film.” Screen International,
25 July 1997.
5 Hye-rim Hwang, “Haepi tugeder kaebong chwajol, kurigo wanggawi ui hanguk
pangmun sambak sail” (Happy Together banned, and Wong Kar-wai’ s four days’
visit to Korea), Ssine 21,113 (July 1997).
6 Steven J. Ross, “The Revolt of the Audience: Reconsidering Audiences and
Reception during the Silent Era,” American Movie Audiences: From the Turn o f the
Century to the Early Sound Era, eds. Melvyn Stokes and Richard Maltby (London:
BFI Publishing, 1999), 92
7 An example can be found in the case when one of U.S. country music idols, Dixie
Chicks were publicly denounced by many domestic fens and were boycotted by
numerous radio stations after the main singer of the band, Natalie Maines said, "Just
so you know, we’ re ashamed the president of die United States is from Texas" during
their concert in London in March 2003. Later, they had to officially apologize for
what they said. More reports in “Dixie Chicks singer apologizes for Bush
comment.” at
http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Music/03/14/dixie.chicks.apology/, 14March
2003.
8 Richard Dyer, Stars (London: BFI Publishing, 1998), 8 .
9 Richard James Havis, “Wong Kar-Wai: One Entrance Many Exits.” Cinemaya 38
(Autumn 1997),16. Wong also claimed that his film, that has the subtitle of “A Story
of Reunion,” had nothing to do with the Hong Kong’ s return to China, which
coincides with the same year when the film was released.
10 John Fiske, M edia Matters: Everyday Culture and Political Change (Minneapolis
and London: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), 6 .
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11 Also in his Hong Kong concert in 2000, he called his partner, “my love.” I thank
WANG Chunchi for the information. The article “Leslie Cheung: Larger than Life”
in the homepage of Hong Kong Vintage Radio station at
http ://www. hkvpradio. com/artists/lesliecheung/
is one of the documents that also confirms similar facts.
12 Lea Jacobs, The Wages o f Sin (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press,
1991), 16.
13 John Street, Politics and Popular Culture (Philadelphia : Temple University Press,
1997), 10.
14 Annette Kuhn, Cinema, Censorship, and Sexuality, 1909-1925 (London and New
York: Routledge, 1988), 115.
15 For example, in 1993 when the Korean pop idols “Seo Taeji and Boys” dyed their
hair red or changed their hair into a “reggae” style, KBS (Korean Broadcasting
System) prohibited the group’s appearance on TV for a while. At that time, red hair
or black-style twisted hair were still considered to be shockingly transgressive to
almost uniformly straight and black haired Korean people. Ironically, from that
moment, you were able to see more red and “reggae” hair styles donned by revolting
fens on the streets of Korea.
16 Denise Tang, “Popular Dialogues of a ‘Discreet’ Nature.” Asian Cinema, 10/1
(1998 Fall), 204.
17 Yong-su Shin. “Tongsongae, ottoke pol kosinga” (How should we look at
homosexuality) Tdngallho, 29 September 1997.
18 Kyung Hyun Kim, The New Korean Cinema, 26.
19 I, as a graduate student, personally participated in such an illegal screening of
Happy Together at Ewha Woman’s University during the fell of 1997. For other
screenings held at other college venues, I rely on my memory of what I heard from
people at that time. Unfortunately, I failed to obtain more exact statistics or factual
evidence about such past occasions from any places, not even from the current Ewha
Woman’s University student senate in 2004. It is a cultural history on the verge of
being obliterated in Korea.
20 Among many Korean cultural analysts, the debut of “Seo Taeji and Boys” in
1992, a Korean pop idol group with unprecedented popularity, is considered to be a
significant landmark in the Korean pop cultural history. With die increasing use of
the internet in Korean society, this period showed the emergence of systematically
organized fen culture in Korea, the model of which can be found in the fan activities
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of “Seo Taeji and Boys.” Despite their legendary popularity in Korean society and
their numerous achievements in Korea pop culture, there were no incidents
associated with them, with such a huge scale and political nature as is described here
in relation to Happy Together.
21 Iwabuchi, Recentering Globalization, 17.
2 2 Hye-rim Hwang.
23 Iwabuchi, Recentering Globalization, 15.
24 Mei-Ling Hsu et al. “Representations of ‘Us’ and ‘Others’ in the AIDS News
Discourse: A Taiwanese Experience,” in Sexual Cultures in East Asia: The Social
Construction o f Sexuality and Sexual Risk in a Time o f AIDS, ed. Evelyne Micollier
(London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2004), 193.
25 Ibid., 192-194.
26 For all the detailed information about die first AIDS patients in Korea, see
Myongguk Kam, “Migun pudae yulaknyo nya tongsongyonaeja nya: hangukhyong
eizu hwanja 1-ho rul chajara” (AProstitute around the U.S. military base or a
homosexual?: search for the first Korean-type AIDS patient) Sindonga online
version, (July 2002), at
http ://www. donga. com/docs/magazine/new_donga/200207/nd2002070300. html.
27 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and
Spread o f Nationalism, revised ed. (London and New York: Verso, 1991), 7.
28 Even when the film was officially released in 1998, the nineteen seconds out of
the entire one hundred and ten seconds of the opening sex scene between two gay
characters had to be excised.
29 Later it was proved that there was no such nude scene in any released version of
the film. The controversy was started by a Chinese male audience member who saw
the film at a press screening in Japan, made an infuriated comment on the internet
about the scene, and uploaded a picture of the scene. The picture turned out to be a
hoax. However, the unhappy feeling o f Chinese people over Zhang’s geisha role still
remained.
I thank “Chris,” the webmaster of Zhang Ziyi fansite, www.hell0 zi5n.com for
insights and providing helpful leads for the information about this incident. For the
debates over the film, see http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20051107_2.htm;
http://www.danwei.0 1g/trends_and_buzz/zhang_ziyi_and_ken_watanabe_na.php;
http .//film.guardian, co. uk/news/story/0,12589,1653008, OO.html?gusrc=rss.
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30 The three main actresses of the film were Zhang, GONG Li, and Michelle Yeoh,
all of whom were recruited from the Chinese and Hong Kong film industries.
31 For such debates, I refer to the discussion of Memoirs o f a Geisha section at
www.imdb.com, and other numerous internet film discussion forums.
32 See
http://kr.news.yahoo. com/service/news/shellview.htm?linkid=l 5&articleid=2005120
203025944210&newssetid=87;
http://kr.news.yahoo.com/service/news/shellview.htm?linkid=l 5&articleid=2005120
109042795970&newssetid=1242.
33 In feet, before KIM, Korean actor CHAIn-pyo and several other actors turned
down the role of a North Korean soldier in Die Another Day (dir. Lee Tamahori,
2002), one of the James Bond sequels, for a similar patriotic reason. The role later
went to Korean-American actor Rick Yune, who was hardly known to Korean
audience at that time.
34 The biographic information of Kaneshiro’s life and career is based on the
following interviews of Kaneshiro: Kate Drake, “Pan-Asian Sensation,” Time (Asia
edition), 6 October, 2003; Alexandra A. Seno, “Making the Great Leap, ” Newsweek
(Hong Kong edition), 26 December, 2005; Ingrid Sischy, “Takeshi Kaneshiro,”
Interview, June 2005; “Cool Rain,” GQ, February 2006, and numerous other reports
on Kaneshiro appearing in Korean, Chinese, and Japanese media and fen sites,
available on the internet.
35 Drake, Time (Asia).
36 Here, I phoneticized all Asian pronunciations into English instead of using
brackets “[ ]” to simplify the process of presenting these names.
37 Ibid.
38 For the careers ofHayakawa and Ahn, detailed book length studies are done
recently. See Diasuke Miyao, “ East Is East and West Is West"? : A Cross-Cultural
Study ofSessue Hayakawa's Silent Stardom, PhD Dissertation, NYU, 2003; Hye
Seung Chung, The Life and Death o f a H o llyw o o d Asian: Philip Ahn and the Politics
o f Cross-Ethnic Performativity, PhD Dissertation, UCLA, 2004.
For Anna May Wong, there are several English publications including Karen
Janis Leong, The China Mystique : Pearl S. Buck, Anna M ay Wong, M ayling Soong,
and the Transformation o f American Orientalism (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1999); Graham Russell Gao Hodges, Anna M ay Wong: From Laundryman's
Daughter to Hollywood Legend (New York : Palgrave Macmillan, 2004); Anthony B.
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Chan, Perpetually C ool: The M any Lives o f Anna M ay Wong (1905-1961)(Lanham,
M d.: Scarecrow Press, 2003), besides numerous essays.
For Li Xianglan, see Shelley Stephenson, “Her Traces Are Found
Everywhere”: Shanghai, Li Xianglan, and the “Creater East Asia Film Sphere,”
Cinema and Urban Culture in Shanghai, 1922-1943, ed. Yingjin Zhang (Stanford,
California: Stanford University Press, 1999). For Kim Yum, so far there is only a
publication in Korean is available: Pock-rey Cho, The Emperor o f Shanghai Movies
o f the 1930s, Jin-Yan (Seoul: Juryusong, 2004).
39 Iwabuchi, Recentering Globalization, 51.
40 It is generally known that Taiwan was more accepting the Japanese culture than
the mainland China. From my conversation with my Taiwanese colleagues and also
from my random surfing of East Asian pop cultural forum on the internet, I found
out that there was a huge popularity over Japanese TV dramas in Taiwan in the
1990s. From such situation, it is assumed that there was not much difficulty for
young Kaneshiro to begin his show business career in Taiwan. Also from Taiwanese
TV shows of the period that I was able to obtain, I found out that Kaneshiro
frequently sang in Japanese and mentioned his Japanese citizenship without
hesitation on Taiwanese TV.
41 Homi K Bhabha, The Location o f Culture (London and New York: Routledge,
1994), 4.
42 “Four Little Heavenly Kings” refer to the four famous young idols in Taiwan in
the early 1990s, including Kaneshiro, Jimmy Lin, Alec Shu, and Nicky Wu. They
are younger version of the “Four Heavenly Kings” in Hong Kong, referring Andy
Lau, Leon Lai, Aaron Kwok, Jacky Cheung.
43 The last time that he made a film with a Taiwanese filmmaker was in 1996.
44 Eva Tsai, “Kaneshiro Takeshi: Transnational Stardom and the Media and Culture
Industries in Asia’s Global/Postcolonial Age,” M odem Chinese Literature and
Culture, 17/1 (Spring, 2005), 108.
45 Ibid., 120.
46 Here, I excluded the multiple venues of narrow casting such as cable or internet
TVs that provide media products for a smaller rather specified demographics.
47 Here I borrow the title of Kaneshiro’s interview in Time, 2003.
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48 Ibid., 124
49 Roger Rouse, requoted in Iwabuchi, Recentering Globalization, 17.
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CHAPTER IV
CHANGING SCENES: MOVING FROM LOCAL TO GLOBAL
Soon after the Hong Kong Film Syndrome, the Korean film industry entered a
period of its own prosperity, which is often called another “Golden Age” of Korean
cinema. 1 This Golden Age is distinguished by the successful reception of both
Korean commercial and art films simultaneously in international and domestic
markets. In feet, this popularity of Korean cinema arrived with the equally
enthusiastic reception of Korean TV dramas and Korean pop music in Asia. This
overall flourishing of Korean popular culture during the period is called, “Hanryu,”
literally translated as the “Korean Wave,” and sometimes referred to as the “Korean
Fever.”
Especially in terms of Korean cinema, the international success almost
immediately followed the rapid decline of the Hong Kong film industry in its
production since the late 1990s. Therefore, the current elevated status of Korean
cinema is often compared to the previous glory of Hong Kong cinema in the 1980s
to the 1990s, and is sometimes directly referred as “another Hong Kong” or “New
Hong Kong.” 2 Although I agree that creating such connections between Korean and
Hong Kong cinema is quite understandable, and creates a nice lineage in writing the
history of East Asian cinema, I find that merely calling the current Korean cinema as
an alternative to the previous popular Hong Kong cinema does not consider the
changing environment of East Asian popular culture in recent years, and henceforth
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the different situations that Hong Kong cinema in previous years and Korean cinema
today had to or have to deal with. Moreover, simply regarding Korean cinema as
replacing the empty seats of its neighbor’s culture presupposes the departure of
Hong Kong cinema from the cultural scene, which I think is premature and quite
rash. Although Hong Kong cinema has temporarily lost its vibrancy of the earlier
period, it is still frilly present both in the regional and global film markets, and is
devising various ways to regain its vitality. However, I do not completely deny the
various similar aspects that both local cinemas display, especially considering
Korean cinema as strongly influenced by its neighbor’s culture before it reached the
current cultural status.
Therefore, in this chapter, I discuss both the similarities and differences
seen in the trajectories that both local cinemas have taken or are currently taking. To
especially indicate the differences, I closely look at the current East Asian cultural
phenomenon, Hanryu, and observe the changing situations surrounding East Asian
film cultures in this age of Hanryu as opposed to the age of the Hong Kong Film
Syndrome. Particularly focusing on the increasing collaborations among Asian film
industries as die main characteristic of this Hanryu period, I discuss the underlying
meaning of these regional collaborations to the East Asian film industries in general
as well to the Korean film industry in particular. Then I move on to discuss the
similarities that the Korean cinema and the Hong Kong cinema displays at their
current stage, specifically focusing on two films from each film industry respectively.
Through a detailed analysis of a common textual strategy in both films, I want to
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locate the current place of East Asian cinema on a larger cultural map of global
cinemas. Also, by comparing the textual qualities of the Korean and Hong Kong
film, in which traces of both the Hong Kong Film Syndrome and Hanryu are present,
the chapter finally re-illuminates the significance of local collaborations in the
globalization process of a local culture.
Hanryu and Pan-Asian Collaborations in Filmmaking
Hanryu refers to the heightened popularity of Korean popular culture in the regions
of East and South East Asia since the late 1990s. According to a government report
by the Korean Ministry of Culture and Tourism, Hanryu started in the mainland
China with the popularity over Korean pop music among Chinese youths in the late
1990s.3 The fandom rapidly spread to other areas of Korean pop culture such as
films and TV dramas, and soon the similar Hanryu phenomenon was increasingly
witnessed in other countries. Although Hanryu is happening over all areas of Korean
popular culture, it is quite a localized phenomenon in which each country responds
differently to different areas of Korean pop culture. For example, unlike China
where the Hanryu initially formed around the music industry, in Hong Kong the
popularity over Korean films surpasses that of other areas. Although Korean pop
songs are still famous, they are usually introduced though Hong Kong pop artists as
remade versions instead of in the original form. Fans in Taiwan and Japan are more
enthusiastic about Korean TV dramas, which eventually led to the “Yonsama”
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phenomenon in Japan, indicating the enormous fandom created for the Korean actor
Pae Yong-jun among Japanese audiences in the early 2000s. Hanryu is not only an
East Asian phenomenon; it is widely expanded to Southeast Asia where countries
like Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam are also under the strong influence of this
specific local culture 4
The factors that led to Hanryu are usually explained both in terms of
textual and contextual elements of Korean cultural production. As for the textual
factors, quite obviously the improvement of the quality of Korean pop culture is
indicated. More interesting than this, however, is the contextual elements, which
might vary depending on the different social and cultural situations of Asian
countries that are responding to Hanryu. For example, the initial rise of Hanryu in
China is explained as partly due to the changed demographic of the Chinese
population. As a result of the government enforced population control for years, the
Chinese youth in recent years are usually raised as a single child surrounded by
relative material abundance. The increased consumer desire among Chinese youth,
the shared cultural sensibilities coming from the Confucian tradition, and the similar
look of Chinese and Korean people, which generates familiarity for Chinese
audiences toward Korean entertainers, are considered the primary reasons behind the
initial phenomenon.5 Added to that may be the wide dissemination of the internet
during the last couple of decades in East Asia, through which access to cultures of
other countries have become much easier than ever
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As for the popularity of Korean TV dramas in Japan, it is often
explained in relation to Japan’s nostalgia projected on the image of other Asian
countries, in a sense that “A good version of old Japan is to be found in the
landscape of an ever-developing Asia.”6 Such speculation is supported by the feet
that most fens of Pae Yong-jun, “Yonsama,” are middle aged Japanese women over
thirty years old, who are more likely to have such a longing for the past than the
younger generation.
Especially in terms of Hanryu over Korean cinema, the primary factors
are regarded to be “the improved quality of Korean films themselves, diverse genres
and stories, themes and contents that are familiar to Asians, attractive actors,
superior quality vis-a-vis the competitive price, and cultural sensibilities that are
both modem and uniquely Asian at the same time, etc.”7 Over all, one of the
significant aspects of Hanryu is that it is derived from the current intermediate state
of Korean popular culture, which is situated between the far Westernized Japan or
the West itself, and the rest of Asian cultures. This is exactly why Korean people
welcomed Hong Kong films during the previous era, because they stood between the
far ends of what Hollywood films and Korean films could offer to Korean people,
respectively.
From both die Hong Kong Film Syndrome and Hanryu, therefore, we
can see that huge fendom over a single local popular culture is created when the
culture of interest is located within a reasonable distance from the consumers, not
too close, yet not too far, either. In other words, such popular cultural trends rely on
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their intermediate status between the consumers and what they are yearning for.
Therefore, each national culture’s ambition to move beyond its current condition via
the cultural bridging of others is implicated in these types of popular cultural trends.
During the period of Hanryu, such a wish to transcend the cultural status quo is
materialized in the form of an increasing rate of transnational collaborations in
filmmaking. I will examine such collaborations especially from the perspective of
the Korea film industry.
Although there were numerous cases of co-productions between the
Korean and Hong Kong film industries in the 1970s, some with deceitful purposes
as mentioned before, such collaborative activities were hardly seen again until the
late 1990s. Only after the influence of Hong Kong cinema rekindled the desire for
cooperation with other film industries to expand and diversify the creative range of
Korean films, were we able to witness active attempts at transnational collaborations
in the Korean film industry again, hi fact, the period since the early 2000s can be
called the year of transnational collaboration and co-productions among East Asian
film industries in general as well as in the Korean film industry. Transnational
collaborations were done in various forms: the exchange of technical crews or
directors, co-financing, or die exchange of actors, etc. Although there were
numerous levels and forms of cooperation among East Asian film industries before,
the recent phenomena of co-productions demand specific observation because of
their frequency, the huge production values, and the inclusion of China and Korea as
active members.
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As the day of Hong Kong’s return to China approached, there were
already vivid discussions and concerns regarding where the filmmakers from the
Hong Kong film industry, the most vibrant film industry of East Asia, would move.
By then, some of the major figures from the industry such as John Woo and Chow
Yun-fat had already began to build their careers in Hollywood. And more and
more cultural figures were mentioned in terms of their possible career migrations,
not just to Hollywood but within East Asia as well. To prevent further drainage of
human resources from Hong Kong, the Chinese government promised to let Hong
Kong keep its current political and economic status for next fifty years by
designating the city the Special Administrative Region of PRC. Nevertheless, the
imagination and ideas about the transnational collaborations of film productions,
initially formed over the actual and potential migration of Hong Kong’s filmmakers,
further spread throughout East Asia. It was not long before practical measures were
considered to accommodate the vividly changing cultural flows in the region. Added
to the situation is the lift of the ban on Japanese popular culture in Korea in 1998,
which further opened possibilities of more active cultural traffic among East Asian
film industries. Then came Hanryu, which proved and further facilitated the newly
active state of transnational cultural trades in East Asia8 So arrived, nominally, the
age of Pan-Asianism in the arena of popular culture in East Asia.
As for the Korean film industry, the period of Hong Kong Film
Syndrome first re-opened opportunities for Korean filmmakers, including
performers, to join forces with other East Asian popular cultures, particularly that of
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Hong Kong. Then, the welcoming reception of Korean films, seen in Hanryu in the
following years, gave Korean filmmakers the confidence to actively devise
collaborative projects with other East Asian film industries, as well as provided
them with the popularity needed to be actively sought by others. The changing
circumstances in film production, increasingly moving from national to transnational
projects, not only changed the economic relations in the involved film industries but
it also transformed some of the textual qualities of the resultant products. The
changing aspects of film texts are made more visible when the transnational
collaboration involves popular culture stars well known among East Asian countries.
The reason for this is that appearances of foreign actors on screen make the
transnational collaborations the most discemable for audiences, and therefore
accordingly result in the largest adjustments to the texts of the films. Here I will look
at some of these changed aspects of the films that the Korean film industry produced
by hiring high-profile actors from other countries.
Those films that I want to particularly discuss in this regard are Musa
(2000), 2009 Lost Memories (2001), and Saulabi (2002). The reason these films are
interesting among other collaborative films from a similar period is that they display
distinct changes not only in the audio visual elements of the films but also on the
level of their narratives. In terms of the visual components, the most remarkable
change is the inclusion of subtitles as one of the essential elements in each of the co
produced films. Since there is no universal language functioning as a lingua franca
in East Asia, the cooperation of actors from different countries quite obviously
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creates a multilingual environment on screen. In Musa, which deals with the
fictional battle between Chinese and Korean warriors in a Chinese territory during
the 14th century, the actors involved were not only famous stars of from Korea such
as AN Song-gi or CHONG, U-song, but were also the internationally known
Chinese star Zhang Ziyi and other actors from the Chinese film industry. Eventually
you can hear at least two different distinct languages, Korean and Chinese, spoken
by them. In 2009 Lost Memories, which deals with a fictional account of the
expanded Japanese colonization of East Asia in the twenty-first century, you can
also experience multilingualism caused by the participation of Japanese star Tom
Nakamura and other Japanese actors in the film. The same situation also occurs in
Saulabi, which deals with the confrontation between Korean and Japanese warriors
in the 11th century, where well-known Japanese actor Takaaki Enoki and others
appear.
Because of their polyglot nature, these films are “always and already”
subtitled films regardless of the countries where they are released.9 The complicated
process of listening to the multiple languages used in the films and of engaging both
visual and audio functions to understand the narrative becomes a certain type of
communal experience that binds the audiences of the involved countries together
with their shared regional and cultural identity. In other words, it provides an
entirely different cinematic experience to an East Asian audience who understands
the aforementioned multilingual films with partial subtitles, and to those who are
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outside of East Asia and therefore have to view the films entirely with subtitles and
do not readily distinguish the different languages involved in the film.
Another significant change in the films produced by transnational
collaborations occurs on the level of the narrative. Because of the long intermingled
history of China, Japan, and Korea, the general national sensibility of one country
toward another is often mixed with both enmity and sympathy. This kind of national
feeling has historically affected the narrative of East Asian films, especially those
dealing with historical events whether in a fictionalized or non-fiction form.
Especially in Korean films, where collaborative filmmaking efforts with other
countries have not been active, enmity toward the others often has been directly
expressed depending upon the historical moments portrayed in the films. Therefore,
in these films, the binary distinction between “us” and “them,” “good” and “evil,” is
represented in a rather clear and simplified way. A typical example would be the
depiction of Japan as the brutal colonizer in many historical films dealing with the
colonial situation in Korea, or of China as the ally of the North Korea, therefore as a
national enemy in the films that deal with the Korean War.
With the proliferation of transnational production, however, this binary
judgment of others in film texts has been drastically reduced in Korean films. Even
when the others are situated as national enemies to the Korean protagonists,
sympathy is always reserved for the opponents along with a strong resonance of
humanism. In general in these films, we no longer find any absolute protagonists,
nor absolute villains. In the historical costume dramas Musa and Saulabi, all of the
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nationally divided warriors confronting each other, in the first case the Chinese and
Korean, and the latter case the Japanese and Korean, eventually die, leaving no
winners. What lingers in both films is the strong sense of skepticism and a critique
of the national confrontations that caused countless tragedies and left numerous
victims throughout the history of East Asia. In 2009 Lost Memories, through
revisiting the fictional, expanded colonial history between Korea and Japan,
audiences are provided with the opportunity to view history from the others’
perspective rather than from the nationalistic and sometimes jingoistic one more
familiar to them. Over all, most of these transnationally cooperated films that deal
with historical subjects tend to introduce a certain revisionist view toward the
official history of countries involved.
This kind of narrative structure is a natural result considering the
various factors involved in transnational productions. First, they are intended to
show a proper respect to the foreign actors whose participation, in many cases,
expands the films’ target markets. During die 1970s, another period when die
Korean-Hong Kong film co-productions were actively taking place, exchanges of
actors in such productions occurred on the level of unknown extras, mostiy due to
the inaccessibility of famous Hong Kong stars to the Korean film industry and to
utilize the Hong Kong film industry’s martial arts skills at minimized costs.
However, as is seen in the above examples, the hiring of foreign actors in recent
Korean films is usually done to maximize the film’s marketability. Eventually the
stars involved in these collaborative works are almost all high-profile stars, and
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subsequently there is more adjustment on the level of narrative as well as in the
production environment to suit to the foreign stars’ presence in such films. From the
same logic of marketability, this type of neutral narrative also takes into
consideration its effect on the audiences of other East Asian countries to whom it
will be shown. With the keen national sensitivities that have been built throughout
history in East Asia at hand, the audiences would not want to go to see a film that
would depict their nation in an offensive way. Moreover, the actors or filmmakers
who by any chance work in a film that hurts the national feelings of their own
people would be easily criticized as traitors to their own country, just as occurred in
the Chinese audience’s vehement criticism against Zhang Ziyi’s role in M em oir’ s o f
a Geisha. Therefore, increasing numbers of films made from collaborative efforts of
different national film industries in recent years tend to engage in neutralizing
national sensitivity or even in rewriting the history. Shohat and Stam indicate that
this kind of dependence on collective feelings is the significant feature of
filmmaking in the countries that have meager domestic markets:
In an increasingly transnational world, characterized by
nomadic images, sounds, goods, and peoples, media
spectatorship impacts complexly on national identity,
communal belonging, and political affiliation. To a certain
extent, a negotiation with diverse national desires is built into
cinema, in that most film industries, especially those without
strong domestic markets, have to take into account the
possible reactions of other nationalities.1 0
This may be true in most cases, and especially to die practices of Korean-Hong
Kong collaborations in the 1970s when one of the primary results of such efforts
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199
was cost-effectiveness. Most of such films were produced primarily for domestic
consumption. Today, a similar endeavor in East Asia, however, might add a slightly
different angle to such an interpretation. The difference comes from the feet that the
recent transnational collaborations are mostly done among film industries that have
already had a certain proven stability within their own domestic markets. This is
shown by the feet that Korea started to actively join in collective projects once it’s
domestic film industry achieved a certain strength both inside and outside of Korea,
and was especially endorsed by the Hanryu phenomenon. Although they have
experienced the occasional mutability of the industrial condition, the Japanese film
industry and the Hong Kong film industry already have had their own prosperous
periods, and, again, have proved themselves in both domestic and foreign markets.
By gradually combining Hong Kong with its own national film industry, the Chinese
film industry created a greater resource basis, and greater and growing influence
over domestic audiences as well as international audiences. In other words, the
recent transnational collaboration among East Asian countries were founded on the
desire to move beyond the scope of the markets that each film industry currently
covers rather than simply supplement the unreliable domestic markets. Particularly
now, the collaborations are done so that the East Asian film industries can
counterbalance the giant force of Hollywood and also further enter into a larger
global market beyond their regional borders. A clear example would be fee fact feat
fee Korean film industry re-started collaborated efforts wife fee Hong Kong film
industry during fee “syndrome era,” to act against the pressure from Hollywood.
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Therefore, behind the recent Pan-Asian collaborations of East Asian film industries
lies each national film industry’s shared ambition to decentralize Hollwyood’s
monopolistic influence not only in their domestic markets but also in larger global
film markets over the long view. Ulf Hannerz says that globalization is “a matter of
increasing long-distance interconnectedness, at least across national boundaries,
preferably between continents as well.”1 1 Maybe the recent collective efforts in film
productions in East Asia need to be observed in terms of each participating country’s
effort to reach audiences at a longer distance than they currently do.1 2
Several questions still remain with this phenomenon of East Asian
collaboration. The first question is whether these type of films can survive, while
generating serious political and historical discourses, if they have to constantly
reserve and neutralize the national feelings of each East Asian country. The second
is whether the pan-East Asianism shown in co-production films can maintain its
balance and successfully work as a collective local reaction to the homogenizing
Hollywood power, or whether this too will in result in another homogenization of
the East Asian popular culture. These questions will eventually be answered as we
observe the future of East Asian collaborations in filmmaking. However, already
some of typical symptoms of blending different Asian cultures, or masking them as
one Asian face if not homogenizing them, started to show in recent films produced
in Asia. The next part of discussion will look at such situations exemplified in two
films from Korea and Hong Kong.
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Oldboy, and the Mixed Aesthetics of East Asia
Here, I want to discuss the specific textual strategy commonly seen in die Korean
film Oldboy (2003) and a Hong Kong film So Close (2002). Winning the Grand Jury
Prize in the Cannes International Film Festival in 2004, Old Boy has been regarded
as produced for circulation in the international art film circuit as well as in
commercial markets from the beginning. On the other hand, So Close was created as
commercial cinema, following the genre convention of Hong Kong’s female action
movies in the previous era. Although seemingly created to endorse different tastes,
one of the common aspects that these two films share is that both of them are
targeting audiences beyond national and even beyond East Asian regional borders.
Looking at markets at a “longer-distance,” both films display an interesting common
textual strategy, by which the full meaning of the text shifts kaleidoscopically for
audiences of different cultural backgrounds. This textual strategy of both films helps
us locate the current place of East Asian cinema on the larger cultural map of global
cinemas. Also, the textual qualities of the Korean and Hong Kong film, both of
which show traces of the Hong Kong Film Syndrome in Korea and Hanryu in Hong
Kong, re-illuminates the significance of local collaborations when a local cinema
enters a larger global market.
The news that the Korean director PARK Chan Wook’s Oldboy won the
Grand Prix at the Cannes International Film Festival in the early 2004 initially
caught my attention not only because of the internationally proven artistic quality of
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the film but because of the clear way that this film breaks from the long lasting
tendency of filmmaking commonly shown by many festival favorite Korean
filmmakers or other Asian filmmakers.
The success of Korean cinema since the 1990s in the international film
circuit follows the achievement of its Asian predecessors such as the Chinese,
Taiwanese, and Hong Kong cinemas that started in the mid 1980s. Chinese Fifth
generation directors such as Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige, Taiwanese New Wave
directors Hou Hsiao Hsien or Tsai Ming Liang, or the later generation Hong Kong
New Wave directors such as Wong Kar-wai or Stanley Kwan became the most
honorable members of the international art film society for more than a decade to
date. While these names represent the success of Asian cinemas in the international
art film circuit, names such as John Woo, Ching Su-tung, or Yuen Woo-ping tell
about the international success of Asian commercial films heralded by Hong Kong
films around the same time. During this period, we can also witness the huge
international cult following of die gory and grotesque Japanese fantasy films
represented by the director Takashi Miike, or similar infatuations for the Japanese
manga and anime. It cannot be just a mere coincidence that Miyazaki Hayao won
the best director’s award at Cannes with his anime, Spirited Away (2001) in this
period. Such a popularity of Asian films eventually led Hollywood to produce their
own versions of Asian films such as The Last Samurai (dir. Edward Zwick, 2003),
the K ill Bill series (dir. Quentin Tarantino, 2003,2004)” and Memoirs o f a Geisha.
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Since the mid 1980s, the audience for Asian cinemas increased in the
international markets, and Korean cinema joined this “Yellow Fever” in the
international film circuit rather belatedly in the mid 1990s, but with satisfactory
results. The winning of awards at numerous prestigious international film festivals
by Im Kwon-taek, Yi Chang-dong attests to the improvement in Korean cinema in
recent years. Kim Ki-dok, despite the heated debate over his constant misogynistic
portrayal of Korean women, also joined the laurel by winning Best Director Awards
at the festivals at Berlin and Venice. Park Chan-wook’ s achievement is only one of
many recent examples of the success of both Asian and Korean cinema in the
international film circuit over the past few years.
However, what makes Oldboy distinct from most other Asian films,
including Korean films that gained recognition in international film festivals, is the
unique textual quality that almost refuses to be instantly identified as a Korean film,
rather than to be instantly identified as one. By doing so, Park’s film apparently
breaks from the commonly visible tendency of internationally successful Asian films
in the past two decades or so. One of the major patterns in which Asian films open a
path to international markets is by self-ethnocizing their own unique cultures, and
therefore, distinguishing themselves from the films of other countries. This tendency
is mostly prevalent in Asian art films submitted to international film festivals. The
films of Zhang Yimou or Chen Kaige, and of Im Kwon-Taek can be included in
these groups of films. In these directors’ films, there are two obvious ways to
ethnocize their own culture. One is by using the country’ s unique traditional cultural
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tradition as the main subjects of the films, such as in Im Kwon-taek’s Seopyonje
[Sopyonje] (1993), Strokes o f Fire, or Chen Kaige’s Farewell my Concubine (1993).
The other way is to ethnocize the specific social situation of the countries, often
utilizing the unequal gender relations of the countries as a backdrop to parade the
exotic bodies of Asian women on the global screen spaces. Zhang Yimou is well
known for gaining his artistic status by using such tactics with his earlier films
featuring Gong li, and now the younger Zhang Ziyi. Korean director Kim Ki-dok is
another such director who has capitalized on the distorted gender relations in his
film. The images of suffering beautiful Asian women seem to have almost
guaranteed the international feme of the directors. The onscreen brutalization of
Asian women is tolerated as a “realistic” artistic portrayal of a specific place at
specific times, the reality which hardly belongs to western countries or western high
culture anymore. Therefore, films of this sort eventually assure the western audience
of their own social advancement above the “resf’ of the world. Rey Chow reads a
certain cultural resistance of such self-ethnocizing films that she calls
“authethnography” in her analysis of the Chinese Fifth generation films.1 3 However,
whether such films are actually using a resistance tactic by directly looking back at
the orientalizaing gaze of the west by the gazed objects, or merely selling out their
culture and social situation to cater to such orientalistic taste is never clear, and
therefore their intentions are always under suspicion.
As for successful Asian commercial cinemas, it highly relies on unique
genre conventions. Japanese Samurai films, Hong Kong wuxia pian or traditional
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martial art films, or contemporary gangster films, etc. are some of the most widely
distributed Asian genre films in the world, and create a certain fixed image about
each national film industry among the global audience. These films are considered
to be best made in the specific Asian national film industries with their long history
and skillful craftsmanship in each genre. The aforementioned Japanese gory and
grotesque fantasy films and anime also join in this group.
Interestingly, Oldboy, although produced in this period in which a
certain tendency of Asian filmmaking and Asian film spectatorship are established in
the international film culture, clearly departs from any of above patterns, not by
being entirely new, but rather by being entirely familiar. Oldboy mixes up everything,
rather than distinguishes itself from the others. Or rather, it distinguishes itself from
the others by mixing up everything. Loosely based on Japanese manga, Oldboy does
not seem to use national or cultural specificity as its main assets as do films from
other cultures in the international film festival. Rather it mixes numerous qualities of
other Asian films, and therefore, visibly blurs its cultural origin. Interestingly, this
film was released in die same year as Quentin Tarantino’s homage to Asian action
genres, K ill B ill Vol. 2, was globally released. That means that half of the globe had
already welcomed the interesting idea that “popular Asian cinemas” can be
summarized into the two hour screening time of K ill Bill Vol I, released a year earlier.
Moreover, Quentin Tarantino was the Chair of the Juries of the Cannes film festival
who gave the award to Oldboy, the formal quality of which is interestingly similar to
his own commercial success pieces. I want to situate the success of Oldboy in this
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very specific cultural moment when Asian films are both increasing their global
audience while at the same time confronting die fete of losing their international
markets to the Hollywood-made films with Asian looks.
The story of Oldboy revolves around a middle-aged ordinary Korean
man, Oh Dae-su, who was kidnapped and imprisoned for fifteen years. During this
period, he was never informed of who imprisoned him and why. His only contact
with the outside world was through TV, from which he learned about the brutal
murder of his wife by a man who deliberately directed the public attention to Oh
himself as the murderer. After he was released, again for reasons unknown to him,
his sole goal in life was to revenge the person who completely destroyed his life.
When he finally stood face to fece with the man Yi U-jin, who also had been taking
vengeance on Oh for a pain Oh had caused him and his family, which Oh himself
was not even aware, they both find that what remained within each of them was not
the will to destroy the other, but rather the will to destroy themselves. It is almost as
if each man’s vengeance toward the other had been ihe strongest driving force of
their life. In the process, Oh discovered that the woman who accompanied him since
his release was in feet his own daughter, and that the incestuous relationship he had
with her had been deliberately set up by Yi. When the moment that their vengeance
for each other was finally sought, they lose their direction in life, and cannot cany
on their lives as themselves. Yi kills himself, and Oh cuts off his tongue and erases
his memory completely.
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This emotionally taxing revenge story is, however, full of instantly
recognizable references to other Asian films and cultures, and therefore does not
look like a unique Korean film so much as an Asian film with everything known
about the regional film industry in it One of the most familiar scenes to
contemporary Asian audiences, or global audiences who are familiar with recent
Asian cinemas, might be the one in which the suicidal man Oh met right after his
release jumped to death from an apartment For many Asian audiences, this scene
almost instantly reminds them of one famous scene from the Hong Kong film,
Infernal Affair (dir. Andrew Lau and Alan Mak, 2003), the huge box office success
all over Asia since its release in 2002. In this film, after Tony Leung’s character, a
police mole implanted in the Hong Kong Triad, secretly contacted his police boss,
the same police boss was killed by the Triad and his body was thrown from a lofty
building almost right in front of Tony Leung’s eyes. Because of the popularity of this
Hong Kong film and the strong impression this specific scene left on its audience,
whoever sees the suicide scene in Oldboy is hard to miss its similarity to the famous
scene in the Hong Kong film.
Some other scenes of Oldboy also remind audiences of familiar film
genres from other Asian countries. One of the scenes is of Oh visiting a series of
Chinese restaurants to find the place from where the dumplings he ate during his
imprisonment were ordered. Here, the whole sequence consists of close-up shots of
Chinese characters of the restaurant signs and the shots of the dumplings. To
knowing Korean fans, this sequence looks almost like a parody of a series of
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Chinese gourmet films, the popularity of which was at its peak during the early to
mid 1990s with such films as Eat, Drink, Man, Woman, or The Chinese Feast etc.
There were numerous spin-offs of the sort, and Korean audiences as well as other
Asian audiences were certainly quite familiar with such images of splendid Chinese
dishes set on a red table cloth. If you consider that the place where Oh meets his
lover/daughter Mido for the first time and eats the live octopus is Japanese sushi
restaurant, you can find that the only ethnic Asian restaurant that we do not see in
this film is none olher than a Korean restaurant. However, eating live octopus is a
unique food culture enjoyed by some Korean people, and is detested by quite a lot of
Western audiences.
The scenes where Oh tortured the owner of the prison where he was
trapped by pulling out his teeth, or where he cut off his own tongue toward the end
of the film remind you of the Japanese gory fantasy films such as Takashi Miike’s
Audition (1999) or Ichi the Killer (2001), etc. And the moment when Oh single-
handedly fights off a group of gangsters presents you with a familiar iconography
found in almost all modem action genre Asian films, not to mention those from
Hong Kong. The fact that these people fight with hammers and wooden clubs rather
than guns makes them uniquely Korea because individuals are not allowed to
possess guns in Korean society. It is rare that we can find any visual quality that
directly associates this film to specific Korean culture or society. At least visually,
this film looks like a typical pastiche of various popular genre films in Asia.
Therefore, this film can be called a truly transnational film text that not only
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collected its sources across borders, but also can be recognized as familiar to other
Asian audiences as well.
Then how can films like Oldboy be differentiated from films like the
Kill Bill series that also mixes different Asian martial art genres and the real martial
art master and sole survivor of countless battles is none other than a blonde Western
woman? Does the globally successful reception of these two films signal the advent
of a period where the global circulation of cultures ultimately blur all of the cultural
and national boundaries, and where the only remaining culture is the mixture of
everything familiar? Does this mean that to claim one’s own unique national film
culture is no longer meaningful in this fast shifting “mediascape”1 4 where rapid
cultural exchange becomes such an effortless procedure created even in your own
home? Or is the look of cultural blending only masking things that are more possibly
nationally or culturally specific? At least in Oldboy, I am quite certain that there are
considerable “Korean components” hidden in this melange of various Asian film
images.
The uniquely Korean motifs in this film are not found in the obvious
formal qualities of the film so much as in its theme. The initial set up of
imprisonment of Oh for unknown reason in this film is said to be borrowed from a
Japanese manga. However, for Korean people who lived the fifteen years from 1988
to 2003 when Oh was trapped inside the small room, the situation instantly brings
back their memory of a very similar situation in Korea’s recent history: the killing of
a Korean college student and a political activist PARK Chong-chol by police torture
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during Chun Doo-hwan’s military government in 1987. His death eventually ignited
one of the biggest political demonstrations in Korean society since the beginning of
Chun’s regime. After his death, it was revealed that an unassuming black building in
the crowded center of Seoul, the capital city of Korea, was the base camp where
most political activists were trapped and tortured during this period. It was such a
shock to the citizens of the country that a torture camp existed in the middle of busy
city streets while virtually no one around it could even imagine such brutality was
happening right next to them. Park’s case was just one among countless instances of
imprisionment, torture, and brutalization inflicted upon Korean citizens by the
military government. Another iconic name that symbolizes the brutality of the
government is the infamous Samchong Re-educational program in Korea in the
1980s. It was initially created by the military government as a reformation program
for violent criminals or people who disturbed the social order. However, history
reveals that the so-called “re-education” of the program actually consisted of severe
physical and mental punishment in inhumane conditions. More shockingly, later
history revealed that not a few innocent citizens who did not even commit any legal
crimes were random victims of the atrocities inside the Samchong program. A lot of
victims later confessed that they did not even know why they were brought to the
place and had to be punished. This is the exact question that Oh kept asking himself
in the beginning of the film Oldboy: what have I done?
Therefore, despite the blend of numerous familiar images from other
Asian films, fee theme of Oldboy has a strong connection to the social reality of
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Korea in the 1980s, and this makes the film a successful socio-political allegory of
the recent history of Korea. What I focus on, however, is not whether this seemingly
transnational film contains any unique Korean components. I instead pay more
attention to the feet that the strongly Korean subject matter of the film is tactfully
hidden in non-Korean imagery. I would argue that this specific strategy of wrapping
up the uniquely Korean aspect of the film within images from other famous Asian
films makes this film a significantly symptomatic text of a transnational Asian
cinema at the moment. The moment can be defined to be a transitional period when
Asian art films need to renew themselves after their initial success in the
international markets by emphasizing certain “local qualities” for a while. It is also a
period when Asian filmmakers are actively expressing an ambition to reach global as
well as regional audiences. This is also a time when Asian films made by Asian
filmmakers need to emulate similar films with Asian qualities made by non-Asian
filmmakers. In this complexly interwoven situation, this period truly challenges
Asian filmmakers to think about the cultural identity of themselves and their films,
and how they can be easily erased or blurred in the high-speed global circulation of
cultural products.
By embedding the very Korean subject matter in the middle of
numerous borrowed visual qualities from other Asian films, Oldboy interacts with
the domestic Korean audience, Asian audiences, and also non-Asian audiences at the
same time, but on different levels. Apparently catering to all levels of audiences
across the globe, the film simultaneously differentiates them according to their
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capability of translating the social and cultural codes enigmatically implicated in the
text. This is an interesting game that the film plays with all levels of audience. But
more important is the feet that the game itself is a clear sign of the tension,
resistance, and the negotiation process that Korean cinema is experiencing at the
moment. Carrying the burden to be global as well as local and national, to be unique
and universal, both serious and fun, Korean films, as well as other Asian films these
days, cannot afford to assume a single characteristic but need to be everything in
order to survive in the harsh competition of the global markets. Oldboy is a text on
which such burden of current Asian film is inscribed.
So Close, and die Issues of Transcultural Remakes and Multicultural Reception
In fact, the reason why I say that such strategy of creating palimpsestic texts shows
the burden of current Asian cinema - not just of Korean cinema - is because a similar
strategy can be found in a film from Hong Kong, although in a slightly different
fashion. Here I want to discuss the strategy of layering different levels of cultural
codes on the text of a Hong Kong film, So Close, as a good comparison to that of
Oldboy.
Imagine Charlie's Angels in Cantonese—with the Angels fighting each
other!
Cory Yuen’s latest opus, a ‘ Charlie’ s Angel’ sort of film.
Hong Kong’s answer to ‘Charlie’ s Angels’...
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The above is an example of e-commentaries by US film critics in regard to Hong
Kong director Cory Yuen’ s recent action film, So Close}5 First released in East
Asia in 2002, the film was shown in select US theaters in late 2003. Appearing on
the first page of a “Yahoo” search for this film title, these reviews clearly make a
close association between So Close, an apparent Hong Kong production, and
Charlie’ s Angels (dir. McQ 2000), an American production globally released in
2000.1 6 Similar connections (or rather prejudices) were also apparent when I saw
this film with US undergraduate students in a cinema class at the University of
Southern California. After the screening I had the chance to discuss this film with
approximately thirty students. They expressed discontent with the film, and were
suspicious of the film’s cinematic plagiarism. Most agreed that this film only
exemplified, in an affirming way, the ceaseless and desperate ambition of local
cinema to emulate the global Hollywood.
Hearing their response, I wondered why no one seemed to consider the
possibility that So Close could be a legitimate “remake” of Charlie’ s Angels, not just
a shameful knock-off The were a number of reasons for my curiosity. First, the
Charlie's Angels film itself is a remake of the 1970s American TV series of the same
title. If it has been widely and openly promoted as a “legitimate” remake of the
earlier TV series, why is So Close constantly disparaged as a Charlie’ s Angels “sort
of” film? The situation appears more unfair when you consider that the film was not
produced solely by insiders of the Hong Kong film industry, but, in feet, was co
produced by Columbia Pictures Film Production Asia, whose sister company,
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Columbia Tristar in the US, in turn produced and distributed the Charlie’ s Angels
film in 2000. If this is the case, why is their a difference in the labeling of the two
films? What are the standards of the evaluation, and what factors inform these
opinions?
The story of So Close revolves around two sisters, Lynn (Shu Qi) and
Sue (Zhao Wei), who are assassins-for-hire; for their work, they use highly
developed technologies such as Global Positioning System (GPS). A female cop,
Kong Yat-Hung (Karen Mok), initially pursues the two sisters for their crimes.
When Lynn is brutally murdered, Yat-Hung finds herself fiamed for the murder
instead. She then joins forces with Sue to combat the evil characters who are
responsible for Lynn’ s death. Featuring three glamorous female combatants fighting
for social and/or personal justice, the film, without doubt, resembles the narrative
structure of Charlie’ s Angels, except for the fact that the three female fighters in the
American production are private detectives rather than assassins. The similarity
extends to the choreography of the fighting scenes, in which young women with 4.5
inch high-heels execute deadly actions through wired stunts. But that is not all. The
original Chinese title of So Close is literally translated as “Sunset Angels,”1 7 and in
her mission in the opening scene, Lynn introduces herself as “Computer Angel.” The
Hong Kong version of the poster even features the three female leads in white suits,
reinforcing their “angelic” image. The visual and literal emphasis on “angel” in the
poster, title, and the character name of So Close inevitably create an explicit
association between this film and Charlie I s Angels, featuring three main characters
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called by the same name. Thus, it seems clear that So Close overtly borrows some of
its creative aspects from the American film.
However, if Charlie’ s Angels is considered a “legitimate” remake of the
earlier TV series, the practice of cultural borrowing itself does not automatically
mean that this film should be considered a rip-off. Therefore, it seems that some rash
prejudices against the cultural hierarchy of different regions is operating in the
assessment of the two similar films. As for this ironic double standard regarding
“authenticity,” Esther Yau provides useful insight:
... when Europe’s artists reference the non-West, this gesture
adds value to their work and their originality; but when non-
Westem artists reference Europe and the United States, their
work is deemed derivative and inauthentic.1 8
This certainly appears true, especially when we assume the relationship between
global and local cultures is a top-down hierarchical one. Even so, the filmmakers of
So Close and the practice of the Hong Kong film industry itself may not completely
be free from some responsibility. In fact, the Hong Kong film industry has been
notorious for its wide spread plagiarism. As Patricia Aufderheide notes,
Some of the most popular Hong Kong films have been
remakes, takeoffs or simply steals of popular American
movies.... In addition, the Hong Kong film industry is
notorious for seizing upon a working formula (for instance,
John Woo’s high-violence gangster drama > 4 Better Tomorrow
[1986]) and then working it to death. (A Better Tomorrow
generated two sequels and many imitators.) Its own movie
traditions instantly become grist for remakes, parodies, and
transformations.” 9
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Successful foreign and domestic films have each been treated this way. Considering
this notorious aspect of the Hong Kong film industry, So Close could be just thought
of as yet another example of such a shameless practice. As the various allusions
discussed earlier almost point directly to Charlie's Angels, the makers of So Close
did not even seem to mind the potential suspicion about their film’s originality. In
this sense, So Close is a rip-off
Or is it? In the case of So Close, the accusation of plagiarism is not
settled all that easily. There are more factors that complicate the issue. As mentioned
above, this film was co-produced with Columbia Pictures Film Production Asia. The
company is one of the local operations for the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture
Group, which is under the auspices of Sony Pictures Entertainment in the US.
Several branch companies of Sony Pictures Entertainment have held and/or
currently hold distribution rights for the original Charlie’ s Angels TV series as well
as the recent film version of it. Seen in this light, the global enterprise of Sony
Pictures Entertainment and its relation to the TV and film versions of Charlie I s
Angels reveal that So Close is not simply a case of a local film industry’s regrettable
efforts to copy a globally successful film. From the inception, the owners of the
“original” acknowledged that So Close would look just like Charlie’ s Angels, and
they did not mind that Nevertheless, it remains the case that So Close has never
been given the publicity which would confer upon it the legitimate status of a
remake of the Charlie’s Angles corpus.
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Another aspect that makes such hasty judgments of the film look
reckless is the film’ s close connection to the tradition of popular Chinese language
film genres. Frankly, having not seen the American Charlie's Angels beforehand, I
was reminded of Hong Kong’s Heroic Trio I and II (1993)2 0 when I saw So Close
for the first time. Featuring three major Hong Kong female stars, Maggie Cheung,
Anita Mui, and Michelle Yeoh, as modem day warriors with super power, the two
films have a cult following, both in the East and the West. The occasional extreme
sentimentality indulged in the story line and the soundtrack of So Close21 link it
more closely to the Heroic Trio series than to Charlie's Angels, since the latter
maintains a comic tone throughout. The absence of an all-overseeing boss or Charlie
figure in the Heroic Trio I and II also connects them more closely to So Close in
terms of structural similarity. Anne T. Ciecko and Sheldon H.Lu also add: “The
Heroic Trio and The Executioners ... beg somewhat allegorical readings of the three
women warriors as representations of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China—an
r Jr )
enactment of identity and genre hybridity via a table of reunification.” In this
respect, the feet that the three female leads, Shu Qi (Taiwan), Zhao Wei (China), and
Karen Mok (Hong Kong), are recruited from the so-called “three Chinese film
industries” also can add such political implications to the character structure of So
Close, and make this film culturally closer to the Heroic Trio than to Charlie’ s
Angels. In addition, both of these films inherit the long tradition of female action
genre in the Chinese film history. As Minh-Ha T. Pham says:
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There is, in fact, a long tradition of niixia (female knight-
errant) films dating back as early as the 1900s, which have
their cultural basis in Chinese legends, such as the story of Fa
Mu Lan.23
Cory Yuen himself is well-known for making several female action
films in Hong Kong including such famous titles as Yes, Madam (1985), the debut
film of Michelle Yeoh. In a press interview in Hong Kong, Yuen says that he had the
idea to make So Close long before Charlie’ s Angels was made, and that the
“similarity is coincidental.” 24 Thus, the more extensive understanding one has about
the diverse cultural resources to which So Close shows significant intertextual
relation, the harder it is to indicate any single “origin” or prototype on which this
film draws.
Here, what is important is that the cultural identity of So Close looks so
obvious and is yet highly elusive at the same time. The lack of publicity that defines
the origin of the film in turn invites various possible readings in relation to the film’s
intertextual linkage. In fact, from the director’s suggestion that his intended target
audiences for this film were “European, American, and Asian audiences, ” 25 we can
suspect that such layered significations of the film text are in fact intentional by the
filmmaker. From what we have seen so fer, it seems that both Chinese and American
audiences can claim that So Close resembles their own previous popular culture.
This could mean that fevored elements of popular culture, such as stories featuring
three heroines, are actually not much different in the East and the West. If quoting or
repetition of other resources is a common practice of filmmaking, what is interesting
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in the case of So Close is that such a universal quality is especially exaggerated both
textually and contextually. Textually, this film almost intentionally alludes to
CharlieS, Angels at times. Contextually, the film was made almost immediately
following the release of the American film, without any publicity shield to protect it
from the derogatory accusation of shameless repetition and imitation. It was put on
the market “seemingly” as a Hong Kong rip-off piece of a Hollywood blockbuster.
In the production of So Close, the widely held perception of the Hong Kong
commercial film industry’s notoriety as a copycat is incorporated as a part of the
essential attributes of the film. It is an imitation of Hollywood made in Hong Kong.
Here, audiences outside of Hong Kong are expected to see not a single individual
film, but an example of “quintessential” Hong Kong imitation cinema They are
looking at one of the “authentic” practices that have defined the local film industry.
So Close is not only merchandizing the cinematic quality of the film, but also the
unfortunate part of the global reputation of the Hong Kong commercial film industry
itself.
However, to Asian audiences, this is simply not the case because they
can detect other sources or lineages of the film. Besides the fact that the characters’
tripartite structure is very familiar in the tradition of Chinese cinema, there are a
couple of other intertextual and intercultural references that are distinctly
recognizable to fans of Asian popular culture. One of the moments in which the film
requires audiences’ specific cultural experience to maximize their viewing pleasure
is the sequence where Lynn and Sue play in a shower room. Showing the childlike
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frolicking between Lynn and Sue, this scene starts with Lynn’s bath interrupted by
the entrance of Sue with a portable digital camera. The scenes show Sue trying to
capture Lynn’s naked body on camera while Lynn defends herself from the
embarrassment with expert martial art moves. In the process, Lynn’s bare body is
partly displayed on screen several times but is never fully revealed. The audience is
only teased with her partial nudity, but not so far as to satisfy their voyeuristic
curiosity.
This scene, appearing to be one of those customary semi-exploitive
moments of the female body in cinema, in feet creates a very interesting intertextual
relationship with the actress Shu Qi’s earlier career. Although now secured in her
status as a talented and respected actress in both mainstream and art house Hong
Kong and Taiwanese cinemas, Shu initially made her name as the notorious
Category 1 1 1 actress in Hong Kong, with films such as Sex and Zen II (1996).2 6 To
audiences who know her past career, the tantalizing bath scene remind them of the
gap between her earlier Category HI films in which they did not have problems in
seeing her frill nudity on screen, and now her “reformed” status that prevent them
from visually accessing her naked body. This sequence creates a self-reflexive
comment on the actress’ personal history as well as makes an intertextual reference
to her earlier Category III films.27 All this information, however, will be unpacked
only by those who are familiar with Shu’s earlier days in die Hong Kong film
industry, and thus most likely by local audiences.
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Similarly, the use of Korean actor Seoung-Heon Song also requires a
specific knowledge about die Asian pop culture to understand its intercultural
significance. Song is one of the leading stars of Hanryu. Considering the previous
history when the Korean film industry was taking the Hong Kong film industry as
their role model, the casting of Song in a high profile Hong Kong popular film is
regarded as an index to the recent achievements of Korean pop culture in Asia, as
well as a recognition of his own popularity in the region. And this was duly
celebrated by the Korean media. His role as Lynn’s boyfriend, Yen, is actually quite
limited, not having much screen time. In addition, aurally, he is not even present at
all in the film, as his dialogue was completely dubbed into Cantonese. Nevertheless,
in the Korean version of the poster for So Close, Song’s image looms larger than the
three Chinese female leads’. This is quite different from the posters circulated in
Hong Kong or America, where Song is completely absent or featured in a much
smaller proportion than the main characters. From this, it is clear that the inclusion
of a Korean pop cultural icon in So Close is intended to impress not everyone, but
only specific Asian audiences. Eventually, this creates a sense of solidarity among
Asian audiences, with their shared cultural knowledge. Therefore, although So Close
appears to be evenly familiar to everyone, the film actually communicates with
audiences on different levels depending on their amount of information and
knowledge about Asian and Hong Kong film cultures.
Thus far, it is obvious that So Close is not simply a case of Hong Kong
cinema’s ripping-off Charlie’ s Angels, but is made to “look like” a rip-off, with
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different translatability to different groups of audiences. This strategy of implanting
different cultural enigmas to be solved by audiences with different cultural
backgrounds is quite similar to that of Oldboy, where the depth of penetrability of
the film is different for Western, Asia, and Korean audiences. The significant effects
of such strategy seem to be found in the wide and diverse range of markets that such
strategy can guarantee. In case of Oldboy, the overall look of mixed aesthetics of
various internationally popular Asian film genres make it available to audiences who
are not necessarily familiar with specific culture of each East Asian country. In the
case of So Close, on the other hand, it takes advantage of the already established
global hype of earlier similar Hollywood films to branch out into the global market
with the systematic aid of a US global corporate media company, by packaging and
risking the rather unpleasant part of reputation of Hong Kong cinema. Nevertheless,
the important aspect in such a process is that both films do not have to exclude or
alienate their local audience to fit the taste of the world outside. Instead, they assure
their film’s bond with the local audiences by placing cultural signals in the text
which are accessible only by local audiences. By simultaneously reaching audiences
across the regional or national borders, these films become generally global and yet
still uniquely local cultural products.
As for the current tension between the global and local film industries,
Stephen Prince notes:,
The relationship between these two contexts—the global and
the local—can be fraught with tension. Hollywood’s
marketing imperative is to extend its model of cinema
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throughout the world, so that audiences in Singapore,
Thailand, Korea, Germany, Ireland, and everywhere else will
develop a taste for American movies.”
The processes of producing and marketing Oldboy and So Close provide
good examples in which such a confrontation of global and local cinemas can be
witnessed. However, the tension in this case is created not necessarily by the
invasion of Hollywood, homogenizing die taste of all local and regional cinemas in
the world. It is rather a case of local cinema widening its global markets, with the
consequence of diversifying the cinematic tastes in the world. The process involves
cooperation between global and local cinemas, but does not seem to be of equal
weight at first sight. The local cinemas tend to follow an “imagined” identity of their
cultures created by outsiders. This seems to be another example of unequal relation
between global and local, where eventually the local sphere is subsumed to the
control of the global hegemony of finances and ideas.
The cases of Oldboy and So Close, however, show how the local
cinemas, even in such moment when their cultural identity is at risk, can still
maintain its contact with local audiences with local characteristics not imagined by
outsiders. Therefore, these films are not consumed by, but are actually taking
advantage of, the globally “imagined” identity of East Asian cinemas to efficiently
enter global as well as local markets. By packaging familiar images from some or
specific East Asian film industries, but also by incorporating specific national or
local cultural codes, Oldboy and So Close propose a new strategy for East Asian
cinemas to survive in the larger global cultural competition.
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Chapter IV Endnotes
1 See my earlier explanation about the “Golden Age” of Korean cinema.
2 Anthony C.YLeong, Korean Cinema: The New Hong Kong (Victoria, Canada:
Trafford, 2002).
3 Munhwa sanop paekso (The government report of the culture industry) 2001,
published by the Korean Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
4 This localized information of Hanryu is based on Munhwa sanop paekso 2001,62-
6 8 and a shortened edition of Ydnghwa punya hanryu hydnhwang kwa hwalsong
pangan yongu (A Study on Hanryu in Korean Cinema), published by KOFIC, 2006,
available at http://www.kofic.or.kr/.
5 Munhwa sanop paekso 2001, 65.
6 Iwabuch, “Time and die Neighbor: Japanese Media Consumption of Asia,” Rogue
Flows: Trans-Asian Cultural Traffic, eds. by Koich Iwabuch et. al. (Hong Kong :
Hong Kong University Press, 2004.), 156.
7 Ydnghwa punya hanryu..., by KOFIC.
8 Still, the only East Asian country that is excluded from such transitional cultural
trades is North Korea.
9 This is especially so as the dubbing of foreign languages in filmmaking
remarkably decreased in recent years.
10 Ella Shohat and Robert Stam, “From the Imperial Family to the Transnational
Imaginary: Media Spectatorship in the Age of Globalization,” in Wilson and
Dissanayake eds., Global/Local, 164.
11 Ulf Hanners, (1996), Transnational Connections: Culture, People, Places
(London and New York: Routledge), 17.
12 In the case of Japan, the movement might possibly head in two directions, to the
global and also to wider regional Asian markets, as their cultural trade has not been
fully activated in all parts of Asia because of Japan’s past colonial history in the
region.
13 Rey Chow, Primitive Passions : Visuality, Sexuality, Ethnography, and
Contemporary Chinese Cinema (New York. Columbia University Press, 1995).
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2 2 5
14 I borrow this term from Appadurai in M odernity at Large.
15 “Reviews: So C lose” EfOnline available at http://www.eonline.eom/Reviews/F
acts/Movies/Reviews/0,1052,88222,OO.html; Joe Mader, ‘Reviews: So Close,’ The H
ollywoodReporter.Com, 8 May 2003, available at http://www.hollywoodreporter.co
m/thr/reviews/review_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=l 883255 ; and Megan Lehmann,
‘Not Even “Close” to Good,” New York Post, 12 September 2003, available at http://
www.nypost.com/movies/5556.htm.
16 The film was widely promoted to be a Hong Kong film in overseas markets such
as in the US or in South Korea. The Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com) also
lists the film’s nationality as Hong Kong.
17 The Chinese title of So Close is
18 Esther C. M. Yau, “Introduction: Hong Kong Cinema in a Borderless World,” in
A t Full Speed, 8.
19 Patricia Aufderheide, “Made in Hong Kong: Translation and Transmutation,” in
Andrew Horton and Stuart Y . McDougal, eds., Playing It Again, Sam: Retakes on
Remakes (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1998), 92-
3. As for the issue of plagiarism in Hong Kong cinema, see also Paul Fonoroff,
“Orientation,” Film Comment (June 1988), 52-6; Lisa Odham Stokes and Michael
Hoover, City on Fire: Hong Kong Cinema (London and New York: Verso, 1999),
17-37; and Jeff Yang, Once Upon a Time in China: A Guide to Hong Kong,
Taiwanese, and Mainland Chinese Cinema (New York: Atria Books, 2003), 118-9
(the piece on piracy is contributed by Andrew Grossman).
20 Heroic Trio II is also called The Executioners in the US market.
21 I owe this insight to prof Dana Polan’s lecture in the class “International Cinema
since World War n,” in the spring semester o f2004, offered by the Division of
Critical Studies in the School of Cinema-Television, the University of Southern
California. His indication of the “shameless sentimentality” of the film reminded me
of my subject position as a long-time audience for Hong Kong and other East Asian
films. The sentimentalism of So Close bypassed my attention at the time, as I am
well-acquainted with this type o f overflowing emotion, a common trait in popular
cultures in East Asia..
22 Anne T. Ciecko and Sheldon H. Lu, “The Heroic Trio: Anita Mui, Maggie
Cheung, Michelle Yeoh—Self-Reflexivity and the Globalization of the Hong Kong
Action Heroine,” Post Script, 19/1 (1999), 75.
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2 2 6
23 Minh-Ha T. Pham, “The Asian Invasion (of Multiculturalism) in Hollywood,”
Journal o f Popular Film and Television, 32/3 (2004), 129. For a discussion o f niixia
films, see also Zhang Zhen, “Bodies in the Air: The Magic of Science and the Fate
of the Early “Martial Arts” Film in China,” PostScript, 20/2-3 (2001), 43-58.
24 So Close press screening documents released by Strand Releasing.
25 “Spotlight for Kicks,” New York, 15 September 2003.
26 Equivalent to the US rating system, the Hong Kong film industry employs a
Category system. Category I films are declared to be suitable for all ages; Category
HA are not suitable for children; Category HB are not suitable for young persons and
children; Category HI films are for persons aged eighteen or above only. Films in the
last category usually contain explicit depiction of sex and violence. The famous Sex
and Zen series are some of best known titles in this category.
27 Shu also plays such a self-reflexive character in Viva Erotica directed by Derek
Lee (1996), in which she plays a Category HI actress. Although the film is not an
exploitation film, its subject matter concerns the Category HI film industry.
Eventually, it was released as a Category in film.
28 Stephen Prince, “Introduction: World Filmmaking and the Hollywood
Blockbuster,” World Literature Today (October-December 2003), 3.
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2 2 7
CONCLUSION
The planned remake of Hong Kong’s quintessential noir film A Better Tomorrow
with multiple financing from Hong Kong, Japanese, and Korea is big news in
Korean Film Culture during the summer o f2006. Although backed by multinational
capital, the project is slated to be filmed by a Korean director with several “Hanryu”
stars in the principle roles and it will primarily be in the Korean language. Almost
twenty years after the film was first released in Korea, and the subsequent huge
popularity of Hong Kong cinema in the society, the anticipation of encountering the
film in a Korean version makes Korean film fans feel quite complicated emotions.
One the one hand, the possible remake of this monumental work of the
popular Hong Kong New Wave reconfirms the elevated status of Korean cinema in
the international film circuit. The Hong Kong film industry is willing to offer one of
their own precious cultural icons to be reborn in Korea. The Korean film industry
now has become a reliable collaborator with its many Asian counterparts. You can
trust Korea.
On the other hand, it makes people who know and love the original film
anxious. Their concern is not simply related to the loss of the “authentic aura” of the
original film that will occur when it is turned it into a different form. It is more about
the current direction that Korean cinema and the entire East Asian cinema are taking.
Remakes are not a new phenomenon at all. Everybody is remaking everyone else’s
films all over the globe. Similarly, film co-productions also happen everywhere. So,
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2 2 8
what is special about the announcement of the remake of A Better Tomorrow? The
answer lies in the specific phase that the entire East Asian filmmaking is confronting
at the moment.
Since the late 1990s, filmmaking in East Asia has displayed a dramatic
increase in die mixing of resources inside the region. Even in the year 2005, there
were several high-profile co-production films among the Chinese, Hong Kong,
Japanese, and Korean film industries such as, Perhaps Love (2005), The Myth
(2005), The Promise (2005), and The Seven Swords (2005). These are only a few
films that were shown at the three major international film festivals in the year and
do not even include tittles of lesser known collaborations. Therefore, we may
consider the particular case of A Better Tomorrow as the culmination of the prevalent
practices of co-production and the blending of aesthetics in East Asia at the moment.
So what?
Seeing in the case of Oldboy and So Close, the mingling of
multicultural aesthetics and resources displayed in numerous recent East Asian films
does not only create hope for reaching wider audiences but also generates uneasy
feelings regarding the cultural specificity and cultural autonomy that might possibly
get lost in their mixed look. They may look like East Asian films but do they seem to
represent any specific culture in East Asia? East Asia itself is already a combination
of several different countries. Where do these films belong to in this amalgam of
different cultures of East Asia? In that light, if it is made in Korea, is A Better
Tomorrow a Korean film or an East Asian film? Is it even a valid question to ask in
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this period of globalization when the whole world is trying to reach everybody, the
center to the peripheries, and the peripheries to the center?
I think it is. Especially when we discuss culture. One of the main mottos
of Korean film industry protesters when protesting against the reduction of screen
quota in Korea has been that culture cannot simply be estimated monetarily. Culture
is the spirit of the people who created it. This may be true. Especially when we think
about how the whole concern arose in regard to the Westernization of almost the
entire globe during the post-colonial modernization process. Today wherever you
travel in the world you may find your rest during the tiring itinerary of the tourism in
none other than one of the global branches of McDonalds. McDonalds has created a
utopian illusion for all the border-crossing global pedestrians. As long as you can be
pampered with the familiar taste of the hamburgers of the US corporate eatery, you
can manage without the food of your own country. Moreover, you gradually forget
its taste and eventually are estranged from it.
The same goes with cinema. The more you are familiar with one
particular group of films your taste adjusts. And eventually you turn away from
films that cannot offer what the specific group does, including those from your own
country. So far, Hollywood has been monopolistically feeding almost the entire
globe with massive amounts of its own films. While the audiences of smaller local
film markets are more and more familiar with the look and glamour of Hollywood
films, their own film industry is dying helplessly.
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2 3 0
This dissertation began its discussion from such a declining point of the
Korean film industry, which was pressured both by internal politics and
Hollywood’s increasing monopolistic ambition in the domestic market. Luckily the
industry did not give in to such difficult conditions and managed to find a way to
survive and eventually prosper. The way that they chose to get out of the depressive
state was to find insights from the healthy neighboring local film industry of Hong
Kong. Passionately consuming and also adopting the successful aspects of Hong
Kong cinema, Korean cinema gradually found its way to move toward a “better
tomorrow.” In the meantime, the cultural difference flowing in from the realm of the
Hong Kong film industry changed and widened the perspectives of the Korean
society toward popular culture and cultural hybridization. Korean people realized
that sometimes popular culture and cinema in particular could become more
effectively appealing by mixing multiple cultural resources.
Then came Hanryu, concurring with the age of pan-Asianism in the
arena of East Asian cinemas. Now everybody is collaborating with one another,
producing a unique “look of East Asia,” instead of insisting on their own separate
cultural specificity. In that way, East Asian cinemas are reaching wider groups of
audiences in the globe and Korean cinema is also progressing along with it. At this
point, it seems like the whole trajectory of Korean cinema from the dismal 1980s to
the prosperous 2000s is a sound success story. Nevertheless, as I trace the history of
Korean cinema in its relation to other East Asian film industries and see the more
and more blurred boundaries among them, the questions becoming clearer to me are
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2 3 1
the old cliched questions of cultural identity: where is East Asian cinema heading in
this jumbling of cultures at the moment and where is Korean cinema standing in
such a pan-Asian cultural movement?
If one of the major concerns before Korea joined in such a pan-Asian
trend in filmmaking was Hollywood’s domination of the cultural taste of Korean
audiences and the film industry, why do we think that it is more tolerable when the
Korean cinema is heavily mixed with the influence of other East Asian cultures?
Either way, the unique sense of the cultural identity of Korea is increasingly hard to
find in Korean film culture. It seems like my anxiety is validated by the continual
box office failure of the aforementioned East Asian co-production films in 2005 in
Korea. The mixed aesthetics of these films eventually did not provide any strong
cultural anchor for each national audience. They did not appeal to Korean audiences
despite some parts and pieces of Korean elements in them.
Stuart Hall says that the reinforced aspect of local bond in the process
of globalization is in feet a “tricky version of ‘the local’, which operates within, and
has been thoroughly reshaped by ‘the global’ and operates largely within its logic.” 1
In fact, the whole solidarity of East Asian film industries at the moment, and
especially Korea’ s participation in it, began with the purpose of securing each
national film industry’s international market share through regional collaborations.
Therefore, the operation of regional cooperation is in feet under the strong influence
of the global cultural power holders. As much as the regional tie was formed to
withstand the ever more strong advancement of the global capitalism of Hollywood,
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2 3 2
it could easily be dismantled depending upon the changing policy of Hollywood’s
control of the world film markets. After that we are left with the question of taste.
Where do we recover each national audience’s almost disappearing taste for their
own culture at that time? Where do we head from there?
Because East Asian collaborations in filmmaking are currently
proliferating, it may be premature for me to ask the future of such activities or to
come to a hasty conclusion of the results. However, to make the process more
positive and hopeful, it is necessary to keep close watch of where we are moving
toward and with what motifs. To make the regional collaborations in filmmaking
more positive and productive industrial practices rather than reductive by any means
more careful concerns and inquiries should be followed. Maybe the rebirth of A
Better Tomorrow by the pan-Asian co-production will provide us more interesting
insights into the future of transnational cultural traffic in East Asia. I look forward to
the day.
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Conclusion Endnotes
1 Stuart Hall, “Culture, Community, Nation,” Cultural Studies 7 (1993), 354,
requoted from Wilson and Dissanayake, “Introduction: Tracking the Global/Local,”
Global/Local, 5.
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Asset Metadata

Creator Lee, Hyung-Sook (author)

Core Title Between local and global: The Hong Kong Film Syndrome in South Korea

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

School Graduate School

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program Cinema-Television (Critical Studies)

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag Cinema,OAI-PMH Harvest

Language English

Advisor James, David (committee chair), Jaikumar, Priya (committee member), Rosen, Stanley (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c16-584419

Unique identifier UC11341892

Identifier 3236522.pdf (filename),usctheses-c16-584419 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier 3236522.pdf

Dmrecord 584419

Document Type Dissertation

Rights Lee, Hyung-Sook

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA

Linked assets

University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses