Anyone interested in a preconst. panel at Kinema Club VII at Yale?

myoungsook park citylights31 at gmail.com
Fri Dec 16 19:19:54 EST 2005


Hello this is Myoungsook Park, a second year Ph. D at Univ. of Iowa cinema
studies program.
I just sent my abstract of my paper to Aaron Gerow. Hopefully, I would get
in the conference.
I have worked on Japanese horror films and Hollywood remakes in terms of
Hollywood's attempt to assimilate Asian market, the future biggest market in
a decade. I found that the issue of 'cultural translation' from Japanese
original to Hollywood remake is quite complex and problematic.
The following is the abstract.
If you have time, would you take a look at that?

Sincerely
Myoungsook
-------------------------------------------------

Semantics of horror: contemporary Japanese horror films, and Hollywoodremakes.



Assessing so called 'Japanese horror boom,' which began with *Ringu*'s
unexpected success in 1998, I would like to historicize what actually the
horror boom means in Japan and other Asian countries such as South Korea,
Taiwan and Hong Kong at the specific period around 1997. I will demonstrate
how the Asian financial crisis, Japan's economic slump the early 90's
onward, and Hong Kong's return to China in 1997 are interrelated to each
other, and contribute to the culture of 'horror' in Asia, and finally how
all those are related to global Hollywood.

Coterminously with the Asian financial crisis and Hong Kong return in 1997,
Hollywood, the biggest global entity of entertainment industry, completed
its mission of globalization. The statistics show that Hollywood's overseas
box office finally reached the same figures as the domestic one in 1998.
Global Hollywood has two missions; provincializing national films, and
protecting the U.S. domestic market from foreign films. Remake seems to be
the best answer. Hollywood had succeeded in assimilating two biggest film
industries in France and Hong Kong which were challenges to Hollywood's
supremacy: by remaking French films avidly in the 80's and early 90's, and
by grabbing Hong Kong talents in the mid 90's to precipitate the fall of the
local film industry and at the same time, to benefit from it. Now, we are
witnessing these two combined together in Hollywood remakes of Japanese
horror films. Takashi Shimizu (*The Grudge)*, and Hideo Nakata (*The
Ring*2) remade their own originals, and they  topped the biggest
opening for a
horror film.

I do not intend to equate the current remake boom with simply a practice of
cultural imperialism. However, the repetitive appearance of trope of
authorship and cultural translation seems very problematic because it tends
to ignore the fundamental power differential. To assign the directorial job
of remake to the original directors seems to be interpreted as an ultimate
virtue with the rhetoric of the truth to the original and respect to
authors. It is epitomized in *The Grudge*; Takashi Shimizu directed the same
film in the same location, and even in the exactly same house used in his
original. The 'minor' difference here, the production company claims, is
people and language. If the original director does the remake, is it a
credential of keeping 'the original director's vision'* *intact? Who
guarantees that language and actors/actresses are minor difference?

*The Grudge *proves that the remake is absolutely different text from its
original despite the same director. Here, we have issues of semantics of
horror genre. Going back to* kaidan* tradition, *Ju-on* raises the question
whether it would be right to equate 'Japanese' horror with generic horror,
which has been defined predominantly in the American context. When the
remakes of Japanese horror films are discussed, it is often agreed by many
American critics that horror genre is one of the most universal genres. This
again presents us with questions of 'who' assumes, and 'who' defines genres.
Although *kaidan* genre is familiar to Japanese and Asian audience, it is
translated as 'Japanese' horror. Indeed, who put the national marker? Whose
genre is this 'unmarked' horror? To what extent, 'Japanese' horror is
horror? Questions about national/local genre are at stake.

By analyzing culturally specific semantics of genre such as  the female
avenger, the figure of high school girls, and the essential sentiment of *
on/**怨** *in Japanese horror, I will address the issue of translation of the
untranslatable.




On 12/13/05, Mark Nornes <amnornes at umich.edu> wrote:
>
> Is there anyone out there that would be interested in forming a panel
> with me on the issue of translation?
>
> I'm thinking of both actual translation practices (subtitling, dubbing,
> interpretation, translation of theory/criticism), or metaphoric uses of
> translation (as you see in many areas of film and cultural studies).
>
> If you are interested in joining me, drop me a line and we'll
> constitute a panel.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Markus
>
>
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