The Asian Popular Cultural Product - Essay Example

Topic: Analysis of Asian popular cultural product Name ID no Unit code and name Lecturer name Assignment No Due Date Introduction The Asian movie industry has evolved and made landmark internationally. Among the most popular genres of Asia movies are horror movies. Initially, the horror movies were considered as low budget movies in most of Asian countries with production made for the local clientele only. The current trend has seen the horror movies being popular in Asian nations such as Korea, Japan, Thailand and Hong Kong. The acceptance of these movies by Holly Wood has made it possible for global acceptance of the same. In Asian horror movies, Japanese horror cinema (J-horror) is one of the widely known pop-culture in Asia (Balmain & Colette, 2008). One aspect that has been evident in the Asian horror movies is the use of excessive violence and cruelties in revenge. This has made Asian horror movies more appealing to the male spectators due to their masculine aspect. The movies can be attributed to the issues such as colonialism, modernization, and the pan-Asian popular culture. Horror films have served a lot in cultural issued exploring cross-national identities, national specificity and convergence of culture (Boey. 2009). This essay will look into the Asian horror films and critically analyze the characteristics, cultural specificity, local and global significance and how and why they have changed when transplanted into other cultures. This will be accomplished by first looking at the characteristics. The Asian horror movies have a more sensitive and elaborate theme on family values. This may be attributed to the family values that are maintained in Asian countries. This makes them more unique to the Western horror movies which do not rely much on family issues. For example, some of the movies show a family being haunted by one of its dead members. This in most cases comes from something wrong that was done to the person during their lifetime. The effect is to depict how strong the family ties and relations are in the Asian countries (Balmain, 2008). A very distinct characteristic in Asian horror films is the use of a female antagonist. The female character is in most cases is used as a ghost or a demon. The role of male counterpart is usually downplayed in the demonic scenes (Cui, 2003). This may be related to the fact that the Asian society has been oppressing the women and giving her traits such as unclean. Looking at an Asian movie like The Ring, the gender role of a female antagonist is evident. In this movie, a child has to be saved from a curse. In the movie, the female ghost crawls out of the well. The fact is that Buddhist concept of female body has a great impact on the role she plays in modern horror films. The female used in the Asian horror movies have two aspects; the human aspect and the spectral aspect. In the human form, beauty dominates her making it possible for her to coexist with the human beings. Using her beauty as a weapon, she can accomplish her vengeful mission. The other form is the vengeful and destructive. This serves as the major creation of the Asian horror movies (The Uninvited, 2009). The movies in most instances revolve on revenge on a previous wrong doing. The grudge kept by the wronged person becomes a theme for the horror. The character set on revenge mission killing and causing terror in the movie. The resentment of those who have wronged someone makes revenge more horrific. The movie tries to show that revenge is not bad if it is executed with good intentions (Cherry, 2009). The mental condition of the antagonist to seek the one responsible for the woes in their death makes it more interesting to watch these movies. Most of the Asian horror movies have less use of blood. This is compensated by being scarier than the Western horror movies due to use of demonic scenes. This is seen especially in the remake movies by Holly Wood. The movie such as Saw have a lot of blood shed in the American context as compared to the Asian version. Though use of blood has an effect of making the scenes look more violent, the condition created by scary pictures in Asian movies makes them horrific without use of blood (Cherry, 2009). The horror characters in most of the Asian horror movies consist of drowned, hanged, suicidal, burned and childbirth ghosts. Victims to the drowned ghosts meet their death through being pulled into the water depth or being lured. The burned ghosts are very harsh as they try to make sure their victims dies as they did in a flame of fire. In most cases, these ghosts are confined to schools, hospitals and hotels. These ghosts are depicted to lure their victims into death scenario resembling how they died (Cherry, 2009). Childbirth ghosts are exhibited in Asian horror movies as children who died during their birth. These children are in most cases seen to have died from abortions and miscarriages which makes them vengeful. These ghosts travel to look for their victims in their homes. Their main aim is to cause agony and hence death to their victims. One of the most types of childbirth ghost in Asian movies is the specter. These are offspring from death of an expectant mother. They are riddled with grief since they have missed mothers love (The Unborn. 2009). Of late technology has impacted the horror industry. The use of technology is another trait that is evident in Japanese horror movies. One of such trait is found in the Japanese horror movie Pulse. In this movie, internet is used to generate the curse. This characteristic has been mostly supported by increased technology use in movie industry. Most of the Asian horror movies that have a supernatural being in their cast have borrowed from the religion. This trait is seen in horror movies where the involvement of religion makes it a movie that can be appreciated in every culture (Cherry, 2009). Most of the Japanese horror movies are cultural specific. The horror movie Ringu is based on Japanese Kaidan (ghost). This is a genre that comes from the traditional Japanese plays from Noh and Kabuki theatre. This is a folklore which deals with the ghost perspective. In the Asian horror movies, the ghosts in most cases are not exterminated. This is in contrasts to the western horror movies. The reason behind this is due to fact that in Asian countries such as Japan, ghosts are not regarded as enemies to human beings. In their culture, ghosts world coexist with humans. This leads to Asian horrors having ghosts who at the end still remain at large (Lee, 2009). Another cultural aspect that is potrayed is enhancement of traditional family ties. The Asian countries had a tradition which experienced rare cases of divorce. In the modern society, these cultural values have diminished and most of the women have freedom. The modern career woman is more independent hence can not be a full time mother. The cases of divorce have increased which has brought tension between modernity and culture. To create fear to these changes which undermine cultural values, movies such as Ringu have been made. This movie reveals the existing tension brought by change (Lim, 2001). The use of the tradition such as Kaidan and ghosts like Kayako and Sayako has been used continuously in Japanese horror movies. In the Ring which is a Japanese horror movie. The movie uses a faceless head which is covered with long black hair and revealing one eye. This represents the Japanese Kurokami which means black hair and spirit (The Eye . 2008). The same has a substantial cultural significance. The long black hair is associated with the Japanese and conceptualization of feminine beauty. This image if interpreted culturally would mean a beautiful woman who has been wronged seeking revenge (The Uninvited. 2009). The theme of supernatural is also highly explored in Asian horror movies. The use of cultural supernatural being is more evident in horror movies that have been made in Korea. These movies involve ghosts who look like human being and involve talking animals. Most of the Japanese horror movies use the Anglophone ghost stories in their casting. Mythology is a cultural factor that appears in most of the Asian Horror movies. This is due to many Asians belief in supreme beings that they pay tribute to. For the Buddhists and Taoists, it’s a common practice to give offering to deities. In Asia, mythology is passed from one generation to the other. This is also enhanced from the fictional stories. This is a proof that the Asian culture is not just a culture representing a particular time but it moves with time hence being incorporated into horror movies (Lee, 2009). Most horrors are derived from the myths that are associated with demons, hell and persecution. These are horror movies that depict Shaman who is said to communicate with deities, spirits and gods. In horror movies, a Shaman has the capability to raise the dead and manipulate them. The involvement of shaman with the dead creates the terrifying effects of the horror movies (Lee, 2009). Another cultural specifies is use of superstitions in Asian horror movies. The probable derivation of superstitions is mythology. The use of superstitions ensures that people adhere to culture fully due to fear. The Chinese have a belief that the ghosts are released into the world once a year. During 7th lunar moon, ghosts are released into the world for an entire month to roam in Chinese culture. This supports the view that most of the Asian horror movies revolves about the ghosts. The horror constitute of victims who die untimely and turn into ghosts. These are known as substute killing ghost who kill unsuspecting individuals (Hantke, 2005). On Asian horror movies, the diverse cultural practices as well as religion are all depicted. These movies are in most cases related with death issues. The matters related to death in Asian community are given a lot of respect from cultural perspective. These are deep issues that Asian community holds in their beliefs. Most of East Asia has a view that the dead are capable of interacting with the material world. This view is integrated into their horror movies which in most cases show the revisiting of the dead to the normal world. These films exhibit the importance of sacred places and fear of them. The possibilities of supernatural curses due to failure of sacred order are also expressed in these movies (Balmain, 2008). The theme of religious horror is only understood in specific cultures. This is due to fact that Asian has different cultural and religious practices compared to most other countries. The Buddhist notion is that the body is made of filth and no matter how we try to preserve it, at the end it must rot. Use of monsters can be related to traditional religious practices of the Asian community. This is especially from the religious abominations such as body waste and the Buddhists view that women are filth. The founder of Buddhism gave negative constructs regarding the female body. The Buddhism views the woman as inferior to men. This is another aspect that shows how the Asian horror movies are related to traditional religious practices such as Buddhism (Stone, 2001). According to the Asian religious and cultural practices, the power of nature governs human beings. The nature is supposed to punish the wrong doers and reward those who do good deeds. This happens to help in differentiating what is good and bad. Sometimes, the evil doers get away. When the man is able to get away with evil deed and do not get punished, grudge comes in. To remove the grudge, it involves acts of something which is beyond nature to appease the wronged (Lim, 2001). Locally, the Asian horror movies have enjoyed dominance in sales and audience. This is due to their target which mostly is the teenagers. The success has made most of Asian countries expand their movie production. Countries such as Japan have a very rich culture, this culture when expressed in their horror movies makes it possible to gain home market popularity. This is because the home market consists of population who understand the culture in these horror movies (Lim, 2001). In the 21st century, the Asian horror movie industries have gained popularity as one of the best in the world. This has been attributed to the great creativity and high quality movies. The creativity part has come about from the use of culture and superstitions to evoke horror. The availability of technology in the movie industry has greatly influenced the speed at which the movies have been received globally. The online movie sales and reviews have been making it possible for global audience to become aware of these movies (Lee, 2009). The movies have added special features that help those in other cultures to understand them more. Some of these features are commentary that helps international audience to get the concept which might be cultural. Another feature is use of subtitles. The western countries have made numerous efforts in adopting and remaking the Asian horror movies (Balmain, 2008). In remaking these films, they have made them suit different nationalities. Some of the movies which have been remade by the western countries include Ringu, The eye and The Grudge. The approach remake has helped the Asian horror movies to attain wide popularity globally. Though the remake changes some aspects of Asian horror movies, the main theme remains the same if it was not cultural. Once the horror movie is taken to a new audience, the cultural theme in most cases is lost. The change of nationality leads to the need of the remake of these movies as culture is specific to audience. For example, the motivation for revenge in the Japanese movies is changed to psychotic killer in American version. Japanese horror films have been a great inspiration to the American movie production for many years. The only problem that existed was related to the American taking these movies and removing the deeper cultural meaning (Yau, 2001). The increased interest in the Asian Horror movies by Hollywood is a clear indication of the global acceptance. The visibility of these movies by the western countries is a clear case of globalization of media. In the past decades, the horror movies production led to cultural exchanges between Asian countries. This was witnessed by the co- production of movies between Hong Kong and South Korea. The popular culture in Japan which led to creation of horror movies among other products was banned in South Korea for a long time since 1945. This ban was later lifted in 2004 making it possible for the two countries to interact in movie production (Lee, 2009). The enthusiasm in which the Asian horror movies have been taken by the western countries has made a boom in revenue generated. The audience has been forced to look into the original version of the movie after seeing the remake from Holly Wood. Apart from increased cash flow, this quest has led to the global understanding of some of the Asian cultural practices and norms (Yau, 2001). The issue of transnationalism has been evident in many of the Asian horror movies due to remake and co-production. Through the ability of foreign countries to adopt universal issues into these movies, the issue of cultural specificity has been dealt with making these movies more open. This has led to an almost balanced spectatorship between local and global viewers. The availability of subtitle tracks in the original version of the Asian movies helps also in making it possible for global viewership. Using internet has supported the transnational theme in that different users are given a chance to comment on review. This has also helped in a long way to transform the foreign film in different countries (Balmain, 2008). When integrated to other cultures, these movies have faced some challenges. The Asian culture is in most aspects different from most nationalities globally. By altering themes and some aspects, these movies have gained acceptance in other cultures. For example, some of the cruelty in Asian horror movies such as The Untold Story which shows a whole family being murdered is offensive to some cultures and has to be altered (Yau, 2001). In conclusion, the Asian popular culture of horror movies is one of the most successful pop- cultures. The movies have diverse characteristics which range from the theme of revenge to use of female antagonist. In the cultural specify, the Asian horror movies have been based on cultural themes that mirrors the Asian cultures. Use of myths and supernatural beings are some of the most noticeable characteristics of the Asian horror movies. The recent adaptations by Holly wood has made it possible for the Asian horror movies to increase its viewers’ base. The movies have been remade to suit the western as well as global audience. Through this, it becomes possible for the movies to be viewed by those who have a different culture and maintain good reception. The combination of the industry with technology has made it possible for the global acceptance of the Asian horror movies making them compete in international market. Asian horror movies have been able to make it in to the Box Office as international hits. The industry has also been able to select its niche market which has made it possible to have a sustained market globally. References Balmain, C 2008, Introduction to Japanese Horror Film, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press. Boey, D 2009, Aesthetics of Horror: Constructing Horror in the Horrifying Cinema, Germany: VDN Verlag, Dr. Müller. Cherry, B 2009. Horror, London, Routledge. Cui, S 2003, Women Through the Lens: Gender and Nation in a Century of Chinese Cinema, Honolulu, University of Hawaii Press. Hantke, S, 2005, Japanese Horror under Western Eyes.In Japanese Horror Cinema. ed. Jay McRoy, Honolulu, University of Hawaii Press. Lee, Jong Seung 2009, Film and Shamanism (in Korean). Paju: Sallim Publishing Company. Lim, B 2001, ‘Spectral Times: The Ghost Film as Historical Allegory’, Positions: East Asia Culture Critique ,vol. 9, no.2, pp.288. Ringu (Ring). 2003. Directed by Hideo Nakata. US: Universal Studios. Stone, B 2001, ‘The Sanctification of Fear: Images of the Religious in Horror Films’. Journal of Religion and Film, vol. 5, no.2, p. 33-88. The Eye 2008, Directed by David Moreau. US: Lionsgate Paramount Vantage. The Eye . 2002. Directed by The Pang Brothers. US: Tartan Films. The Ring 2002, Directed by Gore Verbinski. US. Dreamwork Picures. The Unborn 2009, Directed by David S. Goyer. USA: Universal Studios. The Uninvited 2009, Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan (The Ghost of Yotsuya). 1959. Directed by Nobuo Nagakawa, Japan, Shinto Company. Yau, E (ed). 2001, At Full Speed: Hong Kong Cinema in a Borderless World, Minneapolis, University of Minneapolis Press. Read More

The movies in most instances revolve on revenge on a previous wrong doing. The grudge kept by the wronged person becomes a theme for the horror. The character set on revenge mission killing and causing terror in the movie. The resentment of those who have wronged someone makes revenge more horrific. The movie tries to show that revenge is not bad if it is executed with good intentions (Cherry, 2009). The mental condition of the antagonist to seek the one responsible for the woes in their death makes it more interesting to watch these movies.

Most of the Asian horror movies have less use of blood. This is compensated by being scarier than the Western horror movies due to use of demonic scenes. This is seen especially in the remake movies by Holly Wood. The movie such as Saw have a lot of blood shed in the American context as compared to the Asian version. Though use of blood has an effect of making the scenes look more violent, the condition created by scary pictures in Asian movies makes them horrific without use of blood (Cherry, 2009).

The horror characters in most of the Asian horror movies consist of drowned, hanged, suicidal, burned and childbirth ghosts. Victims to the drowned ghosts meet their death through being pulled into the water depth or being lured. The burned ghosts are very harsh as they try to make sure their victims dies as they did in a flame of fire. In most cases, these ghosts are confined to schools, hospitals and hotels. These ghosts are depicted to lure their victims into death scenario resembling how they died (Cherry, 2009).

Childbirth ghosts are exhibited in Asian horror movies as children who died during their birth. These children are in most cases seen to have died from abortions and miscarriages which makes them vengeful. These ghosts travel to look for their victims in their homes. Their main aim is to cause agony and hence death to their victims. One of the most types of childbirth ghost in Asian movies is the specter. These are offspring from death of an expectant mother. They are riddled with grief since they have missed mothers love (The Unborn. 2009). Of late technology has impacted the horror industry.

The use of technology is another trait that is evident in Japanese horror movies. One of such trait is found in the Japanese horror movie Pulse. In this movie, internet is used to generate the curse. This characteristic has been mostly supported by increased technology use in movie industry. Most of the Asian horror movies that have a supernatural being in their cast have borrowed from the religion. This trait is seen in horror movies where the involvement of religion makes it a movie that can be appreciated in every culture (Cherry, 2009).

Most of the Japanese horror movies are cultural specific. The horror movie Ringu is based on Japanese Kaidan (ghost). This is a genre that comes from the traditional Japanese plays from Noh and Kabuki theatre. This is a folklore which deals with the ghost perspective. In the Asian horror movies, the ghosts in most cases are not exterminated. This is in contrasts to the western horror movies. The reason behind this is due to fact that in Asian countries such as Japan, ghosts are not regarded as enemies to human beings.

In their culture, ghosts world coexist with humans. This leads to Asian horrors having ghosts who at the end still remain at large (Lee, 2009). Another cultural aspect that is potrayed is enhancement of traditional family ties. The Asian countries had a tradition which experienced rare cases of divorce. In the modern society, these cultural values have diminished and most of the women have freedom. The modern career woman is more independent hence can not be a full time mother. The cases of divorce have increased which has brought tension between modernity and culture.

To create fear to these changes which undermine cultural values, movies such as Ringu have been made. This movie reveals the existing tension brought by change (Lim, 2001).

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