Monday, May 7, 2012

Final Project


            When I was thinking of ideas for this final project, I wanted to explore on a topic that would be exciting.  I recalled Mizenko sensei talking about his encounter with ghosts and spirits during his stay in Japan. This sparked my interest in the supernatural, and I knew I had to research on Japanese horror films (J-horror for short).  Those who know me pretty well know that I’m a huge scaredy cat.  I’m the kind of person who gets frightened easily over so many different things.  The one thing that I especially can’t shake off is the feeling I get after watching a haunting, supernatural horror movie.  Especially J-horror films.  These films definitely leave me feeling unsettled and creeped out for days.  Even if I have my hands over my eyes, though I peak through my fingers at times, the vivid haunting images remain forever etched in my memory.  Replaying the scary scenes in my mind still give me the chills.  For this project, I chose to analyze visual forms of J-horror films because I want to investigate what it is that makes J-horror so unique and distinctive from western horror movies.  My interest lies in the intersections that exist between Ringu and its American remake, The Ring, and how J-horror is influencing western horror films today.
            Over the past decades, horror film has been a substantial component of Japanese popular culture.  Influences to these films originate way back from horror and ghost stories of the Edo and Meiji period.  These stories are referred to as “kaidan,” which is an old-fashion term relating to Edo folktales.  Kaidan involves ghosts seeking vengeance for their untimely and undeserved deaths. A vengeful female ghost is a key archetype to this genre (McRoy).  Reference to Kabuki theatre and Noh play is prevalent in J-horror films.  The female ghosts are usually characterized to be insane.  In Kabuki theatre, the symbol of insanity is unkempt hair. These women, called “yurei,” are depicted with long black hair, contrasted to a very pale and distorted face with large staring eyes.  Yurei ghosts are tied to the world through strong emotions.  Usually, they are bound by sadness, or unfinished business.
            One of the earliest kaidan J-horror film and classic is Ugetsu (1953).  This film has influenced modern creators of J-horror films. Ugetsu is about a man named Genjuro, who had abandoned his wife to have an affair with a wealthy woman, who turns out to be a ghost.  Ugetsu isn’t exactly considered to be as frightening as the modern films.  The female ghost named, Lady Wakasa, is a yurei who appears to be normal, not disfigured in any way.  As seen in the first image below, she is portrayed as a beautiful noblewoman, dressed in a beautiful kimono and in formal makeup.  It is seen in the second image that when Genjuro attempts to leave her, the spooky element comes into play, and Lady Wakasa becomes hungry for companionship. In this image, Lady Wakasa is portrayed differently in a melancholic and distraught expression, with her hair a bit disheveled.  Her makeup is accented with those bizarre black eyebrows that are drawn in on the upper fore-head. Her makeup here is reminiscent of the Noh masks, which were used in Noh theatre to portray different expressions of female or nonhuman characters. 
                                                       Ugetsu – Lady Wakasa



                            Noh play masks were props used to convey changes in emotions.


            When comparing American and Japanese horror films, the structure and content are very different.  There are so many prevalent elements in J-horror that makes it unique and unlike American horror. First off, the protagonists are mostly female. Females play a major role.  The common structure is innocent women who are victimized and brutally murdered, then coming back in the form of a murderous spirit, cursing the living. 


                                                    “crawling aspect” in Ringu


            The second element is the use of tension.  J-horror films focus on psychological horror and tension building, the feeling of suppressed suspense and anxiety.  In the popular J-horror film Ringu, the “crawling” aspect is used to make the viewer feel extremely uncomfortable.  The images above show the grotesque, lizard-like body movements of Sadako, the ghost of a murdered psychotic girl.  This spectacle is new to American horror, and the same contorted figure crawling on all fours is replicated in its remake, The Ring.
            The third element is the use of commonplace technology as a means to transmit evil.  This ingenious trick is the Japanese approach to infuse technology so that we will turn against the things that we rely on.  These items include television, cell phones, and internet.  This then evokes fear to technology, and we see those necessities as a threat.  The image below shows the television as a way of transmitting an “evil force.”  The girl crawling out of the television is the central image of technology that is commonly used in modern society, and turning it into an unconditioned feared object.





There is another scene in Ringu, where the television is seen as a bad omen.  This scene is shown in the beginning of the film. The television turns on by itself, again, creates that ominous and eerie effect that foreshadows something bad is bound to happen. 

            The fourth element is the use of contrasting colors—black and white.  J-horror films tend to characterize the ghosts with long black hair with pasty-white skin.  This revisits the “yurei” ghost characters.  Ringu sets and iconic image of a yurei.  Yurei typically dress in white clothing that looks like a nightgown.  In Japan, the color white is worn in funerals.  This type of clothing is a signifier of the dead.   The long and unkempt hair is another signifier of a yurei.  Hair is a staple element in J-horror films.  In Japan, hair is very important to women.  It’s one of the recognizable elements of traditional J-horror. The reason a woman's long black hair has become a major element in scary movies and folklore, is that Japanese women were obsessive and meticulous about their hair. Japanese women who have very long hair have spent a very long time taking care of it.  The long, black hair in Japanese folklore has worked itself into modern films.  This is seen in Ugetsu briefly when a woman is shown treasuring her hair, while meticulously brushing it while watching herself in the mirror.


The long black hair is another signifier of death because it was traditional for Japanese women to grow their hair very long, but then it would be pinned up.   It was tradition for women to let their hair down in death.
            White skin tone is part of Japanese culture, and it is believed that white skin is considered beautiful.  However, as it is unlikely that you will spot a dark skinned Japanese woman in a J-horror film, the ghost characters are represented as extremely pale, which serves as another reminder that these vengeful characters aren’t living entities, but is a color of mourning in Japan.




            The last element is emptiness.  It is Japanese aesthetic tradition to balance out the “empty and the full.” In Japan, it is embraced that “the view of reality and life are structured around a notion of dualism, and advocating a worldview that oppositional forces coexist and hold each other in balance and order…the combination of light and dark in a single image, or the positioning of a complex, three- dimensional image against a flat, empty space, reflects the Japanese aesthetic tradition that values balance above all else.  It is the combination of the empty and the full which creates the aesthetic experience” (Wee 49).   In Ringu, it is the Japanese concept of mu, which “implies that empty space contributes actively to a composition” (Wee 49).  Ringu uses the videotape as object that allows the natural and supernatural world to coexist. 
The images in the video are not explained, only emphasizing fear and the inscrutability of the supernatural horrors.  Again, this is a reflection of exploring ideas and possibility beyond of what is known. 
            Japanese horror has influenced American horror over the past decade.   American horror cinema has been growing a trend of remaking successful Japanese horror films, which include, The Grudge, One Missed Call, and Pulse.  These remakes all reflect the elements and structure of J-horror as a foundation of a horror story.   



References:





Visual Aesthetics and Ways of Seeing: Comparing Ringu and The Ring, by Valerie Wee


Friday, April 20, 2012

Project update

For my final project, I'm going to investigate the imagery of ghosts in Japanese horror films. I'd like to explore the different representations of female ghosts/spirits.  I think I'm going to focus on  modern Japanese horror film, Ringu, and the American remake The Ring. Ringue implements foundational references to earlier films, which I would also like to look into deeper.
Here are some sources:
http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=yOjLtfSsetMC&oi=fnd&pg=PR5&dq=visuals+Japanese+horror+film&ots=WXvPnsXcle&sig=4NE5j8EEiu5KTdhahA19DdnHWaI#v=onepage&q&f=false

http://scholar.googleusercontent.com/scholar?q=cache:aMIyMBcafvQJ:scholar.google.com/+ghost+visuals+Japanese+film&hl=en&as_sdt=0,39

http://iipc.utu.fi/imaginaryjapan/Hansen.pdf

http://ue.ucdavis.edu/explorations/2006/sumpter.pdf

Article by Bliss Cua Lim: Spectral TImes: The Ghost Film as Historical Allegory

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Project: Japanese Horror Films

For my project, I want to study the themes of supernatural, ghost stories of Japanese Horror Films.  I've always found Japanese horror movies way more scarier visually than American ones, and so I want to see exactly what it is that make it more frightening.
This topic is significant because Japanese horror ghost stories can be traced back to Edo and Meiji periods, there may be ties with Kabuki art.  In many of these horror films there are pale, long black haired, females that take form in ghost/spiritual forms. 
Also, Japanese horror movies have found universal appeal. Hollywood has created remakes of several Japanese horror films--The Ring, The Grudge, One Missed Call, etc.
I'd like to learn more on this globalizing trend in different countries.




Some sources I may use:

http://gnovisjournal.org/2009/05/13/it-came-east-japanese-horror-cinema-age-globalization/

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/article/Post-Script/200723436.html

http://www.slideshare.net/hyly_hll/how-japanese-horror-films-have-influenced-hollywood

http://www.life123.com/arts-culture/cinema/horror-movies/japanese-horror-movies.shtml

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Blog Assignment 9



Murakami Takashi "DOB totem pole"  2000


This is Murakami's work of four of DOBs stacked on top of one another as a totem pole.  Each DOB expresses different emotions.  The first one on the bottoms shows an emotion of being surprised with it's eyes dilated and mouth wide open.  It's like his arms spread out in a stop motion.  There is something about this pose that looks very innocent and kawaii with its disproportional body and simple facial features. As we progress up the image we see a completely different expression compared to the first one. The second Dob shows expresses of an unconscious lunatic.  Its oversized teeth clenched, a very constircted pupil, and the other swirly-eyed. The strange expressions of this one gives off a comical feel. The third Dob morphs back to its kawaii character. This one seems like it is mocking the laughing flower in its hand, how  its open mouth is shaped similarly to the flower, and its body also stiff like the stem of a flower.  Lastly the last character is the most grotesque-looking.  Dob is depicted with rows of sharp shark-like teeth and crazy eyes going in opposite directions.
All four versions of DOB look kawaii with its disproportional body, but as you move up the picture, the characters progress into different expressions. The bottom to top show a completely friendly and cute version morphed into a evil and crazy version of the character.



Nara Yoshitomo from drawing for Argentine Hag, 2002
This is one of Nara Yoshitomo's works of a drawing he created for Yoshimoto Banana's novel.  This image depicts a very unhappy young girl.  The background of this image is colored pink with pink floral patterns, giving off a childish and girly feel.  There's a scary element to the girl's eyes.  It's filled black and diluted, and not completely open.  She has very pointed web-like tears on the bottom of her eyes, also adding on to a sharp and scary feeling. 

Monday, February 20, 2012

Maki Haku- Woman

Poem 70-8 (Woman)



This is Haku's modernized rendition of the Chinese character, 女, meaning "woman". Haku was born as Maejima Tadaaki, but went by his alias name. Haku's was known best for his abstract-calligraphic prints.  

This print strongly embodies the meaning of a woman not just through the script but also through the shape and color.  The vibrant red against the black captures the viewer's eyes, giving the strokes of the character a striking image.  At the same time there's a feeling of serenity to it.  The strokes of the characters are calligraphic and curvaceous like a woman's figure.  Though the red color is bold and vivid, the simplicity of the art and the flow of the strokes adds an elegance to it.  When I looked closer at the red strokes, the surface of the strokes didn't look completely flat. I noticed that there are black markings on them.  The texture of the strokes looked rough and uneven, but as a whole it still creates a meditative and calmness to it.
I find it interesting that the artist chose to use red, which is a powerful color in traditional Japanese society.  Red represents power and energy.  In the past, Japanese women carried a subservient image, rather than power.  But in a different and more modern interpretation, red could also represent love and intimacy. In this aspect women are seen as important for bearing children and perpetuating family, rather than just objects of love.  While still conserving the traditional character, I feel as though Haku stylized the character while trying to incorporate a more modern aspect and meaning to the word.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Ukiyo-e Kabuki Dancer







This woodblock print is by Utagawa Kunisada.  It is titled "Eight Views of the East: Dew on the Flowers in the Evening Glow at Ryogoku."  This is one of the eight views of a section of Edo (known today as Tokyo), called Ryogoku.  Kunisada was one of the most popular and successful ukiyo-e woodblock print artist in 19th century Japan. His main occupation were woodblock designs of kabuki and actors.

Kabuki is a form of traditional Japanese drama with stylized song, mime, and dance.  Kabuki originates back in during the Edo period (1603-1868). Kabuki theatre was established as a popular type of theatre for the lower social classes.  In this print, Kunisada is depicting a male Kabuki actor portrayed as a woman. The actor's name is Nakamura Utaemon. He is wearing a kimono of many layers. Formal kimonos were comprised of many visible layers and patterns, which dictated a woman's social status, season, and occasion for which the kimono was worn. Kabuki actors dictated what was popular at the time.  The sense of fashion became stronger during the Edo period, and it was common for people to follow what a kabuki actor did.  The multi-layered kimono signifies that it is still cold outside, despite the blooming flower tree behind him. The flowers called cherry blossoms bloom during the end of winter to early spring.  In addition, the actor is wearing a floral layer part of the kimono, denoting that it is around spring time.

Seeing male actors playing female roles isn't foreign to the foreigners. Since in some societies it was considered disgraceful for a woman to go on stage, only men could become actors. Similarly, men took over female roles when women were banned performing during the Edo period.  Women were banned from appearing in kabuki due to the widespread prostitution of actresses and violent quarrels. Kabuki was restored in the Edo period in which more modern styles were adapted. It was the norm after 1629 that actors were performed only by men. Kabuki actors who specialized in female roles were called onnagata.  

In this print, the actor is in a mie pose, which is a moment frozen in time expressing a character's high emotional state through gestures and body movements. The actor in the print is expressing an emotion of surprise or shock.  By the way the actor's hands are lifted as if he is holding something, and how his gaze is fixed on his covered hands leaves the viewer curious and confused. Since the expression is a bit exaggerated, the actor's eyes widely open and his mouth slightly apart, it gives off a bit of a humorous element to this depiction because there is nothing to be seen to be interpreted as shocking or surprising. Then I focused on the other parts of this print, and saw writing to the left and right.  The writing is a poem celebrating the beauty of the cherry blossoms of the evening.  I went about researching the significance of cherry blossoms, and discovered that the flowers connotes a form of festivity and celebration.  At the time, cherry blossoms were seen as a metaphor for life.  It is praised for its delicate and beautiful appearance yet ephemeral existence, symbolizing the brief and transient nature of life. It was common that people ate and drank in cheerful feasts under these trees. 
What I got out of this print is that the actor was in the midst of carrying laundry baskets when suddenly a flower had fallen off the tree and landed on his kimono. 

The size of this print is oban (10w x 15h).  The quality of this print was great, nor was it poor.  There were a few smudges and noticeable fading of ink. Some colors were more concentrated in some areas than others. There were also some colors that went outside the borders of lines. 

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Ueno Hikoma Samurai and Foreigner 1860s or early 70s


This is a portrait titled “Samurai and foreigner” taken by Ueno Hikoma.  What immediately caught my attention was the only standing foreigner in the middle, who is surrounded by seven samurai.  The foreigner is wearing a western hat and jacket, while the samurai wear what seems like the everyday-wardrobe type of kimono.  It seems to me that the older men are standing in the back, and the younger men are sitting.  The samurai holding a white item in the middle looks the youngest.
What I found interesting were the contrasting qualities between the foreigner and samurai.  The foreigner stands in a tall and upright posture, compared to the frail and delicate looking samurai on his left, and the unhappy samurai with downcast eyes and tilted head.  In addition, I thought the arrangement of the men had an effect on the foreigner.  The foreigner sticks out like a sore thumb since he’s outnumbered and the fact that he's standing in the middle made it seem that the foreigner had some sort of superiority and importance, while the samurai are just sitting and standing in a pretty laid-back manner (excluding the samurai with arms crossed).  
The gazes of the men are dispersed in all different directions.  Most the samurai and the foreigner look pretty focused, while a few of them look like they are about to fall asleep.  By the looks of the samurai, many of them look disinterested. When I think of samurai, I associate the term with power and the feeling of intimidation. Their expressions don’t portray the usual honor, valor, and determination, the qualities of a samurai that I normally imagine.