Young-a Park
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780804783613
- eISBN:
- 9780804793476
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804783613.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Since 1999 South Korean films have drawn roughly 40 to 60 percent of the Korean domestic box office, matching or even surpassing Hollywood films in popularity. How did this Korean “film explosion” ...
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Since 1999 South Korean films have drawn roughly 40 to 60 percent of the Korean domestic box office, matching or even surpassing Hollywood films in popularity. How did this Korean “film explosion” come about? This book examines the Korean film industry’s success story from the viewpoint of a group of unlikely social actors-Korean independent filmmakers. It investigates the unexpected alliances among independent filmmakers, the state, and the mainstream film industry practitioners under the postauthoritarian administrations of Kim Dae-jung (1998–2003) and Roh Moo-hyun (2003–2008), and argues that these alliances were critical to the making of the Korean film sector as we know it. During this postauthoritarian/reform era, independent filmmakers with activist backgrounds who were part of the “democratic generation” or “3–8-6 generation” were able to mobilize the cultural repertoires and networks of their 1980s activism in turning themselves into important players in state cultural institutions. They also negotiated with the purveyors of capital and helped lead national protests against trade liberalization. Instead of simply labeling these alliances with the state, capitalists, and film industry practitioners as “selling out” or “co-optation,” the book explores how independent filmmakers transformed South Korea’s film institutions, policies, and narratives about film. This book is an ethnographic investigation of the political, social, and cultural contexts that created the Korean “film explosion.”Less
Since 1999 South Korean films have drawn roughly 40 to 60 percent of the Korean domestic box office, matching or even surpassing Hollywood films in popularity. How did this Korean “film explosion” come about? This book examines the Korean film industry’s success story from the viewpoint of a group of unlikely social actors-Korean independent filmmakers. It investigates the unexpected alliances among independent filmmakers, the state, and the mainstream film industry practitioners under the postauthoritarian administrations of Kim Dae-jung (1998–2003) and Roh Moo-hyun (2003–2008), and argues that these alliances were critical to the making of the Korean film sector as we know it. During this postauthoritarian/reform era, independent filmmakers with activist backgrounds who were part of the “democratic generation” or “3–8-6 generation” were able to mobilize the cultural repertoires and networks of their 1980s activism in turning themselves into important players in state cultural institutions. They also negotiated with the purveyors of capital and helped lead national protests against trade liberalization. Instead of simply labeling these alliances with the state, capitalists, and film industry practitioners as “selling out” or “co-optation,” the book explores how independent filmmakers transformed South Korea’s film institutions, policies, and narratives about film. This book is an ethnographic investigation of the political, social, and cultural contexts that created the Korean “film explosion.”
Young-a Park
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780804783613
- eISBN:
- 9780804793476
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804783613.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
By interweaving an ethnography of the Pusan International Film Festival, the author’s personal accounts, an overview of Korean modern history (with a focus on the emergence of the “democratic ...
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By interweaving an ethnography of the Pusan International Film Festival, the author’s personal accounts, an overview of Korean modern history (with a focus on the emergence of the “democratic generation”), and a review of relevant anthropological literature the Introduction sheds light on the question, What is the role of independent filmmakers in the “explosion” of Korean films in the postauthoritarian/reform era? The Introduction argues that the “explosion” of Korean film is a product of a wide range of new alliances among social actors and that independent filmmakers played a key role in creating this critical alliance. It asks whether this alliance can be characterized as “co-optation,” and goes on to engage social theories of state, activism, and media in order to establish the significance of the “explosion” of Korean films and the social and political context in which it occurred.Less
By interweaving an ethnography of the Pusan International Film Festival, the author’s personal accounts, an overview of Korean modern history (with a focus on the emergence of the “democratic generation”), and a review of relevant anthropological literature the Introduction sheds light on the question, What is the role of independent filmmakers in the “explosion” of Korean films in the postauthoritarian/reform era? The Introduction argues that the “explosion” of Korean film is a product of a wide range of new alliances among social actors and that independent filmmakers played a key role in creating this critical alliance. It asks whether this alliance can be characterized as “co-optation,” and goes on to engage social theories of state, activism, and media in order to establish the significance of the “explosion” of Korean films and the social and political context in which it occurred.
