E-Book Overview
Over the last two decades, Japanese filmmakers have produced some of the most important and innovative works of cinematic horror. At once visually arresting, philosophically complex, and politically charged, films by directors like Tsukamoto Shinya (Tetsuo: The Iron Man [1988] and Tetsuo II: Body Hammer [1992]), Sato Hisayasu (Muscle [1988] and Naked Blood [1995]) Kurosawa Kiyoshi (Cure [1997], S?ance [2000], and Ka?ro [2001]), Nakata Hideo (Ringu [1998], Ringu II [1999], and Dark Water [2002]), and Miike Takashi (Audition [1999] and Ichi the Killer [2001]) continually revisit and redefine the horror genre in both its Japanese and global contexts. In the process, these and other directors of contemporary Japanese horror film consistently contribute exciting and important new visions, from postmodern reworkings of traditional avenging spirit narratives to groundbreaking works of cinematic terror that position depictions of radical or 'monstrous' alterity/hybridity as metaphors for larger socio-political concerns, including shifting gender roles, reconsiderations of the importance of the extended family as a social institution, and reconceptualisations of the very notion of cultural and national boundaries.
E-Book Content
Nightmare Japan
Contemporary Cinema
4
Series Editors Ernest Mathijs & Steven Jay Schneider Editorial Advisory Board: Martin Barker (University of Wales-Aberystwyth) Wanda Bershen (Founder, Red Diaper Productions) Mark Betz (University of London, King’s College) David Bordwell (University of Wisconsin-Madison) Sean Cubitt (University of Waikato, New Zealand) Roger Garcia (Former Director, Hong Kong International Film Festival) Joke Hermes (University of Amsterdam) Jim Hillier (University of Reading) Mark Jancovich (University of East Anglia) Douglas Kellner (University of California-Los Angeles) Soyoung Kim (Korean National University of Arts) Amy Kronish (Consultant in Jewish & Israeli Film) Barney Oldfield (General Manager, Angelika Entertainment) Murray Pomerance (Ryerson University, Canada) Michael Renov (University of Southern California) David Schwartz (Chief Curator of Film, American Museum of the Moving Image) M.M. Serra (Executive Director, Film-Makers Cooperative) J. David Slocum (New York University) Christina Stojanova (University of Regina) Kristin Thompson (University of Wisconsin-Madison) Contemporary Cinema is a series of edited volumes and single-authored texts focusing on the latest in film culture, theory, reception and interpretation. There is a concentration on films released in the past fifteen years, and the aim is to reflect important current issues while pointing to others that to date have not been given sufficient attention.
Nightmare Japan Contemporary Japanese Horror Cinema
Jay McRoy
Amsterdam - New York, NY 2008
Institutional support: The Centre for Cinema Studies, Department of Theatre and Film, University of British Columbia Illustration cover: Fukasaku Kinji’s Battle Royale (© Tartan Video). Cover design: Pier Post The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of “ISO 9706:1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents - Requirements for permanence”. ISBN: 978-90-420-2331-4 ISSN: 1572-3070 ©Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2008 Printed in the Netherlands
To Amy, as Always…
CONTENTS List of Illustrations Acknowledgements
ix xi
Introduction:‘New Waves’, Old Terrors, and Emerging Fears
1
Guinea Pigs and Entrails: Cultural Transformations and Body Horror in Japanese Torture Film
15
Cultural Transformation, Corporeal Prohibitions and Body Horror in Sato Hisayasu’s Naked Blood and Muscle
49
Ghosts of the Present, Spectres of the Past: The kaidan and the Haunted Family in the Cinema of Nakata Hideo