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ASIAN AMERICAN ISSUES
Is Corean (Korean) Cinema the New HK Cinema?
t the peak of its Golden Era between the mid-80s and early-90s Hong Kong cinema was defending nearly half its domestic box office turf against Hollywood imports, thanks to an unusual concentration of mega-talents like John Woo, Chow Yun-Fat, Jackie Chan and Tsui Hark. No other film industry in the world had been able to claim that for a half century. What's more, some HK kung-fu and gangster flicks outdrew Hollywood thrillers in many international markets.
Corean heartthrob Won Bin
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Hollywood's strategy for coping with the HK threat? Simple and devastatingly effective -- buy up the biggest box-office draws. The result has been an epic shift: the top HK talents have been reduced mostly to coolie-ing on Hollywood formulaics while HK cinema has become a parched gulch with bounding tumbleweeds and half-hinged screen doors banging forlornly with every hot gust.
Corean American Shiri star Kim Yoon-jin
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But just as Asian Americans resigned themselves to having screen images hijacked by a remarkably Asian-unfriendly Hollywood, Corean cinema began throwing off heat. Beginning in the early 90s a hardy new generation of Corean filmmakers made themselves fixtures at the award ceremonies of Cannes, Venice and other international film festivals. By the turn of the century Corea's Pusan Film Festival emerged as Asia's premiere celluloid bazaar. But that was small potatoes, not enough to catch the notice of an industry whose real lifeblood is box office.
Then came Shiri (1999), Kang Jae-gyu's lovingly-wrought, haunting thriller about a deadly North Corean female terrorist who falls in love with exactly the wrong guy. It became the first domestic film in history to break the 2 million ticket mark for the Seoul metropolitan area (which accounts for about 25% of the Corean market), and went on to outgross Hollywood blockbusters like The Mummy, The Matrix, Titanic, Star Wars Episode One and Toy Story. Its $5 million budget is less than a tenth of what Hollywood spends at the drop of a dime but was considered a daring gamble. It paid off. Domestic box office receipts ultimately spiked past $60 million, ensuring an unexpected profit for the film's backer Samsung Entertainment -- and more importantly, whetting the appetites of investors for more "big-budget" projects.
Director Kang took pains to point out that Shiri's success was founded on a painstakingly crafted screenplay -- something few Corean directors had bothered with before then.
In 2000 and 2001 alone, two Corean films surpassed Shiri's box office benchmarks: Joint Security Area (DMZ military mystery/drama, 2000) and Friend (male-bonding, 2001). These blockbusters have stimulated a general upsurge of interest in domestic films. Films like Friend and My Sassy Girl (romantic comedy) outgrossed Hollywood megapics like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. They helped make Corea the only market in which domestic films captured over 50% of box office receipts, with Hollywood fare attracting 40%.
As the saga of Hong Kong cinema has shown, nothing yanks Hollywood's chain like being kicked at the box office. Major studios have begun importing Shiri, Musa (co-starring Zhang Zhiyi as a Ming princess rescued by Corean swordsmen) and other Corean films for limited U.S. theatrical release and video distribution. More significantly -- or ominously, depending on your perspective -- they have begun signing Corean talent. One is actress Shin Eun-kyung who starred in the popular comedy My Wife Is a Gangster (2001) which outgrossed Lord of the Rings. Shin will play the female lead opposite Andy Garcia. Miramax even paid $1.1 million for the remake rights to My Wife Is a Gangster.
Is Corean cinema the new Hong Kong cinema? Or will an Asian version of Hollywood ultimately emerge in Corea?
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WHAT YOU SAY
[This page is closed to new input. --Ed.]
(Updated
Tuesday, Apr 1, 2008, 06:07:16 PM)
"The fact of the matter is, they can't make real hip hop because they aren't from the streets. Now, I don't know about the social environment in Korea, but I doubt it's as rough as the streets of Oakland, Compton or Bed Stuy. They can listen to the likes of Tupac, Necro, Ill Bill, Slum Village, and Dilated Peoples all day, but can never be like them."
--Toi San Jai
You assume those Korean artists are trying to be exactly like the US artists. They're not. It's my understanding that they wouldn't want to be like those so called true hip-hop/rap/etc artists. Because most of the native Koreans do not come from the kind of neighborhoods of American rap artists, many of the lyrics in those songs are either unappealing to Koreans or are just not anything they could relate to. So Korean artists simply modify it to fit their audience and write lyrics that young Koreans can relate to. Apparently it works rather well in Korea and in other overseas Asian markets. It's the same story, people will take what they like, leave out the rest, and modify what they like to fit their tastes. You see this in all cultures.
GDS KA
Friday, April 19, 2002 at 07:15:04 (PDT)
TSJ I am amused that you think rappers have to come from the meanstreets of "Compton" or "Inglewood." That is a bunch of crap. Rap might have originated from such roots, but its hard to say that rap is still completely a product of the "ghetto."(I wonder if Nas or JZ still live in the "streets," and I can attest that Snoop no longer does; he lives a couple blocks from my friends in a suburban white neighborhood) The degree of "roughness" of the neighborhood that a rapper is from does not reflect the quality of the music. Koreans copy or attempt to emulate American hip-hop because of the good beats and quite frankly because it is a staple in main stream pop culture. You shouldn't compare Korean "rap" to American rap becuase nearly all the korean gasoos aren't trying to emulate American rappers or their lifestyles.
theajushi
knamja@hotmail.com
Thursday, April 18, 2002 at 21:59:15 (PDT)
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