East Asian Film Genres in a Globalizing World

Catalog description

Connections between different cinemas within East Asia and between East Asia and the rest of the world explored from a genre perspective. Hong Kong and Korean gangster movies, Chinese swordplay and Japanese samurai films, and horror films from Japan and Thailand as examples of the transnational circulation of genres, involving processes of both localization and globalization. Focus on three interrelated genres: the martial arts film, the Eastern Western and the film noir/crime film. Explore Hollywood-centered genre theory, trace complex webs of creative influences, and appreciate the sameness and difference that characterizes both genre films and our globalizing world. Make a short "genre film" for screening at the end of the term