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New Korean Cinema

From the publisher’s website:

A wide-ranging analysis of one of the world’s most important contemporary film industries

  • Provides new insights into the relations forged between cinema and civil society since the early 1990s
  • Considers innovative and timely areas of concern such as globalization, transnationalism and new media
  • Contains in-depth analyses of key films like Chunhyang, Memento Mori, Peppermint Candy and Take Care of My Cat
  • Includes a glossary of key terms and bibliography of works on Korean cinema
  • Illustrated with 24 black-and-white stills

New Korean Cinema adopts a cross-cultural and multi-dimensional perspective and provides a comprehensive overview of the production, circulation and reception of modern South Korean cinema. Together with discussions of Korean society and culture, it considers the political economy of the film industry, strategies of domestic and international distribution and marketing, the consumption of films in diverse reception environments, and the relation of film texts to their cultural, historical and social contexts. Gathering critics from Asia, Europe and North America, New Korean Cinema contributes to the discussion of the complex role played by national and regional cinemas in a global age. It will be of interest to students and critics of Popular Culture and Film Studies as well as East Asian Studies and Korean Studies.

Contents

Introduction: JULIAN STRINGER

Part I: Forging a New Cinema

  1. Contemporary Cultural Production in South Korea: Vanishing Meta-Narratives of Nation: MICHAEL ROBINSON
  2. The Korean Film Industry: 1992 to the Present: DARCY PAQUET
  3. Globalization and New Korean Cinema: JEEYOUNG SHIN
  4. Chunhyang: Marketing an Old Tradition in New Korean Cinema: HYANGJIN LEE
  5. ‘Cine-Mania’ or Cinephilia: Film Festivals and the Identity Question: SOYOUNG KIM

Part II: Generic Transformations

  1. Putting Korean Cinema in Its Place: Genre Classifications and the Contexts of Reception: JULIAN STRINGER
  2. Horror as Critique in Tell Me Something and Sympathy for Mr Vengeance: KYU HYUN KIM
  3. Two of a Kind: Gender and Friendship in Friend and Take Care of My Cat: CHI-YUN SHIN
  4. ‘Just Because’: Comedy, Melodrama, and Youth Violence in Attack the Gas Station: NANCY ABELMANN AND JUNG-AH CHOI
  5. All at Sea?: National History and Historiology in Soul’s Protest and Phantom, the Submarine: CHRIS BERRY

Part III: Social Change and Civil Society

  1. Peppermint Candy: The Will Not to Forget: AARON HAN JOON MAGNAN-PARK
  2. The Awkward Traveler in Turning Gate: KYUNG HYUN KIM
  3. Memento Mori and Other Ghostly Sexualities: ANDREW GROSSMAN AND JOORAN LEE
  4. Interethnic Romance and Political Reconciliation in Asako in Ruby Shoes: HYE SEUNG CHUNG AND DAVID SCOTT DIFFRIENT

Glossary of Key Terms: CHI-YUN SHIN
Bibliography of Works on Korean Cinema: SOOJEONG AHN.

LKL says:

The pleasure with this book will be in returning to it and in finding that the articles which may not have connected with you the first time round are now the most interesting. It is a book to which, because of its great diversity, one will return in the future to appreciate new aspects.

LKL rating: score-2score-2score-2score-2score-0. Read our review of this book here.

External links:

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