Seoul Searching: Culture and Identity in Contemporary Korean Cinema

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Frances Gateward
State University of New York Press, Feb 1, 2012 - Performing Arts - 328 pages
Seoul Searching is a collection of fourteen provocative essays about contemporary South Korean cinema, the most productive and dynamic cinema in Asia. Examining the three dominant genres that have led Korean film to international acclaim—melodramas, big-budget action blockbusters, and youth films—the contributors look at Korean cinema as industry, art form, and cultural product, and engage cinema's role in the formation of Korean identities.

Committed to approaching Korean cinema within its cultural contexts, the contributors analyze feature-length films and documentaries as well as industry structures and governmental policies in relation to transnational reception, marketing, modes of production, aesthetics, and other forms of popular culture. An interdisciplinary text, Seoul Searching provides an original contribution to film studies and expands the developing area of Korean studies.
 

Contents

Introduction
1
PART 1 Industry Trends and Popular Genres
13
PART 2 Directing New Korean Cinema
97
PART 3 Narratives of the National
189
Contributors
299
Index
303
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About the author (2012)

Frances Gateward is Professor of Film Studies at Ursinus College. She is the editor of Zhang Yimou: Interviews and coeditor (with Murray Pomerance) of Where the Boys Are: Cinemas of Masculinity and Youth.

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