This course examines films of three representative South Korean directors, Bong Joon-ho, Kim Ki-young, and Park Chan-wook, over the span of five decades. Some scholars call their films cult films. Others use “Asian extreme cinema,” a suspicious term saturated with Euro-American centrism, to refer to these directors’ non-normative narratives and styles. Regardless of these different nomenclatures, Bong, Kim, and Park are now regarded as the most important South Korean directors. One of the themes that bind these three directors together is transgression or deviation. Indeed, films of these directors explicitly challenge the social norms and tackle such issues as class division, gender inequality, inequitable society, and heteropatriarchy. Though it is impossible to view and analyze all their works, this course aims to follow their trajectory of filmmaking from their early works to their most recent work or swan song. By studying and comparing the works of these representative filmmakers intensively, this course also examines how these directors communicate with one another through styles, techniques, and artistic visions. Along with films by the three directors, students will also view Korean films of transgression made by women directors. Throughout the semester, we will also seek to answer the following questions: “what makes a great director?”, “who grants and recognizes the canonical status of films?”, “why aren’t there more representative women directors?”, and “can we decolonize Western-centrism in film studies by studying cinemas of small nations?”
Course Requirements:
Active participation, quizzes, response papers, and a final research project.
Intended Audience:
Advanced FTVM majors/minors and other majors who are interested in film aesthetics, national cinema, film theory, and auteur studies. It is highly recommended that students have previously taken at least one film analysis/history/theory course. No prior knowledge of the Korean language is required.
Class Format:
Two 90-minute seminars weekly.