The Action Genre in East Asian Cinema

The action genre is a persistent film genre with a strong literary, theatrical, and operatic tradition in East Asian cinema. This course traces the historical and cinematic evolution of the action genre from swordplay to kungfu to gunplay in Hong Kong, Japanese, and Korean cinema from the 1960s to the digital age. Students will acquire a critical vocabulary in visual analysis such as classical Hollywood narration, montage, continuity editing, and the `pause-burst-pause` pattern that are central to the punctuation of kinesthetic shocks in the action genre. We will explore how culturally specific codes of honor, loyalty, masculinity, and femininity (rooted in literature and theatrical codes) are lost or gained in translation as a result of film adaptations, international co-productions, and cross-cultural readings. Taught in English. All films are subtitled in English.