Accented Horror

October 24, 2021 8:53 AM

Mainland Chinese Horror & Censorship [11:11]
Thai Horror Is So Underrated [13:35]
A Brief Overview on J-Horror (Part 1) [15:08] (Part 2) [13:18]

For non-Mainland Chinese horror, see The Eye: Philosophy of Chinese Horror [11:49] and Mr. Vampire: How to Write Family Horror [12:54]. For J-Horror left out of the overview, there's Noroi: Realistic J-Horror [13:53]. For K-Horror there's a (spoilery) Train to Busan: How to Kill a Character (or three) [13:18]

Chinese-Canadian filmmaker and photographer Yang Zhang's YouTube channel Accented Cinema features video essays with an emphasis on East Asian films of all kinds. His essays on Ip Man were featured previously.

posted by ChurchHatesTucker (3 comments total)

Thanks for posting these! I watched the videos above the fold and enjoyed them all. As essays, they seem like a mix of introductory content aimed at people who haven't seen these films and then also like engaging and opinionated reviews that include representative scenes.

Just incidentally, J-Horror pt.1's overview of 1950s-1960s horror skips The Ghost of Yotsuya (1959), and to me that film stands out in a way that nearly breaks the pattern yet also helps contextualize Ringu (1998). Like, it's still based on folk legends / ghost stories like the other 50s-60s films mentioned in the video, but like later horror it's, uh, waaaay scarier--it had to have been terrifying in the 50s--and it also features a ghost with the onryō ghost look from traditional theater, vaguely similar to the ghost in Ringu.

I can only find a Portuguese-subtitled version on Youtube, but the relevant scares are here, here, here, and here [all massive spoilers].
posted by Wobbuffet at 9:49 PM on October 24, 2021 [3 favorites]

they seem like a mix of introductory content aimed at people who haven't seen these films and then also like engaging and opinionated reviews that include representative scenes.

A redditor described his style as "how an older brother shares his experience and knowledge to his younger brother" which feels right.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 10:14 PM on October 24, 2021 [2 favorites]

I watched Pee Mak last night bc of this post, and ... it wasn't great ... but it was light going and silly, and that was actually what I wanted right then so I enjoyed it.
posted by fleacircus at 7:17 PM on October 27, 2021 [1 favorite]