Week 3: "J-Horror"

          

(Illustration by Danielle Otrakji)

         Along with the moster, vampire, frankenstein class of characters and themes, I am most fascinated with J-Horror at this specific time in my life. It is partly because I find it to be the most frightening category within horror literature and film. My artwork is heavily influenced by Japanese horror and the visual elements in it. My nightmares are also heavily influenced by J-horror and it's a wonderful but unsettling thing. Japanese writers approach the idea of 'monsters' in their stories so differently than American writers. There is often times more revenge or reason behind the stories in Japanese horror and the characters are typically evil as a result of something torturous or traumatizing in their past. I think what I find most frightening in Japanese Horror films and literature is the ghostly elements intertwined with modern technology (Like white-noise on a television, inexplicable phone calls from ghosts, computer screen glitches, and spirits emerging from the TV), paired with the overall foreign quality they have (to an American or non-Japanese viewer of course). In Japanese horror films, the stories are not overpowered with heavy soundtracks or special effects. They move rather slowly, creating a lot of suspense and anticipation, and that slow pacing emphasizes the creepy, eerie mood most of the Japanese horror films possess. They have a very raw quality to them, making it easy to put yourself in the film, therefore making them as sinister and eerie as they are. 

        Kwaidan, the collection of traditional ghost stories, is a good example of the revenge most spirits in J-horror experience. It is easy for the reader to perceive the spirits as evil, because they kill on instinct, when really they are often times tortured souls, or enraged with a personal struggle, and kill out of that rage. Many American films are beginning to embrace the themes and qualities of J-horror, and often times readapting specific films like "The Grudge", "The Eye", and many more.