Premodern History and the Contemporary South Korean Period Blockbuster

Abstract

The chapter positions the historical film as a long-standing, popular and culturally important genre within South Korean cinema. In applying contemporary examples as case studies, the chapter looks at how genre filmmaking can present a distinctive Korean-ness and a quality transnational filmmaking style by utilising local issues and socio-historical contingencies with technological developments. The historical film and hybrid genre form that emerges effectively combines Hollywood blockbuster aesthetics and characterisation with a cinematic imaginary of the Korean past. In doing so, it offers an important barometer of South Korean social, political, and cultural direction framed by their traumatic past and modern post-colonial sensibility. Thus, the chapter concludes that the historical film emerges as a transcultural genre that can point to many indices of Korean film history.