Korea Assignments

Student Project Gallery (forthcoming)

	O Chong-hui's "Chinatown" is framed by the stories of quite a few "outsiders"--social outcast, women (alienated figures but ironically the "center" of the household), the jobless father, the GIs, whores, Maggie, and the Chinese living in the shadow of that house on the hill. What do these "outsiders" represent? Compared to the Imitation Foreign Devil in Lu Xun's "The True Story of Ah Q," how are the Chinese represented in "Chinatown"? What are the Korean women characters' attitudes toward the Chinese living among them?
	Shiri, the second feature film by Kang Che-gyu (Jacky Kang), appears to be a Korean War inspired espionage thriller, but it creates a new film genre mixing Hollywood action movie cinematography and movements with Kang's unique stylized narration of romance and national allegory. What do the hypervisible shiri and the "invisible" liquid bomb symbolize in the film? What do the fish bowl and fish tanks contribute to the imaginary world of the transcient relationship between Hee and Ryu? Other than the plot function (fish with a bug plannted inside), what is shiri's role in the film?