Over the past few decades, Japanese culture has attempted to permeate the West. Manga and Japanese comics have had a modicum of success with films like Miyazaki’s Princess Mononoke; however, Japanese horror, or J-horror has had the most overwhelming effect. With their deliberate pace and roots in mythology, ghost stories and religion Japanese filmmakers have created some of the most nuanced, multi-layered films in the genres recent memory.
Culture shock, however, keeps the West from truly understanding the depth of Japanese horror. Remakes of Ring and Juon into The Ring and The Grudge, respectively, have attempted to acclimate themselves to a new country but a gulf of differences remain between our two cultures. Unfortunately, the West is too often unwilling to learn these differences. So the question begs, is ignorance bliss? If we knew the cultural references would these films still frighten us to such an extreme degree?
As with most cultures, religion plays an in important part in the day-to-day life of the Japanese people. Two religions dominate society, Buddhism and Shinto. As opposed to the differences between Christian, Jewish and Islamic faiths in the West, these two Japanese religious views have a tendency to cross lines. For instance, many families practice Shinto weddings while the same family may follow a typically Buddhist burial service. The absence of a particular deity but rather a philosophy guiding life allows for a blurring of the lines between the two religions. Rituals are followed out of tradition, not out of a specific religious affiliation.
Buddhism is a religion teaching that life is a cycle. While many Buddhist stories focus on the physical, Shinto teaches that the dead can not only be preyed to but also spoken to. Shinto’s creation myth describes a land of the dead as an entity described as Yormi. Shinto rarely deals with death directly but rather opts to infer that each person has a soul that can be stuck in between the living and the dead if that person has an overwhelming abundance of emotion upon their death or is not given the proper burial. Most importantly is the notion that the Japanese do not define themselves by one religion thereby allowing a certain ambiguity in the telling of their stories.
Ghosts and monsters also have their own identities known as the Youkai and the Yurrei. The Youkai are physical beings of a bizarre nature that typically follow Western motifs including goblins and giants but they are more often than not benign creatures. More important to the discussion of modern Japanese horror are the Yurrei. Yurrei are ghosts that have been left in our world with unfinished business, typically with a great deal of emotion surrounding them. As a person transcends into the Yurrei they discard their human life and focus solely on what is keeping them from resting. Unlike the Youkai, the Yurrei are entities of malicious intent.
Described often as Onnen, the idea that spirits return from the grave because their emotions are so strong that they are compelled to finish their Earthly business, the Yurrei can most noticeably be seen in the modern film Ring (1998) directed by Hideo Nakata. Ring is the tale of a reporter, Asakawa (Nanako Matsushima), who stumbles upon a videotape that, if watched, spells the demise of the viewer seven days later. The antagonist is Sadako, a young girl whose father killed her and discarded her body in a well. Sadako is the classic archetype of the Yurrei. She is a vengeful spirit, dressed in a white garment. This is important, as it is the traditional funeral robe for the Japanese people. This is an example of the differences in our cultures as it is a reference that most Americans do not understand. Also, the image of the long, black hair streaming over Sadako’s face is a typical trait of the Yurrei. Most often portrayed as women, the hair represents the freedom of a Japanese woman in death. The culture’s history of female oppression is relieved in death. The Yurrei’s hair is free to be let down as her emotions are freed while attacking her oppressor.
Another characteristic of the Yurrei is its reliance upon rules. We in the West have a tendency to believe that ghosts have free reign over their territory however, the Yurrei are hindered by a belief structure. The existence of both Shinto and Buddhism in the Japanese culture requires a certain amount of reconciliation between the two religions. Hence, a certain amount of ambiguity exists when explaining the afterlife. Japanese horror has a solution in its reliance upon rules. These rules however, need not be grasped or understood by the ethereal world but the spirit world must adhere to them. Take for example the aforementioned Ring. The videotape restricts Sadako. Someone must watch the tape for his or her fate to be sealed however, if said person convinces someone else to watch the tape, the previous person is now off limits to Sadako. She has a singular focus, to find the one responsible for her death and her inability to cross over. All others are merely a means to that end. They are incidental.
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n Japanese horror, rules govern the spiritual world as much as they govern the physical one. The Yurrei must adhere to these rules becoming the Magoffin that keeps the plot rolling while the human characters discover how to break the rules.
Japanese horror, however, is not restricted to ghosts and goblins. Japanese genre films are often indicative of graphic violence with an undercurrent of sexual depravity. J-horror’s current auteur of this sub-genre is Takashi Miike. His films including Ichi the Killer (2001), Audition (1999) and Sukiyaki Western Djano (2007) have captivated audiences while also turning stomachs over the course of the past decade. This trend can be seen in Miike’s own Imprint (2006). The 13th installment of the Masters of Horror collection tells the story of Christopher (Billy Drago), an American journalist in Victorian era Japan searching for a lost girlfriend, Komomo, on an island inhabited by prostitutes and those they serve.
Often focused upon, and rightly so, is the intense amount of graphic violence Miike portrays during Imprint. One scene depicting the torture of Komomo in which needles are slowly and methodically slid under her fingernails in extreme close-up is a perfect example of the extreme violence depicted throughout the course of the film. The television network, Showtime, shelved Imprint for this very reason.
Also an example of J-horror’s tendency toward violent content is in Miike’s Audition. The story of a man, Shegeharu Aoyama (Ryo Ishibashi) holding auditions for a new love interest takes a disturbing turn when the winner of the audition, Asami Yamazaki (Eihi Shiina), turns the tables on Aoyama revealing herself to be a violent sadist. She places acupuncture needles in his eyes while later amputating his foot with a piano wire. While much can be said regarding the symbolic uprising of the Japanese female against her male oppressors the violent content is what most take away from the film.
Sometimes known as “pinky films”, this tendency toward violent, exploitative content is not nearly as atmospheric as the Yurrei ghost stories thereby failing, in the eye of some, to truly terrify its audience. That doesn’t seem to matter though. The filmmakers of these violent films, like Takashi Miike, are presenting their audience with the other and daring you to watch.
American horror is too often hindered by its incessant need to explain away and intellectualize that, which is inherently unexplainable. There is an element of control that American horror places on its films without realizing that horror is about a loss of control. Japanese horror is far more willing to leave things open ended. We don’t know why Sadako exudes so much power in Ring or why she uses a videotape to return. Where does the creaking sound in Juon come from how does that curse exactly work? These questions leave the audience with a festering need to understand thereby giving the films a weight that is missing among many American films of the genre.
While culture shock may prevent a Western audience from understanding the slight nuances of Japanese horror, its focus on atmosphere and understated mood keep us intrigued. J-horror can be subtle or overtly violent. It can confound with its tendency to leave its constructs in the dark. However, if Western audiences are willing, there is an entire culture waiting to be unveiled.
Critical Mass 