- Global Voices - https://globalvoices.org -

Watch a Short History of Japan's Frighteningly Good Horror Films

Categories: East Asia, Japan, Arts & Culture, Citizen Media, Film
onibaba [1]

A still from the 1964 horror film Onibaba [2]. Screencap from YouTube [1].

If you're interested in Japanese horror movies, YouTube channel One Hundred Years of Cinema [3]‘s short 15-minute documentary-style overview of the genre is for you.

A Short History of Japanese Horror [4]” takes a look at horror in Japanese culture, from the genre's roots in folk stories and Kabuki plays throughout the ages.

The video covers many Japanese horror classics, including “Kaidan” [5] and “Onibaba” [6] from Japan's Golden Age of cinema [7] in the 1950s and 1960s to more contemporary landmark horror films such as “Tetsuo: the Iron Man” [8] and “Ringu” [9].

Other short documentaries on the YouTube channel include “How Metropolis Changed the Way We See the Future” [10], “The Invention of Cinema (1888 to 1914)” [11] and “What do possessed hand movies tell us about fear?” [12]

If you want to learn more,  “So You Want to Read Japanese Horror: Here’s Where to Start” [13] by Feliza Casano for Unbound Worlds [14], a website focused on literary coverage of science fiction and fantasy, is also a good place to start.