Fear Inducing Japanese Horror, Explained by the Director of “The Grudge”
Defining fear: How fear differs in Japan and the US
by Takuma Go
Takashi Shimizu is a movie director known for directing one of J-horror’s most iconic pieces, The Grudge. We talked to him about the difference between Japanese fear and fear from other countries, as well as how to portray fear that crosses country borders.
Is the fear “scary” or “surprising”?
After releasing Juon in Japan in 2002, I worked on the Hollywood remake The GRUDGE and the sequel The GRUDGE 2, and through these experiences I started to understand the difference between fear in Japan and fear in America. When it comes to horror, no matter what country, it’s a genre that creates entertainment from fear. However, the portrayal of that fear varies differently depending on if it’s “scary” fear or “surprising” fear. The culture and social climate of the countries are where I feel America and Japan differ the most.
In basic terms, American audiences tend to prefer “surprising” fear that makes them jump out of their seats. And after being scared, the audience often bursts our in laughter. It’s kind of similar to riding a roller coaster; they like to enjoy a physical sense of fear. Especially with the traditional American tradition of Halloween, there is a tendency to “enjoy” or “have fun” with fear in America. From kids to adults, everyone understands that Halloween is a world of fantasy, allowing them to truly enjoy themselves on a societal level. This is why most American’s burst out laughing after being surprised with a scary experience.
A Japanese person who has been living in America told me that although he used to be scared of traditional Japanese ghost stories, after spending a long time in America and getting used to the culture and traditions, the Hollywood-style of horror has become more effective at portraying fear in a direct fashion. Basically, he said there is more reality to be felt from the type of horror that is based on “logic-defying beings attacking people with evil intentions”. This is why Hollywood-style horror is based in the direct sense of physical fear that comes from the idea of being attacked, eaten, or killed by various creatures and monsters. This type of fear, which could be labeled as masculine fear, comes from the real fear humans feel when we sense physical danger and is a fear that transcends cultural barriers. Thinking about it, for a multi-cultural country like America, this type of fear is what should be expected.
On the other hand, Japanese audiences prefer the “scary” type of fear that affects them indirectly and psychologically. This is the type of fear that quietly builds up, creating an impending sense of intangible doom. Many Japanese people feel that the image of a ghost just standing nearby, doing nothing, is much more fear-inducing than other images. That’s why these types of scenes are often used in Japanese horror. Although this may come from religious values, the idea of a ghost just standing nearby is enough for Japanese people to imagine what type of memories or regrets haunt the ghost internally. Japanese feel the most fear when those feelings are filled with negative memories and emotions. Most American’s may look at these situations and think, “What is scary about a ghost that doesn’t attack you?” But it’s this sense of foreboding silence that truly induces fear into Japanese audiences. In Japanese, there is a word called “WABISABI” that represents the Japanese ideal that imperfect objects are more beautiful than perfect objects, or, for example, one single cut flower is more gracious than a full flower garden. I think this Japanese ideal of “WABISABI” is an essential ingredient in today’s Japanese horror. Compared to the masculine fear in American horror, Japanese horror could be described as a feminine-type of fear.
How to overcome language barriers and express Japanese horror
Although words like “NOROU (invoke evil upon)” and “TATARU (come back to haunt)” are essential keywords when it comes to Japanese horror, I believe these words are unique to Asia. In Asian countries, when you use words like “NOROU” and “URAMI (grudge)”, you are able to create an unwelcome image of something that is silently creeping up, bringing along a warm, damp feeling around one’s body. This is not masculine violence, but instead is a metaphor for feminine fear. Although it may not be able to directly cause physical violence, it’s internal “memories” and “regrets” are universally accepted to be incredibly powerful. These emotions are what make up the psychological fear brought about by words like “NOROU” and “TATARU”.
However, it is extremely difficult to explain these words and concepts to people from English speaking countries. For example, when I was directing the Hollywood remake of “JUON” and tried to explain how I wanted to make the meaning and feeling of the NOROI much deeper to the producer, Sam Raimi, he translated that as making the curse “more angry”. But it’s not about anger! It’s not that simple! No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t effectively portray this idea. But as I kept trying to explain how NOROI is something that is a very deep and heavy concept, NOROI was translated as “curse”. All of a sudden, it started to feel like some historical curse, like a curse from the pyramids, and the concept started to drift away from what I had imagined. I was in trouble.
Although we ended up calling the movie “THE GRUDGE”, it was very difficult for me to make that decision. In Japanese “GRUDGE” is translated as “NETAMI”, which is similar to resentment or jealousy. In Japanese, “NOROI” is not the same as “NETAMI”, so there was no translation available that could effectively portray what I wanted to say. In the end, the only think we could do in order to appeal to an audience that speaks a different language and has a different cultural background is to find a way to express the motives without relying on a shared common view. All we could do was to search for words or phrases that were similar to the original idea of the movie. This was essential in order to have foreign audiences understand Japanese horror, and I believe it gave movie fans in America a brand-new horror movie experience.
The Japanese are a people who have found beauty in equating “repressing one’s true feelings” with “humility”. This is also one of the moral foundations of Japanese culture. Due to this fact, the type of fear that affects Japanese people the most is when these repressed feelings become the source for the fear. This aspect of Japanese culture is incredibly hard to express to western audiences, which is why I believe “JUON” was so well received, since it was able to portray this unique sense of fear. I think many American viewers went away from the film thinking, “I’ve never experienced a type of horror like that before.”
The horror movie format and Japan’s ghost story culture
Among all the different movie genres and story formats, films in the horror genre tend to stick to a similar format more than other films do. In Japanese horror films, there is a particular format that is often used known as the “Konaka Theory(1)”, which I also spent time using when I was younger. You can also think of traditional Japanese ghost stories as another type of format for horror content. Japanese ghost stories are constructed similarly to Japanese comedy, and the two share a very similar format. I think this is mainly due to the story-telling rhythm that has formed over the long history of the Japanese people.
(1)Konaka Theory: A method of directing horror films created by screenwriter Chiaki Konaka after working with director Norio Tsuruta.
Directing with certain rhythms that are familiar to the audience is a very useful method when creating films. On the other hand, there are many people who get completely hooked on formats and story-telling rhythms from cultures that are not similar from their own. In my case, I’m always trying to create my own unique style by digging deep into typical rhythms and formats, but I always try to look at the way other directors like Stanley Kubrick use framing and slow cuts to create unsettling scenes for viewers to watch.
Honestly, from a director’s point of view, filming something to surprise the audience is nothing special and really any director can pull it off. If you want to make the audience jump, all you have to do is just catch them off guard. Let’s take a typical horror movie scene where someone is following the character from behind. Add some dark and brooding music, and slowly move closer to the character. BANG! Someone grabs the character’s shoulder, and after turning around, the character sees the person chasing her was her friend. I find these horror tropes silly and embarrassing. I mean, it’s unnatural, don’t you think? If your friend were following you, he or she would call out to you before surprising you. But in Hollywood horror movies, these types of scenes are expected. It’s almost promised to the audience since the movies follow similar formats.
Recommended viewing for people interested in Japanese-style horror films
Although it’s not really horror, the film that continues to scare me is Yoshitaro Nomura’s KICHIKU (English title: The Demon) (1978). Based on a story by Seichi Matsumoto that takes place in 1970’s Japan, the film revolves around the murder of a child that spurs from problems between a husband and wife. When I first saw this movie on TV, I was in elementary school and still living in the countryside. I was overcome with empathy as I watched the character of the son slowly lose the ability to trust even his own parents because he is unable to comprehend the problems they deal with. The empathy I felt filled me with fear-inducing anxiety. To me, this masterpiece is far more shocking than any war film I’ve seen.
Although his film actually falls under the human suspense category, not horror, but the way it creates emotionally stressful situations is exactly why I feel it represents Japanese horror. I mean, the title KICHIKU itself is incredibly menacing. However, if you are not familiar with the Buddhist teachings of cyclic existence(2), you wouldn’t be able to understand what the word means. Obviously, a Japanese word would make no sense to American audiences, so when the DVD was released in the US, it was titled The Demon. For a Japanese person like me, the word demon (AKUMA) doesn’t really fit this film but translations are just something you have to accept.
(2) Cyclic Existence: a Buddhist term that refers to the process of cycling through one rebirth after another within the six realms of existence, where each realm can be understood as either a physical realm or a psychological state characterized by a particular type of suffering (God, Demi-God, Human, Animal, Hungry Ghost, Hell)
Even now, just hearing the main theme song for this film makes my hair stand on end. The experiences we have when we are young children are incredibly influential on how we grow and live our lives, which is a concept that you can also find in JUON. But Japanese society has changed dramatically since the release of this film, and I doubt the younger generation even understands what the word KICHIKU represents. If elementary school children saw this movie today, I don’t think they would feel the same fear that I experienced. As you can see, this idea of fear changes even in the same country, so if you factor in different generations as well as different cultural backgrounds, it becomes even more difficult to express this particular type of Japanese fear. This is why Japanese horror films have to continue to evolve and find new methods to make viewers experience true Japanese fear.
(translation: Nelson Babin-Coy)
Originally published at ignition.co.
