Japanese Horror

We spent some time in the realm of Japanese horror for our third week. I read Kwaidan, a collection of short stories and I watched Audition; a film by Takashi Miike. Both media share similarities in the way the tales are constructed, even if they do depart somewhat from each other in terms of endings.

As I was reading Kwaidan it occurred to me how much like campfire ghost stories each tale was. Most of the stories within Kwaidan dealt with the supernatural in terms of vengeful or restless spirits. This is no real surprise considering Japan’s deep spiritual beliefs about nature and the afterlife. A vast majority of Japanese practice the Shinto religion which centers on the connection between the past and present through the appeasement of kami, or gods and spirits. The Japanese also have a deep respect for nature and have designated several spots throughout Japan as places of power. In particular, mountains have always been seen as the realm of the dead and are often considered holy or sacred. I think it’s important to keep these traditions in mind when analyzing Japanese horror as nearly all of its writings, horror or otherwise, have been influenced by its spiritual beliefs.

The Japanese belief in spirits is not just limited to those helpful kami, but also revolves around the Oni. They are depicted as demons, devils, ogres or trolls that seek to destroy or disrupt the individual, especially when that person has done something dishonorable or deserving of punishment. This belief provides a well of material for any Japanese horror writer as the figure of the demon has been present in Japanese art and literature throughout its history.

This style of writing also coincides with the Western tradition of story-telling that often sees the evil-doer getting his or her comeuppance in the end.  It is this similarity that led to me to associate the stories in Kwaidan to our own Western campfire ghost stories. However, I feel that there are still significant differences between the two formats in the way the stories resolve. In a lot of Western folktales, the story ends upon the discovery of the supernatural source, ending the tale very shortly after the climax (i.e. …and they were never seen again). With a lot of the Japanese writings, it felt like the story continued for several more beats after the climax or discovery of the source of the supernatural. This made the story feel stale or slow by comparison and reduced its impact on me. Indeed, a lot of the stories had very slow parts where nothing much happened until suddenly the vengeful spirit appears and is just as quickly gone. Overall, I found the stories to be unrefined and lacking any real strength in terms of their ability to frighten me. I also failed to recognize any obvious moral to most of the stories as it was rarely the main character that had to learn anything. Typically the main character runs across another who had either been cursed or was an Oni in disguise. They either dispatch or aid the other character, depending on their nature. The main character either dies or goes on his way to tell his tale to others. There was so little variation in structure from story to story that reading them in procession was a bit of a task.  I also found that the image of the evil spirit has varied little throughout Japanese history. What scared them hundreds of years ago continues to provide a source of fear today. Note the similarities in the images below.

As for the movie, Audition, I found myself forgetting that I was watching a horror film; so little was the actual horror component. It felt more like a romantic movie until the very end where it turned into a gore-fest that was shocking only in its depiction of violence. I was further distracted by the director’s usage of flashbacks that were not actually flashbacks but some warped reality that the main character was experiencing. It seemed disjointed and took me out of the film rather than pull me in further. Overall, I didn’t find that the main character deserved his fate. I also didn’t feel that there was a moral to the story other than “there are crazy women out there that want to cut your feet off so beware of who you date.”

In summary, I don’t find anything compelling or frightening about Japanese horror and without a convincing reason to try it again I will likely abstain from it in the future.