Week 9: Hollywoodisation i.e. De-Asianisation

Hollywoodisation, according to the Oxford Dictionary (online) is to ‘adapt (a story or series of events) so as to conform to the supposed norms of a typical Hollywood film, especially in respect of being unrealistically glamorous, exciting, or simplistic’ (Oxford University Press, 2013). With the prestige, and success of the Hollywood film making industry, is no wonder that films are influenced and re-made in order to appeal to a Hollywood audience (i.e. the majority of the world’s population).

A product of extreme hollywoodisation is the film The Ring. Most people would know this film as a 2002 American psychological Horror film starring the likes of Naomi Watts and Martin Henderson. What many people don’t know is actually a remake of the 1998 Japanese production Ring(“Ringu”), an adaption of a Japanese novel of the same name, written by Suzuki Koji.

Image from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2f/The_Ring_Poster.jpg/404px-The_Ring_Poster.jpg

Both versions of the film share almost indistinguishable plot lines, and were each co-written by Suzuki Koji himself. Both films were highly successful, with Ringu being referred to as ‘a landmark in horror cinema.’ (Film4, 2007)

Ringu Full Movie. Video from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUUt9kuQoZI

The Ring (American Version) trailer. Video from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuH5FaUpFm4

Due to the global dominance of the American Film industry (Wasser, 1995), the American re-make of Ringu, revealed up this story line to a more global audience, and created greater publicity for Suzuki Koji and his works.   

On one hand, this may be considered a success for Koji, as his works became part of a global phenomenon. However, at the same time, this hollywoodisation may have been considered as a de-asianisation; stripping The Ring of its Japanese origins to make way for the glamours of Hollywood. As a result, we may consider Japanese film producers stripped of their rightful praise, and thus, giving away the opportunity to challenge the Hollywood Film Industry’s hegemon status.

References

Demming, M. 2012, , Ringu (RIng) [Homepage of Flixter Inc.], [Online]. Available: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/ringu/ [2013, 27/09].

Lopez, J. 2013, , Curse of the Ring [Homepage of J. Lopez], [Online]. Available: http://www.curseofthering.com/books.php [2013, 27/09].

Wasser, Frederick 1995, ‘Is Hollywood America? The Trans-nationalization of the American Film Industry’ Critical Studies in Mass Communication. Vol 12. Pp423-437.

Week Eight: Celebrities. German star to Superstar.

Often referred to as the ‘German Brad Pitt’ (Deubel, S, 2010*) Til Schweiger, as well as being one of Germany’s most popular, and most successful domestic TV/Film stars; has become a valuable export, representing Germany in a number of Hollywood films.

Image from:  http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/19/ROMY_2012_47_Til_Schweiger_cropped.jpg/449px-ROMY_2012_47_Til_Schweiger_cropped.jpg

Image from: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/42/Brad_Pitt_4%2C_2013.jpg/400px-Brad_Pitt_4%2C_2013.jpg

More recently, Til Schweiger appeared in the Hollywood production of the film The Courier, in which he plays in a title role as an American FBI agent.

After seeing Til in some of his previous movies, Keinohrhasen and Zweiohrkueken (both produced for a German audience), and New Year’s Eve (A Hollywood production in which Til plays a German-American); it was interesting to observe Schweiger in a role in which his native accent was barely prevalent. At times even I could have believed that he was an American actor! Seeing this movie made me wonder whether, in order to appeal to a more globalised audience, Schweiger had undergone what Marshall would consider a ‘new reconstruction of how the self is reconstituted through the screens’ (Marshall, 2010)

This sort of acting maybe seen as a response to the ‘specular economy’ – a concept in which ‘we are becoming more conscious of how we present ourselves’ (Marshall, 2010).

Coinciding with the general perception that if you make it in Hollywood, you can make it anywhere, it is no wonder that international film stars such as Til Schweiger are prepared to ‘reproduce’ themselves as products of the Hollywood film industry. Through Amercan roles such as in The Courier; Schweiger has established himself as a Hollywood star, rather than perhaps, just a talented German export.

Already carrying the charm and looks of America’s Brad Pitt, the reconstituted Til Schweiger, through his ‘new’ American accent is seeing the success of Hollywood stardom. 

References

Marshal, P.D 2010, ‘The Specular Economy’, Society, vol. 47, no. 6, pp. 498-502

*Sina Deubel is my German exchange student, from Marburg, Germany.

Week Seven: Representation. A tweenagers view.

Being a stereotypical ‘tweenager’ (a few years back now) was caught up in The Sims revolution that swept through the Gen Y’ers of Mebourne.

After being shown the ropes of zombie fighting, car racing, and James Bond-esque type video games by my big brother, The Sims for me meant that I could participate in the gaming world without blowing someone’s guts out, or any sort of fighting for that matter.

Image From: http://th06.deviantart.net/fs71/300W/i/2010/341/6/d/zombie_part_2_by_devl29-d34gbf2.jpg

My Brother on the other hand, had no interest in The Sims whatsoever, instead found more enjoyment in his action-filled, zombie fighting, and street-racing games. At the time, completely disgusted at the thought of killing people, I often wondered how he could find such pleasure in games with such negative connotations.

According to Stuart Hall’s Encoding/Decoding Model (Hall, 1973), there are three different types of reading strategies used by an audience in order to interpret texts. 

The first one involves the consumer to take a Dominant/Hegemonic approach. This occurs whereby the consumer absorbs the meaning of the text exactly as it is written to be decoded.

The second, occurs when the observer is willing to accept the leading message intended by the creator. However, instead of receiving the meanings as literally is the dominant approach; the consumer applies question and modification to the meanings, understanding them in relation to their own experiences and beliefs. This is referred to as a Negotiated Approach (Hall, 1973).

Thirdly, consumers may also take an oppositional position when interpreting the meanings of a given text or media. This involves decoding of the dominant messages; for the sake of the consumers own interpretation.

Image from: http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2433/3589884253_a83a44df41_o.jpg

In regards to my experiences with video games, with time, I began to take an oppositional position in regards to the zombie games, as it was harder to accept as ‘real life’ than The Sims. As I could relate real life experiences that The Sims represented, I was more willing to take a dominant approach, and therefore experienced greater pleasure.

References

Hall, S. 1973, Encoding and Decoding in the Television Discourse. Birmingham [England: Centre for Cultural Studies, University of Birmingham, 1973. 507-17 (available: HYPERLINK "http://visualstudies.buffalo.edu/coursenotes/art250/250A/_assets/_readings/encoding_decoding_hall.pdf"http://visualstudies.buffalo.edu/coursenotes/art250/250A/_assets/_readings/encoding_decoding_hall.pdf )

Week Five: Überveillance. Orwell's 2013.

Image From: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/BigBrother.jpg 

Who would have thought that back in 1949, with the creation of the superficial icon of Big Brother, in George Orwell’s 1984, that today’s society would reflect the many aspects that make people shudder every time the word Oceania is heard.

In the 1940s, when social media was beyond existence, the concept of Überveillance is most likely to have been looked upon as science fantasy. There was no way that people would be willing to be under constant surveillance, especially when connected with the negative connotations produced by Orwell (Orwell, G; 1949)

However, with the trending modern technology, GPS tracking, social media tagging, mobile data networks etc, it seems that people are almost choosing to have their daily movements constantly tracked and surveyed, as having been micro chipped at the vet.

But what is Überveillance exactly?

According to M.G Michael, and K. Michael, Überveillance is ‘real time location tracking and conditioning monitoring.’ (M.G. Michael and K. Michael 2010) It is a concept that attempts to answer the questions of who/where/when? in the attempt to predict ‘a person’s expected behaviour, traits, likes, or dislikes’ Etc (M.G. Michael and K. Michael 2010).

Already by using social media, take Facebook for example; we are constantly showered with options to share our thoughts, likes, and locations with the online world. But what is the difference between this and Überveillance? Well instead of choosing to share your locations here and there, and the occasional like of a photo; Überveillance technology, such as ‘microchip implants’, provides constant flows of information about where and who you are, without the extra effort of checking in, or similar activity.

‘Think of Big Brother looking out.’ (M.G. Michael and K. Michael 2010) Instead of Big brother watching your every move from the outside, with the use of video and sound recording; Überveillance is the tracking of ones behaviour through their eyes, rather than the eyes of someone else.

In terms of the future, despite Orwell’s chilling warnings, we have continued to digress towards continual the continual surveillance of society. Who’s to say this won’t continue to intensify in the future...  

References:

M.G. Michael and K. Michael 2010 ‘Towards a State of Überveillance’ IEEE Technology and Society Magazine 29.2 (2010): 9-16. [Available at: HYPERLINK "http://works.bepress.com/kmichael/187" http://works.bepress.com/kmichael/187 ]

Orwell, George (1949). Nineteen Eighty-Four. A novel. London: Secker & Warburg.

Week 6: Community and Culture in the Blogosphere. It's not Small Small World

For this weeks post i had to stray from the underpinning theme of my blog, instead, delving into the inter-connectivity of the real and online culture via the blogosphere.

Here goes...

To everyone out there who was raised by the likes of Walt Disney and his magic, im sure you’ll all be aware of the painfully beautiful, yet very repetitive line

‘It’s a small world after all,’

Video From:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxvlKp-76io

From a young age, i personally, as I'm sure is the case of many other Y's, grew up sheltered under the belief that the world, with its ‘one moon and one golden sun’ was a single domain. One which wasn't going to grow any more than Arnold Schwartznegger's biceps.

Anything on the internet was not considered real, it was always part of cyberspace, or an online realm separate to the thoughts and behaviors of the real world. 

With recent online innovations, and trends such as blogging, i have come to believe that the distinction between what is real-world, and what is cyberspace is slowly disappearing from our understanding of reality, and it can largely be related back to culture.

A culture is something that defines one group of people from the next, through behavioural characteristics, beliefs, and understanding of the world around. Generally, culture is shared through the interaction of people usually with in a particular geographical region, and often is a way of defining one nation from the next. 

The blogosphere, according to Merlyna Lim, ‘connects familiar strangers based on ‘old’ and traditional boundaries.’ (Lim, M; 2012) It allows for the flow of culture between the real and online worlds, connecting people not only in these worlds as separate domains, but also, to an extent, personifying what we know to be the internet.

It is with the support of the blogosphere that real life culture can be shared between different geographical locations, as well as peoples online presence, individually and as part of an online community.

The Blogosphere means that ‘conventional boundaries and barriers can be transcended’, it forms a bridge between our everyday thoughts and the online world, creating a dystopia which makes me question my childhood belief that in fact 'it's a small small world.'

References

Merlyna Lim (2012) Life Is Local in the Imagined Global Community: Islam

and Politics in the Indonesian Blogosphere, Journal of Media and Religion, 11:3, 127-140, DOI:

10.1080/15348423.2012.706144