South Korea Has Been Awarding Horror for Years
The Academy Awards, commonly referred to as the Oscars, are awards for ostensible artistic and technical achievement within the American film industry (and, often, beyond). Now, of course, savvy audiences know well that for every earnest ounce of recognition, there’s just as much shady, behind-the-scenes campaigning. This ain’t a scene, it’s a goddamn arms race. It’s hegemony, pure and simple, an industry awarding itself to retain cultural currency. That’s not an innately bad thing, per se. But for horror fans especially, it’s troubling. Why is horror never part of that self-aggrandization?
Sure, horror films haven’t gone without recognition completely. The Exorcist, Jaws, The Silence of the Lambs, The Sixth Sense, Black Swan, and Get Out have all been nominated for Best Picture. Their respective performers and scribes, too, have either been nominated or won awards. The Academy isn’t totally bereft of horror recognition, though it feels so special when it happens because, truthfully, it doesn’t happen often enough.
Sure, some horror fans strain credulity, arguing for genre nominations that aren’t really that deserving. But in recent years, there have been several bonafide snubs that easily call the Academy’s genre merits into question. Mia Goth’s performance in Pearl deserved genuine consideration. Decision to Leave should easily have snagged a nomination for Best Picture, Best Director for Park Chan-wook, and Best Actress for Tang Wei. Everyone and their mother know that Toni Collette’s shut out for Hereditary represents the most grievous of snub sins. So, while the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences might not recognize genre filmmaking writ large, there is at least another industry more than happy to right the Academy’s wrongs.
Enter South Korea.
Sports Chosun hosts the annual Blue Dragon Film Awards while The Motion Pictures Association of Korea hosts the annual Grand Bell Awards. Both voting bodies are awash in genuine genre recognition. They put the American film industry’s perennial reticence to even whisper horror to genuine shame. The Grand Bell Awards speak broadly to excellence within South Korean cinema, and their slate of nominees both past and present are aggressively horror diverse. Decision to Leave won the most recent Grand Bell award for Best Picture. Bong Joon-ho’s Memories of Murder won in 2003. Na Hong-jin’s The Chaser—arguably one of the best serial killer films of the century—won in 2008.
The Blue Dragon Film Awards are more inclined to nominate and recognize blockbusters. Decision to Leave also recently won the Blue Dragon Film Award for Best Film. In 2016, The Wailing, Train to Busan, and The Handmaiden were all nominated (Woo Min-ho’s Inside Men won the top honor). Snowpiercer was nominated in 2013. Mother won in 2009, and Thirst was nominated that same year.
Going back further yields the same results. The Academy Awards actualize the genre’s intent, at times appearing genuinely afraid of horror. Yet, the two major cinematic voting bodies in South Korea aren’t just willing, but actively eager, to recognize achievements within the genre. This isn’t to say that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences should be nominating the likes of Train to Busan for Best Picture. But it’s also to say; why not? What does Train to Busan do, other than being a zombie movie, that renders it any less deserving of recognition?
Within the broad landscape of American film and film in general, the disparity highlights the increasingly ridiculous need to isolate and compartmentalize genre film and horror specifically. Scream VI opens with a character rightfully expounding upon how horror, especially slasher films, are gateways into the societal ills and fears of their contemporaneous moment. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre better conceptualizes post-war ennui and strife better than most movies of the time. Scream is as pitch-perfect a window into 90s grunge and errant kids as anything else released that decade.
Horror movies aren’t just operating as vehicles for scares, but as cultural touchstones. They’re artifacts of bygone times and bygone (though sometimes enduring) fears. They’re as culturally relevant as any other genre, and often, no less technically impressive. Whatever the reason, the Academy Awards remain afraid. The easiest and most likely answer is ignorance. Ask any quasi film buff in your life what they think of horror and they’ll likely respond the same way. “Oh, I don’t watch that stuff.” “It’s too gory for me.” Decades of quick conceptualization have rendered a diverse genre as one thing. They’re violent body count movies, nothing more.
That isn’t true, of course, As the Academy continues to snub horror, they simultaneously snub audiences. For better or worse, that gold statue—even a nomination therein—is a gateway. Everyone has seen Michael Morris’ To Leslie now because it snagged an outfield nomination. That same spotlight could be cast toward horror. Yet, with the most recent crop of nominations, horror has been shut out. Yes, even Nope, which at the very least deserved a nomination for its sound design. Horror fans might then broaden their horizons. What the Academy Awards fail to see, South Korea has been highlighting for years. It doesn’t erase the damage, but it mitigates it. When the anger is heightened, just watch Park Chan-wook’s Thirst. You’ll feel better. I promise.
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