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Celluloid Democracy tells the story of the Korean filmmakers, distributors, and exhibitors who reshaped cinema in radically empowering ways through the decades of authoritarian rule that followed Korea's liberation from Japanese occupation. Employing tactics that ranged from representing the dispossessed on the screen to redistributing state-controlled resources through bootlegging, these film workers explored ideas and practices that simultaneously challenged repressive rule and pushed the limits of the cinematic medium. Drawing on archival research, film analysis, and interviews, Hieyoon Kim examines how their work foregrounds a utopian vision of democracy where the ruled represent themselves and access resources free from state suppression. The first book to offer a history of film activism in post-1945 South Korea, Celluloid Democracy shows how Korean film workers during the Cold War reclaimed cinema as an ecology in which democratic discourses and practices could flourish.
Open Access
Celluloid Democracy Cinema and Politics in Cold War South Korea
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Reviews
"A fascinating and polished piece of scholarship written in clear and vivid prose. I don't know of any other book quite like this one. Moving away from the traditional focus on auteurs and film texts, Kim masterfully draws our attention to the critical yet often forgotten figures working on the margins of the postwar film scene, filling in some substantial gaps in our understanding of this period."—Christina Klein, author of Cold War Cosmopolitanism: Period Style in 1950s Korean Cinema