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Brushed in Light: Calligraphy in East Asian Cinema
Drawing on a millennia of calligraphy theory and history, Brushed in Light examines how the brushed word appears in films and in film cultures of Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and PRC cinemas. This includes silent era intertitles, subtitles, title frames, letters, graffiti, end titles, and props. Markus Nornes also looks at the role of calligraphy in film culture at large, from gifts to correspondence to advertising. The book begins with a historical dimension, tracking how calligraphy is initially used in early cinema and how it is continually rearticulated by transforming conventions and the integration of new technologies. These chapters ask how calligraphy creates new meaning in cinema and demonstrate how calligraphy, cinematography, and acting work together in a single film. The last part of the book moves to other regions of theory. Nornes explores the cinematization of the handwritten word and explores how calligraphers understand their own work.
Figure 7.1. 13 Assassins (13-nin no shikaku, 2010): calligraphy written by mouth, by a woman whose arms and legs were cut off by a rival, with tears of blood splashing the page. The assassin displays her message—“Kill them all”/みなごろし—before slaughtering the villain.
Figure 7.2. The last writing of Mizoguchi, from the documentary Kenji Mizoguchi: The Life of a Film Director (Aru eiga kantoku no shogai, 1975). In the tradition of Buddhist disciples capturing the moment of death of their master through calligraphy, his screenwriter gave him pen and paper the day before he died. The director wrote, “The chill autumn air has already arrived. I want the pleasure of working with all of you at the studio.” On the lower left above the seal, it says, “Mizoguchi Kenji’s last writing (zeppitsu); recorded by Yoda Yoshikata.” The seal has the crushed character for 義, the third character in Yoda’s name.
Figure 7.3. In What’s a Film Director? (Eiga kantoku tte nan da?, 2006), every wispy line of Oshima Nagisa’s painting registers his lack of bodily control and his utter will to finish. From the fading ink, it is clear he wrote backwards (left to right), starting with his name.
Figure 7.4. The Human Promise (a.k.a. A Promise, Ningen no yakusoku, 1986) starts with a title card that mixes (from left to right) Semi-Cursive Walking Style, Seal Style, Standard Style, and Cursive Grass Style.
Figure 7.5. Then as the credits for The Human Promise proceed, the character 人 (human) repeats on every single frame; in the manner of a signature, every iteration of the character—like every human in history—is the same but slightly different.
Page 160 →Markus Nornes is Professor of Asian Cinema at the University of Michigan, where he specializes in Japanese film, documentary and translation theory. He has done extensive programming on the international film festival circuit, especially at the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival. He has written books on Japanese documentary, City of Sadness, film translation, and a critical biography of director Ogawa Shinsuke. Nornes has also co-directed a number of films, including The Big House (2018). He is currently working on a biography of filmmaker Adachi Masao.
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