This essay aims to examine Korean motion picture policy from multiple perspectives, which had been understood from a simplistic angle of 'protection and nourishment' or 'control and repression.' Also, it aims to inquire what the characteristic of Kore...
This essay aims to examine Korean motion picture policy from multiple perspectives, which had been understood from a simplistic angle of 'protection and nourishment' or 'control and repression.' Also, it aims to inquire what the characteristic of Korean motion picture policy is and how South Korea recognizes the film industry. With this in mind, the study focuses on the specific period from the late Rhee Syngman regime through the Chang Myun regime to the early Park Chung Hee government. For it was the crucial period when a cardinal direction of Korean motion picture policy was decided and general characteristics of film industry was established. Additionally, considering it was from the late 1950s to early 1960s when Korean modernization began to form its full-scaled appearance and to engage in the change of motion picture policy, the study of film industry also requires an examination of Korean modernization.
Therefore, the essay sheds light on the purpose and specific contents of the motion picture policy and illustrates its effect on film industry by analyzing the status and structure of the industry. Especially, it proposes that as the production of Korean film got activated from the 1950s, the accompanying changes indicated the attempts for film industrialization. Also, it pays attention to how voluntary efforts from the world of motion pictures underwent changes through the state-led policy of modernization.
First of all, during the late Rhee Syngman regime, motion picture policy aimed at the protection of domestic films in accordance with a national goal, the so-called people integration, and the tax exemption policy for domestic films paved the way for the industrial development of Korean films. In this context, Korean film world began to take the initiative step toward industrialization including the formation of film production and system, and the production of genre films. However, the Rhee Syngman regime did not succeed in accomplishing the foundation of a centripetal state system and the development of modernization demanded from the social domain.
The main motion picture policy during the Chang Myun regime, unlike the previous regime, had been conducted as a precaution of comprehensive Agreement regarding Economic/Technical Assistance between the Government of Republic of Korea and the Government of the United States of America in order to reserve tax sources and to attain the economic development in the hope of solving the problems of national finance. It resulted from the effort of the national political measures for the economic modernization under the banner of 'Economy First.' However, the Chang Myun regime did not have sufficient time to achieve the goal of the policy and encountered difficulties in controlling social disorder. Meanwhile, the film industry had not yet overcome the war-time situation and the subject of film industry expressed its various demands for the policy of the nourishment of film in the democratizing atmosphere of the 4.19 Student Revolution.
The following Park Chung Hee's military government, which carried out the military coup d'etat on 16 May 1961, promoted the state-led modernization and mobilized all people and all societies by addressing the national discourse of 'modernization of the fatherland.' In addition, it consolidated the law and systems of various kinds by establishing the fundamental frame of a modern nation. According to it, the first motion picture law was enacted and was followed by the outset of motion picture administration. While the industrialization policy, which was a main motion picture policy during Park Chung Hee's government, was the state's policy of film industry, the foreign film import quota system was a policy that was initiated to promote the Korean films with foreign film earnings and had an impact on the formation of a foreign-film-focused market structure. As a result of the enactment of this motion picture policy, the industrialization of Korean film begun in the 1950s did not sustain and the dominant film industry lost its competitiveness by just relying on the state policy. Consequently, it led Korean cinema to the dark age of the 1970s. However, autonomous filmmaking practices had been formed from places of fissures where motion picture policy could not exert its control. It has also been shown that the film world was capable of forming its own structure in an active way even under repressive circumstances by not following the policy passively.
Through this discussion, we can understand not only that Korean motion picture policy was based on the statement that Korean films are inferior to foreign films, but also that there was no understanding of economic and cultural effect on the film industry with the simple emphasis on the commercial application of a film. Rather than the reality of film industry, the national situation in hand took priority of determining the policy. It resulted from that the national consciousness regarding motion picture policy had not ripened since Korean society considered modernization and the economic development as a top priority. In other words, the limitation of film policy during these periods was closely connected with the fact that the national development of South Korea remained at an early stage.
Since the late 1990, Korean films have been based on the development of economy, democratization, and civil society according to the modernization. The relationship between Korean government and film industry reciprocally has been changed and they positively tried to overcome the limit of a previous film policy and film industry. In addition, the government that recognized an economic effect of the film's industry carried out an essential promotion policy for the industry. Its recognition of cultural effect has brought about drafting policies that took issues of the diversity of film’s culture into consideration. In other words, the policy supporting the growth of film industry could come through the change of the government's recognition due to the development of Korean society and through the mutual relationship of the government and the film industry.
However, the growth of the film industry has stagnated because the market scale of the Korean film has reached the limit since the middle of 2000. Also, the FTA agreement between Korea and the United States has accelerated its incorporation into neo-liberalistic globalization phase. Thus, now is the time to request for a qualitative change beyond the existing growth-oriented policy so Korean film can continue to develop. In the present time when the growth of industry has arrived at a stable level, it becomes necessary to leave market issues to the industrialists and to take a public responsibility for the areas where the logic of capital does not reach. Above all, one of the most significant tasks is not only to make an abundant cultural environment and foundation so Korean film can be developed in the long term, but also to maintain its cultural identity and diversity.