Korean artists excel once given opportunity

Korean artists excel once given opportunity

By Mark Russell Coming out of the wreckage of the Korean War, Seoul was mostly rubble, with some 80 percent of the city leveled. Everything would have to be rebuilt. But with materials and money in short supply, that reconstruction needed to be prioritized. So it is telling that two of the earliest buildings constructed after the War were movie theaters. Built with money from organized crime, actually. It is a sign of how important cinema and entertainment was, and is, to people in Korea. And although all the arts have had their ups and downs over the years, few people could have imagined in 1950 how big and influential Korean entertainment would become, both at home and abroad. By the 1960s, the Korean movie industry was booming, producing hundreds of films each year as people flocked to theaters in incredible numbers. Many of the directors of this period have become legends, producing famous films that have earned praise from around the world. Sadly, though, the good times did not last. First came television, and as in most countries around the world, television took a big chunk out of the movie business, as people decided to stay home and watch the tube rather than go to the cinema. But the decline in movies in the 1970s was a result of more than just television. Increasingly the government of the day cracked down on movies, forcing production companies to merge and submit to government control, censoring stories, restricting imports and generally taking control out of the hands of filmmakers. Although there were a few notable filmmakers to distinguish themselves, generally speaking the industry as a whole was on life support until the late 1990s, when a new generation of filmmakers brought forth new ideas and attitudes, with a firm focus on entertainment and flash. Shiri was the first of the Korean mega-blockbusters, overtaking Titanic and showing the Korean film industry it could compete at the highest level. Shiri was followed by JSA, then Friend, Taegukgi, The Host and many other notable films. For the next decade, Korean hits kept getting bigger and bigger, until it became the well-known success story it is today. For the past three or four years, the Korean movie box office has hovered around $1 billion a year, with local films accounting for 40-50 percent of admissions (and a high of 65 percent in 2006). Television made its debut in Korea on May 12, 1956, when the American RCA company launched the tiny, 100-watt HLKZ-TV from downtown Seoul. (North Korea would have to wait until 1963 to get its own Central TV Broadcasting System.) But the studio mysteriously burned to the ground in 1959 ― many think the fire was deliberate, set by government supporters who thought the station was too independent. For the next couple of years, the only Korean television available was the U.S. military’s AFKN, which allowed a couple of hours a day for Korean content. Finally on Dec. 31, 1961, Korean TV got going again with the launch of the Seoul Television channel, which would eventually become Korea’s main state-run station KBS (Korea Broadcasting System). TBC (Tongyang Broadcasting Corporation) would start in December 1964, followed by the radio station MBC (Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation) entering television broadcasting in August 1969. Such diversity and independence would not last long, however, as the military regime forced TBC to merge with KBS to form KBS-TV2 in 1980, and MBC became a de facto public broadcaster in the 1980s. As in most of the world, once television got its start, it spread rapidly ― from 300 sets in 1957 to 30,000 in 1962, to 6.3 million in 1980. Along with the growth in TV sets and stations there was growth in programming. Imports accounted for one-third of all programming in 1969, but just 16 percent by 1983, and then 10 percent by 1987. Today, the free-to-air channels broadcast very little foreign programming, leaving it instead to the cable channels. The only privately owned TV station in Korea, SBS, would not explode on the scene until 1990. With SBS, competition to get the best actors, writers and directors really stepped up, and over the next few years some of the most popular, highest-rated TV programs ever entertained the masses ― shows like Tears of Dawn, Hourglass, What on Earth Is Love? as well as Sons and Daughters. Later in the 1990s Korean TV stations started to look overseas for markets for their programs, and when they did, what an impact they had. Winter Sonata, Jewel in the Palace and other programs created huge followings and obsessive fans all over the world, from Singapore to Japan, and increasingly in the Middle East, Eastern Europe and even South American and Africa. But in terms of changing culture in Korea, I would argue that the rise of cable television was even more significant than those famous exports. Korean cable launched in 1994 and for years was little more than an afterthought. Then Friends became a huge hit, unlike anything before shown on cable, rivaling even the big terrestrial networks. And then came Sex & the City and CSI, and soon cable TV was a huge, dynamic market, introducing international tastes and trends faster and deeper to Korea than ever before. On another note Nevertheless, of all the pop arts, music is the most important in Korea. There are reports by Chinese diplomats from over 1,000 years ago, describing how much Koreans love music. Following the Korean War, many people found work playing music for American audiences in army bases around the country. Gradually the top talent from the base scene began to leak out and create a new music wave in Korea. Shin Joong-hyun, He6, the Key Boys and many more stars created a uniquely Korean take on early rock music that grew into a phenomenon. Sadly the good times could not last, and government crackdowns in the mid-1970s pretty much ended that scene. For the next 15 years, Korean music became much softer and unthreatening, and the live scene lay comatose. By the 1990s, however, the energy in music revived, with new stars promoting new sounds and selling impressively. The biggest of those stars was Seo Taiji. His combination of hiphop and dance transformed music in Korea, laying the foundation for today’s K-pop industry. Following Seo Taiji, a whole host of music management companies sprung up, starting with SM Entertainment, looking to industrialize the process of creating teen pop stars. H.O.T was their first success, but soon dozens of others clamored for musical attention. SM Entertainment followed a more Japanese-style formula in its music. JYP Entertainment (which launched Rain’s career, and today is home of the Wondergirls and 2pm) was more American in their organization. YG Entertainment (Big Bang) promoted a hip hop stance. Yet even as Korean music companies were evolving and becoming ever more savvy about creating pop stars, suddenly the Internet arrived and completely transformed the music industry here. President Kim Dae-jung spearheaded a massive rollout of high-speed Internet that soon had Korea the most wired country in the world. So when the Internet infiltrated the music industry, it devastated the local scene faster and harder than anywhere else. Physicals sales of CDs and cassettes fell from nearly $500 million in the late 1990s to barely $50 million last year. Whereas there were once over 5,200 music stores in Korea in 1999, today there are just a few dozen. As a consequence and nearly as quickly, online and digital music sales in Korea took off. By 2004, Koreans were spending more money on digital music than they ever did on CDs and tapes (if you can remember those). Music companies had to scramble to deal with this transition. Today, the actual music is a just small part of being a music star, as music labels must create complete entertainers and manage all aspects of their careers. These changes also forced music labels to try harder than ever to extend their presence abroad. Japan is so much larger than Korea, companies hunger for success there, but China and South Asia also beckon. And, of course, the United States remains the biggest prize, but as of yet, Korean stars have had only mixed reactions there. Animation and comic books Animation and comic books also have had a compelling history since the end of the Korean War. Despite getting a cool reception from the Korean government for decades (in 1980 the government called science fiction animation “an empty and meaningless illusion”), comics and animation kept building and getting stronger, until they really took off in the 1990s. At one point in the late 1990s, Korea was producing nearly half of all the animation in the world. The rise of the Internet also greatly changed comics in Korea, as online artists were able to create whole new genres and business models. This was led by prominent artists such as Kang Full, Shim Seung-hyun and Kim Poong. If there is a larger theme of how entertainment has developed since the Korean War, I think it would be how success and openness have generally gone together. When the government has controlled the entertainment industry or when restrictions have closed off markets, the industry has generally withered. The politics of dancing When governments get involved in the arts, the arts inevitably become politicized. More than subsidies and quotas, the most important contribution the Korean government has made to entertainment industries over the years has been when it helped improve transparency. Not that subsidies are always bad, but openness, freedom and transparency are the best tools for entertainment companies. The 1988 Seoul Olympics and dynamic democratization were essential to Korea’s amazing creative revival during the past 20 years. The economic crisis of 1997-98 also led to the entertainment industries growth and substance. The incredible success of the iPhone, Android and other smart phones, with their open application markets, are now transforming online culture in Korea, too. Korea’s entertainment business has been noticeably spurred on a boom with the Korean Wave “Hallyu” which was ignited by brilliant overseas activities of its pop culture stars engaged in film, music, and animation. Hallyu, which started as a new genre of foreigners’ demand for dramas, films and pop music in 2002, has generated keen interest from more foreigners trying to learn about the beauty of Korean traditions and customs. The Hallyu surge, which peaked around 2005, led growing numbers of foreigners to choose Korea as a honeymoon destination. One thing Korean artists have proven over and over again is how creative and powerful they can be any time they are given the opportunity. Rising from the ashes and recovering from a war, Korea has emerged to become one of the primary countries exporting their culture, spreading their artistic influence around the world. The Korean entertainment industry is now on a roll. What will be the next step in Korea's entertainment industry? So what do you do after a revolution? As described in the main story, the Korean film industry went from near-extinction in the 1990s to grow several times exponentially and become a huge success, creating enviable blockbusters and earning respect from prominent critics. Today, however, the movie industry in Korea is mature, with less room for expansion than a decade ago. So instead the film business is wrestling with how to succeed (or at least survive) in an increasingly competitive and constantly changing environment. One big change that needs to take place, though, is with secondary markets ― what we used to call “home video” ― as well as licensing and all the other ways movies can create profits in the West. After all, Hollywood gets only about 30 percent of its revenues from the movie theaters. The rest comes from TV, DVD, toys and lunchboxes, and all that fun stuff. The Korean movie industry, on the other hand, gets around 80 percent of its revenue from the movie theaters. This is a very dangerous situation. For one thing, it makes filmmakers very dependent on just one source of revenue (theaters), and if something goes wrong (say, someone decides to open Transformers 3 at the same time as your movie), that can ruin a producer, almost instantly. It also changes the kind of movies that get made. Teenagers drive the movie theater market, so more movies get made for them. And as fewer films get made for older audiences, those markets either dry up or they look for fun elsewhere. DVD sales in Korea were never very big, even at their peak, and thanks to the ubiquitous high-speed Internet, they have now almost completely disappeared. This is a time of transition, with online markets still developing and changing the entertainment industry. But for the Korean movie industry to gain secure stability in the future, it needs to develop those secondary sales opportunities more urgently. Past and future of Korean music Despite the many amazing successes of the Korean pop music industry, I fear that the music business will not be truly healthy in Korea until it diversifies and once again embraces live performance as its foundation. It can be hard to imagine these days, but for hundreds of years, the foundation of Korean music was freeform, creative live music. Musicians in Joseon (1392-1910) times were expected to combine ideas from different teachers and come up with new sounds. This foundation was evident in the amazing rock music that Korea produced in the 1960s and early 1970s. Fuzzy guitars, long jams (Shin Joong-hyun has many songs over 15 minutes long), and beautiful vocals combined to create a special music scene. Sadly, though, Park Chung-hee’s government did not approve, and squelched that movement. Today, there is once again a live music scene (mostly around Hongik University in western Seoul), but it is commercially tiny, and very few acts ever cross over from the indie community to the mainstream. At present, with CD sales gone and pop music firmly in the hand of teenagers, the importance of growing Korean indie music cannot be overstated. The big summer music festivals that have sprung up in recent years ― Pentaport, Jisan Valley, Mint Festa, and more ― are meaningful first steps to encouraging a more organic and mature music foundation. The emergence of those festivals in Japan in the mid-1990s played an essential part in the revival of its alternative scene. Hopefully a similar type of awakening can happen here. Today, the vast majority of potential music fans are being overlooked by the local music labels. Developing a better and more varied live music culture is the best way to increase appreciation and exposure to music choices for everyone in Korea. Who is the writer? Mark Russell was the Korea correspondent for The Hollywood Report, Billboard and other international publications. He also wrote the book Pop Goes Korea: Behind the Revolution in Movies, Music and Internet Culture (Stone Bridge Press, 2008), the first comprehensive look at the Korean entertainment industry in English. In addition, he is the founder of the Korean music blog the Korea Gig Guide (www.koreagigguide.com).