Abstract
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Conventional reports often hint at how Koreans gained fijilm industry experience and
training in Korea and Japan during the 1920s and early 1930s under Cultural Policy
reforms. Yet, few studies consider the full range of influences that motivated their contributions
to a local vibrant popular entertainment industry and to the global transition
to sound. This article attempts to recast the story of cinema in colonial Korea by
offfering new insights into the productive and destructive characteristics of colonial
modernity. The exhibition of talkies from Japan and the West (primarily the United
States)—as early as in 1925 and more regularly after 1930—inspired Korean fijilmmakers
and technicians to experiment with sound technology in a way similar to others
around the world. Producing a small number of talkies on “locally-made” equipment
enabled them to reach out to millions of cinemagoers and to contribute to a “goldenage”
of cinema—rather than simply “collaborating” with the Japanese. In the process,
they constructed new spaces for the expression of Korean language and culture
within and despite the political and cultural boundaries of colonialism. Colonialism
involved entangled degrees of entrepreneurialism, nationalism, and modernity—particularly
for those who dreamt of bringing modernity to Korea and sought the type of
cosmopolitan lifestyle found in a fijilm production center such as Seoul,