Capstone Rough Draft

There was a big interest in Japanese horror movies in America during the early 2000s after the success of the American remake of “The Ring”. America started to remake many famous Japanese horror movies like “Juon” (it is called “The Grudge” in America), “One Missed Call”, “Pulse”, “The Eye”, and many others. There is one main question that many people asked about this phenomenon, why did remakes of Japanese horror movies become very popular in America? Was it possibly that Japanese horror movies are really different than most horror movies? Does it cause new thrills that American horror movies could not provide? What are the differences between American horror movies and Japanese horror movies? According to the director of “Ringu” and “Ringu 2”, Hideo Nakata, “The difference between Japanese horror and Western horror can be traced back to the difference in religious beliefs.” (Tadayuki, 2005) If people want to understand Japanese horror movies and American horror movies, they have to know the influence of religious beliefs behind both. Religious influence on Japanese horror movies, religious influence on American horror movies, and comparing Japanese horror movies and American horror movies on how the religious influence affects both.

Many Japanese horror movies can trace their roots back to religious beliefs and classical Japanese literature. (Tadayuki, 2005) One of the main religions in Japan, called Shinto, has made a big impact on all horror stories and movies in Japan. Most of the beliefs of Shinto revolve around the belief that there is an unseen world existing all around us. (Tadayuki, 2005) People have believed that ancestral spirits protect their descendants, but there is the belief that spirits of those who die violently are unable to make their final passage to the world of the dead and they reappear before the living until they fully avenge themselves. (Tadayuki, 2005)

Japanese horror movies base their stories on these beliefs. For example, in the movie “Juon”, two spirits haunt a house because they were murdered there. Japanese horror movies play with the Shinto belief of that “the rules of the universe are beyond human understanding.” (Chris, 2006) Japanese horror movies use this belief to not explain some rules of a haunting. For example, “The Ring” never explained why a spirit is haunting a video tape. They also follow the belief that “the universe is governed by rules”. (Chris, 2006) This has always been a central theme in Japanese horror; this often means that there has to be a sequence of events that must happen before terror can be revealed. (Chris, 2006) There are several examples that prove this like in the movie “The Ring”, a person must watch the haunted video tape and they receive a phone call that tells them that they will die in seven days. Also in the movie “Juon”, people have to enter the house, the one that the mother and son died in, to be haunted and later on be killed by the spirits. Japanese horror movies not only use Shinto as an influence, but they also are influenced by some classic Japanese literature. “The Story of Okiku” was about a maid who is killed by the samurai family that she is working for because she broke a plate in an extremely valuable ten plate collection. They dump her body in an old well and every night afterwards, she rises out of the well and she causes the samurai family to go insane and kill themselves. (Chris, 2006) There are some Shinto beliefs shown in the story (Okiku is killed and her spirit haunts the place) and some Japanese horror movies even borrow story elements from this story. For example, the movie “The Ring” uses the story element that the antagonist, Sadako, was killed by her mother and dumped in a well. Japanese horror movies base the looks of the spirits from “The Story of Okiku” and several other stories (like the “Snow Woman”). The Japanese portray the spirits in white funeral garb with long dark hair and they are usually female.

Japanese horror movies are influenced by the religion Shinto, while American horror movies base the central themes on Christian religious concerns and have religious symbolism. (Stone, October 2001) Every genre of horror has them. Sci-fi horror has tons of religious concerns as themes like the power of God over matters of life and death, sciences that abused nature, and trespassing on the territory of God. (Stone, October 2001) For example, the movie “Frankenstein” was about a scientist who brings a dead man back to life. Zombie movies deal with the concerns of life after death and sometimes the supernatural. For example, in the movie “White Zombie” a man turns to a witch doctor to bring his wife back from the dead. Vampire horror movies usually have lots of religious symbols such as crosses, holy water, and Eucharistic wafers. Also, vampires symbolize the devil because they will fully embrace evil, violate institutions of family, religion, and law, and they lure married or engaged women away from their husbands. (Stone, October 2001) For example, in the movie “Dracula (1992 version)”, Dracula lures Jonathan Harker’s finance away. Exorcism movies deal with religion itself and it always deals with the main conflict of God versus Satan. For example, in the movie “The Exorcist” had the conflict of two priests who have to exorcize a girl who is possessed by a demon. Nature gone wild movies have the religious symbolism of that nature represents the turf of God and they attack humans who trespass on that turf. (Stone, October 2001) For example, in the movie “The Birds”, birds start attacking people in a town for no reason. The point is that American horror movies have Christian themes and symbolism.

There are a lot of differences on how religion affects both Japanese horror movies and American horror movies. One, Japanese horror movies use their religious beliefs as story elements. While in American horror movies they just use religious beliefs as themes of the movies. Two, Japanese horror movies leave some of the plot to the imagination like that most of Sadako’s back story is unexplained in “The Ring”.

 On the other hand, American horror movies try to explain everything in the story making the movie less scary (there are some exceptions like “The Shining” and “The Birds”). (Chris, 2006)Third, “Both Buddhism and Shinto within the culture require the Japanese to accept a level of ambiguity about how the universe works. However, the Christian perspective tends to break the world down into good and evil categories.” (Chris, 2006) Fourth,  these points can be proven by comparing the original Japanese horror movies and the American remakes. In the American version of “The Ring”, everything about Samara’s (in the Japanese version her name was Sadako) life was explained to help explain various details of the plot. While in the Japanese version, most of her life is never explained. (Chris, 2006) Fifth, in American horror movies, the main conflict is the good trying to destroy the evil. While, in most Japanese horror movies, the main conflict is to put the spirit to rest so it can pass into the realm of the dead.

Religious influence on Japanese horror movies, religious influence on American horror movies, and comparing how Japanese horror movies and American horror movies show the differences in both cultures; overall, both countries put a lot of culture behind their horror movies. They try to scare the audience in different ways. American horror movies try to scare the audience by having characters decent into the unknown while Japanese horror movies often have the unknown invading the known. (Chris, 2006) For example, the movie “The Descent” a group of women explores an unexplored cave and they get attacked by creatures inside the cave. The movie “The Ring” has a ghost that comes out of the television to kill people. Horror movies from different countries can show how different they are with the culture and religion shown in their movies.

http://paulteusner.org/docs/paper.pdf

3362 Marshrun Dr.

Grove City, Ohio 43123

January 12, 2012

To whom it may concern

Owner

Seann’s Anime and Comics

5442 Monroe St. #2

Toledo, OH 43623

Dear Whoever:

My name is Tyler Austin and I’m a senior in the South Western Career Academy. I am working on a Capstone project this year. I wanted to do a research paper of comparing J-Horror movies and American horror movies. I need a person that I can get information about J-Horror movies from and I was thinking that you would be an excellent source of information of this subject. I just need to know about the movies and myth/folk tales that inspired J-Horror movies. Could I e-mail you an informational interview?

Sincerely,

Tyler Austin

time lapse questions

What equipment does Dakotalapse.com  use to create the videos on the site.

How long are the exposures?

How could you simulate the  technique with our technology

Define Time –Lapse Photography

Define Stop-Motion Photography

Define Bullet -Time Photography

Who is Ray Harryhausen, why is he famous?

After watching the dakotalapse videos and learning about time lapse, stop motion, and bullet time. Think of a way you could use this in a creative project.  How could you use this in a new and interesting way?

HIPAA q's

1.)HIPAA is an acronym for Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

2.) A.) HIPAA regulates the availability and breadth of group health plans and certain individual health insurance policies. B.) HIPAA regulates limits restrictions that a group health plan can place on benefits for preexisting conditions. C.) protects health insurance coverage for workers and their families when they change or lose their jobs. D.)HIPAA addresses the security and privacy of health data. E.) requires the Department of Health and Human Services to establish national standards for electronic health care transactions and national identifiers for providers, health plans, and employers.

3.) Small businesses will lose money faster because they have to keep up with HIPAA rules.

4.) It gives you privacy rights.

5.) yes

6.) A night or two in the hospital may cost tens of thousands of dollars.

7.) A 21 year old male in my zip code would get over 100 plans starting as low as $29.35 per month.

8.) A smoker would have more expensive health insurance than a non-smoker.

9.) The lowest cost for health insurance for a adult and a child is $57.85 per month.

10.)It would cost $694.20 per year.

11.) PPO- Preferred-provider organization

12. Network- a “network” of doctors/hospitals who have contracted with your insurer as participants in your specific plan.
    13.) Deductable- Some health insurance plans or prescription drug plans have an amount set that the patient is responsible to pay before the insurance will start picing up costs.
    14.) Coinsurance- the amount you are required to pay for medical care in a fee-for-service plan after you have met your deductable.
    15.)The Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act allowed commercial banks, investment banks, securities firms, and insurance companies to consolidate.
    16.) It helped the economy at the time.
    17.) The Safeguards Rule requires financial institutions to develop a written information security plan that describes how the company is prepared for, and plans to continue to protect clients’ nonpublic personal information.
    18.) Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act, Sarbox, SOX, Corborate and Auditing Accountability and responsibility Act, and Sarbanes-Oxely.
    19.) The bill was enacted as a reaction to a number of major corporate and accounting scandals.
    20.) Strengthening corporate accounting controls.

21.)SOX has introduced an overly complex regulatory environment into U.S. financial markets.

22. The homeland security act was encated in 2002 because of the Setember 11^th attacks and subsequent mailings of anthrax spores.
    23.) Department of Homeland Security
    24.) Emergency Preparedness and Response
    25.) Arming Pilots Against Terroism
    26.) Department of Justice Divisions
    27.) Corrections To Existing Law Relating to Airline Transportation Security
    28.) National Homeland Security Council
    29.) Science And Technology In Support of Homeland Security
    30.) Directorate Of Border And Transportation Security
    31.) Information Analysis And Infrastructure Protection
    32.) Treatment of Charitable Trusts For Members Of The Armed Forces Of The United States And Other Governmental Organizations
    33.) Coordination With Non-Federal Entities; Inspector General; United States Secret Service; Coast Guard; General Provisions
    34.) Information Security
    35.) Airline War Risk Insurance Legislation
    36.) Federal Workforce Improvement
    37.) Conforming And Technical Amendments
    38.) Transition
    39.) Management
    40.)Coordination With Non-Federal Entities

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