Investigation, Realisation, Recognition: Women Editors in South Korean Horror Cinema

by: Alice Haylett Bryan , February 6, 2024

Korean cinema scholar Molly Kim writes that ‘the history of Korean female filmmakers is not short, but it is thin’ (2020: 136). Films helmed by women in South Korea are few, and horror films even less so. However, to only look at directors is to tell just one side of the story. This video essay celebrates the proliferation of women editors working in the horror and thriller genres in Korea. These women have edited some of the most successful Korean films and television shows of all time including Gwoemul/The Host (2006, edited by Kim Sun-min) Ojing-eo geim/Squid Game (2021-, edited by Nam Na-yeong) and Seom/The Isle (2000, edited by Kyeong Min-ho). Kim Sun-min and Nam Na-yeong in particular have had prolific careers, each working on many lauded projects and winning numerous editing awards across Asia. Of the top ten domestic films with the highest admissions of all time in South Korea, seven were edited (solely or in part) by women. This statistic is reflected in the winners of the Best Editing category of the Grand Bell Awards (the Korean equivalent of the Academy Awards): since 2011, seven of the ten recipients have been women (KOFIC 2023). This is significant, given Korea is a nation in which domestic productions are as popular (if not more so) than imports from abroad. The prevalence of women editors is not a new phenomenon either. Lee Kyeong-ja has had a career as an editor dating back to the 1950s, including collaborating with celebrated director Yu Hyun-mok at the peak of his career. However, critical and popular writing on Korean film and television remains drawn to the directors of these works, resulting in a lack of recognition of these female practitioners. The names of these women remain largely unknown outside of the industry.

Whilst scholarship on Korean women directors is slowly gathering pace (Kim 2023), little to no attention has been paid to editors. This is nothing new. The analysis of editing is often understood through the creative decisions of the director, and the editors themselves are rarely mentioned. For example, the influence of D.W. Griffith on editing practice is widely celebrated, yet there is little mention of Rose Smith, the editor who collaborated with him on many of his films (Pearlman and Heftberger 2018). Furthermore, as Valerie Orpen notes, most texts on editing focus on ‘canonical’ examples, suggesting that editing is ‘only effective when it is memorable’ (2003: 11). Yet what is distinctive about editing is that it often goes unnoticed. Orpen also explains how key introductory works such as David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson’s Film Art: An Introduction focus on the ‘connective properties of editing… narrative coherence rather than expressiveness’ (2003: 10). Texts such as Bordwell and Thompson’s present editing as a process or system that can be broken down into various components such as spatial relations, rhythm, shot/reverse shots, eyeline matches etc. Such a ‘system’ removes any sense of individual style and artistry from the process, reinforcing the idea that the director is the source of creativity behind a film. This prioritising of directorial authorship comes at the cost of recognising the labour, skill, and artistry of other professions in the filmmaking process.

This video essay addresses this deficit by highlighting the labour and skill of these women. The piece opens with the words of Agnès Guillemot, an editor whose prolific career enabled her to work with some of the leading figures in French cinema, from Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut to Catherine Breillat. In an interview with Roger Crittenden, Guillemot explains how as a child she wished to study music, but as she was unable to play an instrument, she considered becoming a conductor. Her thoughts then turned to film: ‘I discovered that cinema is music and that editing is like being a conductor. I would not be able to invent themes, to be a composer, but I can produce orchestrations’ (2006: 5). My video essay follows the same path. As it is often impossible to pinpoint whether a decision has been made by an editor, director, or another person from the production team, I was unable to make claims about the exact authorship of these women. So, like Guillemot, I worked with what I had to produce an orchestration that paid attention to what was shared among these various films. By combining sequences from across Korean horror and thriller cinema, I brought the work of these editors together in moments of diegetic investigation and discovery, mirroring my own process of researching and recognising this body of female talent. As the clips seemingly respond too and interact with each other, a mesh of sound and image is created that reinforces the key role that editors play in creation of tension and fear in the horror and thriller genres. Guillemot reveals that  as an editor, ‘the material is given by someone else, but I listen to it afresh’. She explains, ‘I do not try to make it mine, I try to make it produce what it can do’ (2006: 6). As such, my video essay is not about uncovering something new – these women know their labour and the labour of their peers. Rather, it seeks to recognise and celebrate their labour through my own homage to their artistry.