ZEITGEIST

Review by Adam Hartzell

    Resurrection of the Butterfly

I don't require a film to be completely inspiring and profound. I prefer it to be, but when a film provides a lackluster or non-existent impact, I encourage myself to see what significance might remain for the film in the course of a review rather than focus exclusively on the critical slam. That prefaced, Resurrection of the Butterfly requires that I look for something flickering on the screen outside of entertainment and/or enlightenment value.

Competing in competition at the 11th PiFan, Resurrection of the Butterfly (the Korean title translates as "Shadow") was a project coupling a student director (Kim Min-sook) with a more experienced director (Lee Jung-gook). This is something to salvage from the film. I would encourage more such projects regardless of the less than succulent fruits born of this particular seedling.

The film connects the three primary actors through roles across two stories of similar love triangles, one taking place well in the past and the other taking place in the present. Director Kim's story works off the historical character of Non-gae, a kisaeng known for remaining loyal to the Joseon dynasty by killing the Japanese commander who conquers her village rather than transferring her services as a prostitute/performer to the Japanese. (There is a shrine to her near Chokseongnu called "Uiam" or "the rock of righteousness.") Liberties are taken with this historical character's story that might upset the purists in the audience, but no claim is made by director Kim to be revisioning the history, in that she doesn't seek to claim her vision as truth. This is merely speculative history, a ‘what if' scenario to play out the possibilities if Non-gae had failed to kill the Japanese commander. In this version, Non-gae still remains within the spirit of her legend by becoming a spirit, one that haunts the Japanese commander.

The second story, overseen by director Lee, finds a man whose head injury limits his recall into the events that preceded his appearance deep into the mountains, where a mountain ranger has found him. Only a diary leads to clues about who this man is and what he's done. We discover from the diary that he was brought to the mountains with his girlfriend, a botany enthusiast, in search of a rare plant. On this journey they stumbled along the path of a young guide. As the story unfolds, we begin to question this man's position in this story relayed in the diary.

Ironically, it is the student's first half that shows greater promise than the veteran's second half. Veteran director Lee happens to have directed what is perhaps my least favorite of all South Korean films, The Letter. What I found unpalatable about The Letter was the excruciatingly drawn out, and falsely felt, melodramatic emotions. I understand that Korean culture allows for a greater expression of sadness, loss, and grief. (And I understand my opinion about The Letter is at odds with the audience that made it the most popular South Korean film in 1997.) What in the West we might determine overzealous might be more acceptable emoting in South Korea. But several South Korean directors and actresses/actors are still able to take this ‘excess' of express and allow even the most cynical of viewers to find such expressions believable. Director Lee demonstrates in his half of this project that he still can't handle the truth of these extended emotions in the incredibly poor way the wounded hiker's terror is presented in the second half of this film under his control.

My impression of Resurrection of the Butterfly may have been affected by the poor audio and visuals of the screening I attended at PiFan that was noted by, if I recall correctly, producer Byun Jang-wan. But I don't think even better sound and clearer and more vibrant colors could have saved this film. I commend the idea of coupling a neophyte with a veteran and don't find myself turning away from hope for better things from student director Kim Min-sook just yet. (I hear she directed a very compelling short called "Apple" of which others speak highly.) But director Lee Jung-gook's half further demonstrates that his cinematic letters are ones I'd best leave unopened, if not have returned to sender. (Hey, I didn't say I don't submit critical slams, I only said I don't like to center on them exclusively.)       (Adam Hartzell)

Review by Darcy Paquet

    Shadows in the Palace

The Joseon Dynasty palace is divided into parts, like the chambers of a heart. One part belongs to the women -- or more accurately, the women of the palace belong to this space (Gungnyeo, meaning "palace woman," is the Korean title of the film). Sworn into secrecy, submission, and celibacy, the women of the palace officially exist only for the sake of the king and his young heir. Behind closed doors, of course, the dynamics are much more complicated.

Shadows in the Palace is the debut work of writer/director Kim Mee-jeung, who served on the production team of King and the Clown and Once Upon a Time in a Battlefield. Shooting on a comparatively low budget using pre-existing sets from King and the Clown and other productions (not that you can tell: the imagery is dazzling), the film can be considered a fusion of genres: part costume drama, part mystery, part J-Horror.

Aside from its almost completely female cast, Shadows was also crafted primarily by women, including the director, producer, and executive producer. (The film was shot apparently with none of the late-night drinking that characterizes the sets of many male-directed Korean films) However viewers expecting a kinder, gentler movie are due for an awakening -- Shadows contains medieval cruelty to rival any of its genre contemporaries (pulled fingernails, needles in flesh, severed hands). The violence underlines the cruelty of a system where the women and their bodies are mere cogs in a wheel. The psychological toll can be seen on the women's faces -- even for those few who manage to claw their way to the top.

Keeping track of all the names and plot twists is a challenge, but here is a plot summary: the king (who rarely appears onscreen) has no heir by his queen, however a royal concubine Heebin has given birth to a son. The queen mother is pushing to have the child officially adopted by the queen, but Heebin resists, correctly sensing that she could be easily disposed of after the adoption. Amidst this tense standoff, Heebin's most trusted maid is found dead, a suicide. Or was it? Chun-ryung, a royal medic, discovers that she was actually strangled. What's more, there are signs that the maid had given birth at some time in the past, which would have been absolutely forbidden under palace rules. Ignoring orders to wrap up the case quickly, Chun-ryung sets off in search of answers.

The wide cast of characters, most of whom are well-known but not stars in Korea, contain an equally wide spectrum of performances. Most prominent is Park Jin-hee (Love Talk) in the lead role of Chun-ryung. I'm a fan of Park's straightforward, accessible style, though here I wonder if she may have been miscast. Chun-ryung's internal drive -- her need to know the truth, even if it puts her in danger -- is the film's key narrative engine, but here I found it not quite convincing. Still, many of the other performances are quite effective, especially Kim Seong-ryeong (pictured above) as a fearsome supervisor who has adopted completely the ruthless strictures of palace discipline.

As the film moves towards its conclusion, the fantasy/horror elements that were merely hinted at earlier begin to creep out of the closet (and yes, there is long black hair). At the same time, though, the film's broader themes regarding oppression and power begin to come into focus. I'm particularly fond of the last scene, with the palace women all dressed in white mourning robes, witnessing power being taken up by a new set of hands. We've been led to believe that the strict set of rules which govern the palace are an insurmountable force, but events may tell us otherwise.

It may not be possible to ever completely understand what life was like for people who lived in centuries past, given the lack of records and the vast cultural gap between us and them. Films set in the past usually end up telling us more about contemporary society than about the era on the screen. But is there anything wrong with that? Cinema is an act of imagination, and setting a film in a little-understood historical setting allows room for the imagination to extend itself. More than anything, it's the conceptual energy and narrative momentum of Shadows in the Palace that makes it an exciting discovery among this year's Korean films.      (Darcy Paquet)

Review by Kyu Hyun Kim

    Paradise Murdered

1986. A group of men are fishing while listening to a live broadcast of the Asian Games. One of their poles snags on a big clamper, and the owner pulls on it delightedly. Splat! The decomposed head of a guy lands in the kettle where ramen noodles are boiling. The men scream their heads off. So begins the murder mystery Paradise Murdered, which was one of the surprise hits of the early summer season, selling more than 2.2 million tickets before being decimated by Spider-Man 3 and other summer blockbusters. Frankly this "funny" intro led me to expect nothing other than a usual high-concept mock-Hollywood "thriller" with bumbling cops, a lumbering sub-Michael Myers serial killer and gore galore. While clunky in certain respects, however, Paradise Murdered turns out to be a decent mystery, a rare Korean whodunit (in this case, also a whodunwhat) with the plot that actually makes sense, and good clues available for sharp viewers to put it all together before the curtain comes down.

Essentially a variation on Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians" with a handful of supernatural red herrings thrown in, the film does a good job of playing with audience expectations. Writer-director Kim Han-min places various institutional activities of the tiny Paradise Island in the larger context of military dictatorship and political corruption, through subtle signs such as Sang-gu's arrogant behavior as a local "New Village Movement" leader, and provides the characters with realistic, non-over-the-top dialogue. The film's success owes much to the fine ensemble cast, most of whom do their best not to push their acting into the realms of exaggerated comedy or overt heroism, thus retaining the viewer's suspicion about their true motives.

The veteran Choi Joo-bong (Please Teach Me English), the always reliable Park Won-sang (R-Point, The Big Swindle) and the currently ubiquitous An Nae-sang (Marathon, Someone Behind Me, Desire) all provide solid supports as the village notables. Seong Ji-roo (unforgettable in A Good Lawyer's Wife) is appropriately menacing and pathetic in turns, although director Kim seems to largely leave him to his own devices by the slightly overcooked climax. Park Hae-il (The Host) was also an inspired choice for the ostensible protagonist, projecting fatigued compassion and cold calculation in equal measure, his obsidian pupils glistening with streaks of chilling obsession. On the other hand, the schoolteacher character played by Park Sol-mi (TV's Winter Sonata and All-in) is poorly conceived, and Park is simply awful in the role. Whenever she mouths her dialogue in that over-emphatic, strenuously earnest "I am in love with you, dammit" Hallyu-drama-beachfront-confessional style, the movie's fragile wall of believability comes crashing down. I must also say Kim Han-min is a much better writer than a director. Perhaps out of insecurities, he tries to lure the viewers in by adding some totally unnecessary John Landis-like buffoonery and comic "recreations" of the crimes in the early part.

Taken as a whole, however, Paradise Murdered is one of the best thrillers to come out of Korea in 2007, supported by solid performances by mostly talented actors and endowed with a real mystery plot and a satisfactory resolution. In these times of dreadful mutual cannibalization of ideas on a global scale, with endless remakes, retoolings, copycats, rip-offs and spin-offs colonizing not only movies but all creative media, even a little originality goes long way.      (Kyu Hyun  Kim)

2007.12.01:  Thoughts as the year nears its end   There's a very interesting, wide-ranging debate going on over at the Korean Film Discussion Board about where Korean cinema stands now after ten years of growth and commercial development. Have commercial pressures overwhelmed the industry? Creatively, does Korean cinema provide any meaningful alternative to Hollywood at this point? What can we expect going forward?

I'll contribute my thoughts about those specific issues on the board, but now also seemed a good time to consider the "numbers" for 2007 (not pretty) to see what we can make of them. First, perhaps we can consider a couple predictions I made a year ago about industry trends, namely (a) There will be about 80 Korean films released in 2007, down from 107 in 2006; and (b) Total annual admissions will drop for the first time in a decade. It seems, first of all, that I was wrong about (a) and right about (b).

There will total about 108 Korean films released this year, including everything from low-budget independent films to D-War. This large number makes me suspect that the talk we hear about a crisis in Korean film finance needs to be put into context. Certainly on an individual level, many producers are struggling mightily to find funding for their projects. But it seems to me that the number of people trying to make films these days is much, much higher than it was a couple years ago. If everyone who wanted to make films was able to find investors, I bet we'd have 200-300 movies made each year. It's true that a certain kind of investor (venture capitalists, partial investors) seems to be dropping out, but at the same time a couple big companies like SK Telecom and KT are now moving aggressively into the film industry, so I don't expect a crash in production next year either.

(I argued in another column for Cine21 that because of the structure of the Korean film industry, a crash will not mean that the number Korean films made will suddenly drop, it will mean that we see an unending stream of boring, $3 million films that try to imitate the successes of the past. Is that what is happening now?)

Regarding (b), the final numbers won't be in for a month or two, but I'm guessing we can expect a drop from 2006's all time high to about 2005 levels. This in itself is not a disaster -- the last ten years of uninterrupted growth were a very special situation that will not be repeated. Normal film industries do slightly better one year, slightly worse the next, depending on the quality of films released. Korea has now become a normal, developed film industry. However looking only at admissions for Korean films, it's a bigger drop, because local movies accounted for over 60% of tickets sold in 2006, and a little over 50% this year.

This points to maybe the bigger issue, which is that Korean audiences just don't seem as excited about local films anymore. It's still not clear to me whether this is a cyclical thing, due to a lack of interesting movies this year, or the first sign of a longer decline. After all, 2004 was a pretty bad year (the numbers for March to December were ugly), but 2005 and 2006 were much better. And the second half of this year has been an improvement over the first.

I'll post a top ten list and my thoughts about the year in a creative sense later, but still, from a commercial standpoint, there was very little to get excited about. Maybe this can be linked back to the pessimism that hangs over the industry these days -- maybe it's more difficult to make exciting commercial films than it used to be. But none of the top ten grossing Korean films of 2007 were unusually fun to watch.