Director Lee Chang-dong
Director Lee Chang-dong with actress Jeon Jong-seo
BURNING
(Beoning)
A-
South Korea (148 mi) 2018 ‘Scope
d: Lee Chang-dong
His first film in 8-years, after having two films make the
year’s Top Ten, 2011
Top Ten Films of the Year #6 Poetry and 2011
Top Ten Films of the Year #8 Secret Sunshine, this is a curiously murky and
enigmatic film that explores an ambiguous state between the living and illusory
worlds, Lee Chang-dong’s moody and self-reflective film was the highest rated
at Cannes this year, averaging 3.8 on the Screendaily
jury grid, breaking the 3.7 record set earlier by 2017 Top
Ten List #2 Toni Erdmann, but like that film, came away with no major jury
awards, winning a FIPRESCI prize, where it is described as “A visually stunning
film and an emotionally complex comment on contemporary society.”
Extremely subtle and fatalistic, this is a fascinating character study about
how money allows you to literally get away with murder, while low-end workers
have a dim view of their own future, as if it’s literally been stolen from
them, painting a picture of two distinctively different South Koreas.
Based on Haruki Murakami’s short story Barn
Burning, Barn
Burning, by Haruki Murakami 13-page short story (pdf), Lee’s clever
adaptation is transplanted from Tokyo to Paju, South Korea with a few other
minor changes as well, where just about the entire film takes place under the
surface, focused upon a central character of Jongsu (Yoo Ah-in), an aloof and
aspiring young novelist living at his father’s farm on the outskirts of town
after his father has been imprisoned for striking a government official.
The location of the farm is so far north that it is near the DMZ where
telephone poles have speakers continually broadcasting North Korean propaganda,
which adds a curious aspect to this film, like an underlying layer of deceit.
Walking through town, a victim of staggering youth unemployment (working a temp
job as a delivery boy), he runs into a childhood neighbor that he doesn’t
recognize at first, Haemi (Jeon Jong-seo), who may have undergone plastic
surgery to improve her appearance, as what she recalls when they were much
younger was Jongsu crossing the street to tell her just how ugly she was.
They seem to have polar opposite personalities, as Haemi is outgoing and
socially gregarious, even theatrical in the way she expresses herself, which
includes a mime performance over dinner that Jongsu finds utterly captivating,
while he is more quietly introspective and keeps to himself most of the time,
barely uttering a word. Yet the film is seen through his keenly observing
eyes. When she invites him up to her one-roomed apartment, they have sex
before offering the keys and telling him to feed her reclusive cat (that he
never sees) while she’s away on a visit to Africa. He has to ask if the
cat is real or illusory, like the mime show, but he dutifully feeds the cat,
sight unseen, while usually masturbating on the premises. In this way the
film resembles Wong Kar-wai’s marvelous CHUNGKING EXPRESS (1994), specifically
Faye Wong’s wacky clean-up visits into Tony Leung’s apartment while he’s out of
town, obviously taking a liking to what she sees, but she never lets on,
refusing to speak about it. When her flight home from Nairobi is delayed
a few days due to terrorist alerts, Haemi calls to have Jongsu pick her up at
the airport, but she has a surprising friend with her, Ben (Korean-American
actor Steven Yeun), who she met at the airport as they were the only
Koreans. Exploring this CABARET (1972)-like threesome becomes the
unraveling centerpiece of the film, with suggestions of a toxic masculinity.
Beautifully shot by Hong Kyung-pyo, there is another quiet film with a deeply
despairing take on a Murakami novel by the same name, Vietnamese director Tran
Anh Hung’s greatly overlooked and unappreciated Norwegian
Wood (2010) that uses the dazzling impressionistic visual imagery of master
cinematographer Mark Lee Ping-bin to examine the depths of grief. More
renowned in Asia than the United States, where he’s acclaimed as the “voice of
a generation,” Murakami’s work places an emphasis on the mundane aspects of
everyday life, where you have to read between the lines to appreciate his
artistry.
All three have uniquely different personalities, where the
viewer is always kept off-guard as to the specifics of the relationship, as is
Jongsu, oftentimes feeling like the odd man out, immediately feeling jealous
and threatened, especially when he discovers Ben comes from an upper class of
what is likely inherited wealth, driving a Porsche sports car, having his own
upscale apartment in Seoul’s wealthiest district, living a carefree lifestyle
where he can do pretty much whatever he wants, which is the exact opposite of
the more cash-strapped Haemi and Jongsu who are up to their ears in debt.
Ben has a very cavalier manner about himself, where he’s used to getting what
he wants, but is equally charmed by Haemi, whose vivacious personality excites
them both, where they politely put up with the other guy just to be close to
her, sort of pretending to have a friendship, though Jongsu likely loathes Ben
from the outset. Driving his father’s old, barely functioning Kia truck,
dressed in a worn out track suit, Jongsu is such a soft-spoken guy, never
stepping out of bounds, knowing deep down the feelings he has for Haemi, but he
keeps them secret as they visit various restaurants and multi-colored dance
clubs, including an extremely laid-back café where the muted music in the
background is Miles Davis playing the original score for Louis Malle’s film
ELEVATOR TO THE GALLOWS (Ascenseur Pour L’Échafaud), aka FRANTIC from 1958, Miles Davis - Ascenseur pour
l'échafaud - Lift to the Gallows (Full Album) (26:15). This
ultra-cool and extremely melancholy music is just dripping with film noir
atmosphere, described as “The loneliest trumpet sound you will ever hear,”
which only accentuates the distances between characters, as none of them reveal
anything personal about themselves, yet there’s a continuing struggle under the
surface that never reveals itself, with motives remaining hidden, out of sight,
where they pretend to be best of friends, but they’re anything but that,
carefully concealed behind social custom and polite manner, exhibiting no signs
of suspicion, yet there’s not an ounce of trust anywhere to be found.
This strange game plays out onscreen, where hidden in the deep recesses there
may be some strange and mysterious hope for a calamitous event knocking out
their competition, opening up a pathway to Haemi’s heart, but some key evidence
is missing, something they can’t put their finger on or explain, but we sense
there is an underlying problem that will soon loom larger as time goes
on. This is a minimalist film with original electronic music by Mowg that
grows increasingly ominous, where nothing is as it seems, challenging the
audience to see through the waves of deception, offering an accurate portrait
of modern day life where truth is hidden underneath layers of class and
deceitful messaging, all targeting secret aims and agendas, but media is
engulfed in mixed messaging, sending so many different signals that it’s hard
to sift through all the bullshit, but what’s clear is young people today aren’t
getting the same opportunities as previous generations, stuck in an unending
cycle of lower-end jobs with no way to pull themselves up, leaving them angry
and hopelessly demoralized. What’s clear is that the youth of the nation
exists in a kind of existential void where they can either fade away in
insignificance, largely forgotten, or live a casual life of wealth and
excess. As Jongsu tells Ben, “To me, the world is a mystery.” This
is truly a film for the times with an alienated lower class who haven’t a clue
how to unravel the mystery of it all.
This gulf between knowledge and the unknown, real and
illusory, only grows as the film progresses, with one miraculous scene setting
the stage. Ben drives Haemi to Jongsu’s farm, with the three of them
drinking expensive French wine on the porch and watching the sunset over the
fields. Ben offers the allure of smoking some pot, then playing the Miles
Davis music from his car, adding a surreal layer of hypnotic bliss, with Haemi
capturing the ancient spirit, emboldened by being high, ripping her shirt and
sweater off, offering a silhouette dancing topless against a setting sun at
dusk, an elusive time between day and night, suddenly free and liberated,
completely in tune with her body, like a fertility ritual, with both guys glued
to their seats, refusing to move a muscle. Falling asleep on the couch
afterwards, these two guys continue a weird discussion, with Jongsu
acknowledging a hatred for his abusive father, who drove his mother away at an
early age, forcing him to burn her belongings, while also out of the blue
pledging his love for Haemi, but doesn’t tell her, instead telling Ben, who
finds this kind of personal confession amusing, as if he now has the upper
hand, deciding to add some of his own hidden secrets, telling Jongsu that he
has a penchant for arson, specifically burning greenhouses, perhaps one every
two or three months, not really providing a motive, just revealing a peculiar
habit, like an uncontrolled pyromaniac who likes to watch the fires they
set. In this case, it’s hard to distinguish whether this is a metaphor
for something else or an actual criminal habit, but it shows just how different
the worlds are where these two men come from, one still traumatized since
childhood, the other oblivious to consequences, as if wealth allows him to
remain outside the law. Ben goes so far as to telegraph his
intentions, saying he plans to burn another one down very soon, choosing a site
very close to where Jongsu lives, so close he may miss it. In his misplaced
anger at Ben, Jongsu lashes out against Haemi, inexplicably offering another
cruel comment, exactly like he did much earlier in their lives, which shows how
distanced he is from his true feelings, as he has nothing but affection for
her. By the next day Jongsu takes up jogging, obsessively visiting all
the greenhouses in the vicinity, checking on each one of them individually, yet
notices nothing new. Instead he receives a strange call from Haemi that
is quickly interrupted, sounding like footsteps followed by a deafening silence
when her phone quickly goes dead, mysteriously disappearing afterwards, never
heard from again. He stops by her apartment, but it’s been all tidied up,
looking clean as a whistle, not at all lived in, with her suitcase still there,
and no sign of the cat. With no other clues, he decides to stalk Ben, who
he silently blames and has derogatorily labeled a Gatsby, claiming there are
many of them in Korea these days, monetarily above the fray, answering to their
own laws, as if society’s morals don’t apply to them, another comment on the
extreme class differentiation in present-day South Korea. Following in
his car, learning what he can, hoping to make some sense out of this, Jongsu’s
efforts lead to confusion and themes of loneliness, but also anger and
helplessness, a sense that something is terribly wrong with the world that he
can’t quite realize or comprehend, all engulfed in blurred lines of reality,
where there are suggestions that he may never know the truth, that there will
always be a missing piece to contend with, that life will always be an unsolved
mystery, yet he pursues his quest anyway out of love and a steadfast allegiance
to Haemi, who has been reduced to a living ghost, still fresh in his mind, so
close that he can almost touch her, yet he can’t. While the finale is
different in the film than the story, more definitive, yet the beauty of the
film is the development of a mysterious undertone, a focus on meticulous
detail, and the idea of an all-consuming broken relationship where the sorrow
never ends, with the young novelist writing Haemi’s story perhaps to purge his
soul of a crime he never committed, forced to live with the eternal sadness
that comes with the full knowledge that he failed to ever once tell her how he
felt.
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