In Water (Mul-an-e-seo)

 

Writer/director Hong Sang-soo

principal cast

IN WATER (Mul-an-e-seo)                B                                                                                   South Korea  (61 mo)  2023  d: Hong Sang-soo

Do you know the man from a faraway land who swam out to sea?

He’s a man who’s never properly known love.

Rather than see his beautiful heart go bad from being lonely so long…

Do you know such a man who swam far out to sea?

—song at the end written by filmmaker Seong-mo (Shin Seok-ho)

For the past three decades, Hong Sang-Soo has carved out his own unique corner of the world cinema landscape, making films that only he could make, usually consisting of minimalist portraits of artists, film directors, actors, painters, novelists, and poets navigating the relationships between their personal lives and their art, generating curiosities due to a particular type of cinema that has not yet been fully understood or embraced by viewing audiences, despite academic essays and texts at festivals.  His style, characterized by the use of a static camera and frequent zoom shots, shootings at specific environments, or a focus on the realism of everyday life, is expressed through the naturalism of conversational dialogue, frequently associated with ritualized scenes of drinking and eating, as well as awkward misunderstandings.  However, each film must be absorbed as a singular experience, part of a regular pattern in his works, where artists are going through a creative or moral crisis, developing ideas surrounding the experience of artistic invention.  A character in the previous film, WALK UP (2022), dreamed of shooting a film on Jeju Island, Korea’s southernmost territory, and a frequent vacation destination, so it’s only appropriate that’s where we find ourselves for this film, one of the few in the entire Hong output that features only young people.  And while it’s short, only 61 minutes in length, it’s also intentionally shot out of focus, much like the intentionally blurry art from Alexandre Koberidze’s Dry Leaf (2025), which alters how we view what we see onscreen, perhaps a reflection of Hong’s deteriorating eyesight over the years, but more likely a still-in-development, youthful mindset of a coming-of-age film that resembles a water color painting.  The movie was made with little money, shot in just six days and edited in one, as a trio of friends wanders to the rocky shores of the windswept island to shoot a short film together, summoned by the director, Seong-mo (Shin Seok-ho), who recently gave up acting to become a film director, financing it himself for only $3000, renting a vacation home for a week, accompanied by his former university classmate Sang-guk (Ha Seong-guk) as the cameraman, who has a more extensive background in filmmaking, and actress Nam-hee (Kim Seung-yun).  Still an inexperienced, self-questioning artist, Seong-mo is ambivalent about his plans, with only a rough idea in his head of what he wants to do, as he doesn’t want to write a screenplay in advance, preferring to wait for inspiration to strike and then create the film almost spontaneously, a minimalist style that resembles the director’s own.  Hoping to find a connection with the landscape, as all around them is a striking amount of beauty, they take walks and scout locations, with exquisitely composed vignettes of the coast, seen discussing various ideas, while devouring local take-out food.  There is no real conflict between them, but Seong-mo seems to be more isolated and distant, in a world by himself, while the other two grow friendlier as time goes on. 

A tale of three friends who wander around a quaint seaside village and otherwise do absolutely nothing, opening with gentle guitar strums with shots of the sea, these musical riffs are heard throughout the film at various interludes, in water (2023) OST — Hong Sang-soo YouTube (1:19).  And while the outside shots are out of focus, with the cast admitting they didn’t know the film would be out of focus until they saw the completed film in theaters, the inside shots of the three of them eating are mostly in focus, showing a noticeable contrast in mood and texture, exposing the blurred boundaries between art and life.  When they go for a walk, they discover an alleyway composed of stone walls and ponder the ways they can make use of its curvature for maximum emotional effect, wondering whether it could be used as a location, lending a certain mystique to the island, which they amusingly describe as an “isle of rocks.”  As they eat sandwiches overlooking the sea, they question what kind of film Seong-mo wants to make, and while he’s ambiguous about details, he dreams of making an original film instead of copying others, where he wants the setting to dictate what he films, drawing from the everyday life and reality around them.  While his partners are a little apprehensive at working without a script, they are nonetheless aligned with his thinking that it needs to be original.  Back at the house, Seong-mo steps outside to view the plentiful fish in a nearby stream, seemingly existing in perfect harmony with nature.  As they discuss how they will spend their day, Nam-hee mentions she was awake in the middle of the night when she heard a screaming voice call out, “Snap out of it!”  Shocked at what she heard, unable to identify the source, she felt it was a ghost condemning her for her sins, followed by a heavy dose of guilt, something inexplicable still weighing on her conscience the next morning.  Like some kind of foreshadowing warning sign, the three of them plod ahead on their project, with Seong-mo indicating the story is so simple there is no need to write anything.  They walk to a cliff overlooking the beach and the sea beyond, occasionally seen wearing masks, where the landscape is spectacular as Seong-mo decides to climb down the rocks and politely inquires why a woman is cleaning up the beach on her own.  Claiming she lives nearby, with tourists continually leaving refuse everywhere, she is selflessly dedicating her life to cleaning up after them.  Simple as it is, this becomes part of a story he was searching for.  Easily Hong’s most experimental work, an impressionist tableaux of the tangled relationships between art and life, hinting at mysterious realms lurking below the surface of everyday reality, this is one of Hong’s darkest films, along with Hotel by the River (Gangbyeon Hotel) (2018) and In Front of Your Face (Dangsin-eolgul-apeseo) (2021), which may be a kind of director’s manifesto, a statement on why his own films deviate so substantially from the mainstream, often overlooked by Korean audiences, and difficult to find around the world except at film festivals.   

As they set the tripod up for the shoot, Seong-mo describes what he wants to film, which is clear enough to them, adding a little personal touch that he wants to add a song he composed for a former girlfriend on her birthday, gaining permission from her (Kim Min-hee) to use in the film, as he has it stored on his phone, which he can add to the recording function as they are filming.  What stands out is the ambiguous circumstances of the shoot, the frustrating psychology, while also tapping into the unknown realms of a creative artist, where it’s more about his inner self than anything else.  As much as any film he’s ever made, this reveals the blueprint for how Hong makes films, where his job is to make what’s unclear clear, or to make the inaccessible accessible.  In this way, the unusual circumstances mirror the simplicity of Hong’s creative process with each and every film, where you never know what you’re going to discover, or how it will evolve, but the journey of the artist is the most important thing, as essentially his films are about how he himself makes movies in his own peculiar way.  Scenes of drinking and talking are the true essence of a Hong Sang-soo film, as true feelings and social façades intersect, revealing the complex psychology of the characters.  “Why does life have to be so hard?” the young director asks towards the end.  A film about a young filmmaker struggling through his creative process, where the lack of focus may symbolize just how unclear the creative process can be, as there is no conventional cause-and-effect shape of the narrative, and no action sequences that follow a traditional dramatic pattern, Hong instead sketches the vague contours of a love triangle, with the implication that the overly reserved Seong-mo has planned the film shoot largely as a means of getting closer to Nam-hee, who remains polite but guarded around him.  As Seong-mo becomes increasingly consumed by his creative process, Nam-hee and Sang-guk, who are left alone with nothing to do, spark a connection.  All of this remains under the surface, however, as no character makes an open romantic gesture toward another.  Literally blurring the boundary between reality and fiction, the stunning finale is mystifying to experience, with references to Edward Yang’s That Day, On the Beach (Hai tan de yi tian) (1983), and even Niki Caro's WHALE RIDER (2002), as it’s profoundly introspective and deeply affecting, unlike anything else Hong has ever done, becoming imprinted in the deep recesses of our subconscious.  Hong does not ask the viewer to evaluate the value of the final images produced by Seoung-mo (we never see his film) so much as he invites us to reflect on the methods through which he crafts his vision, concluding with a haunting final shot accompanied by the unseen voice of Kim Min-hee (who also plays the masked woman cleaning up on the beach) singing the sad song that the filmmaker wrote, the same song we’ve heard bits and pieces of earlier, offering poetic undertones.  All we’re left with is the sound of the waves quietly lapping against the shore, with the brief end credits also appearing out of focus.    

Walk Up (Tab)

 

Writer/director Hong Sang-soo

WALK UP (Tab)        B                                                                                                           South Korea  (97 mo)  2022  d: Hong Sang-soo

A minimalist, architectural story from Hong Sang-soo, yet another example of just how unique and original an artist he is, a rejection of the norms that dictate what movies should be and how they get made, as this is a truly different kind of movie, modest in scope, even for him, yet emblematic of a “post-political” Korea.  In this case, the most prominent character is a building, comprised of four floors, each containing a different chapter of the story, focusing on its exploration of a film director's life through a four-story building in Seoul, where the film utilizes the vertical structure to explore relationships and shifting realities, with the changing floors evoking progressions in time, as the lives of four women intersect and weave together like parallel worlds, but is actually an infinite exploration towards the everyday, seen from a variety of prisms that connect in a terribly intimate way, either in the most emotional aspect or in the purely cinematic, where it’s hard to decipher just what’s going on here, as time advances unknowingly between episodes, making large, unexpected leaps in chronology, where much of what happens takes place offscreen, with viewers hard-pressed to comprehend what’s transpired in the unseen, empty spaces in between.  In fact, the only way to know we’re advancing to a new chapter is the guitar music interlude, or maybe it’s a mandolin, composed by the director himself, who once again writes, directs, edits, films, and produces this film, which is shot in high contrast black and white.  Celebrated for its signature minimalist style, painting a poetic and intimate portrait of the daily life of a building populated by artists, the film explores art, memory, and aging, with the passage of time becoming a significant aspect, as perspectives change over time.  Kwon Hae-hyo is acclaimed director Byung-soo, often seen as a stand-in for Hong himself, completely recognizable in his ninth film with the director, where the actor openly acknowledges his working method, “the key is not to prepare anything.”  He arrives with his estranged adult daughter Jeong-su (Park Mi-so), who is an aspiring interior decorator, at a building greeted by an old friend, who is the building owner, Ms. Kim (Lee Hye-young), but also well established in the designer field.  She gives them a tour of the property, which includes a restaurant and cooking studio on the first two floors, her office in the basement, a residence on the third floor, and an artist’s studio on the top filled with abstract paintings, which she generously offers to the director, as the current occupant, a painter, has run out of funds to pay rent.  They catch up over a bottle of wine, but Byung-soo leaves for an important meeting at his film office nearby, leaving Jeong-su alone with Ms. Kim to discuss her ambitions, which sound earnest enough, hoping to work as her apprentice, though it remains questionable whether she’s really serious enough, instead confessing thoughts about her filmmaking father, “He’s well known outside, but to me he’s completely different.  People have no idea.  People admire my dad because of his image as a film director.”  Ms. Kim perceptively responds, “We’re all different when we go out, we’re different inside and outside.  Maybe the person he is when he’s outside is more genuine.”

If, as Jeong-su suggests, you cannot get the whole picture of a person like her father merely from watching his films, then the same is likely to be true of Hong.  While his films are intimate, loosely autobiographical portraits of the director, they are also inevitably oblique, distorted, and incomplete, becoming more experimental of late, as the narrative advances with almost imperceptible variations, leaving viewers to make of it what they will, where there is always drunkenness and people who smoke excessively.  The second chapter takes place on the second floor where Byung-soo and Ms. Kim dine in the tiny restaurant with the cook, Sun-hee (Song Seon-mi), a former painter who admires his films, informing him, “There’s a lot of talking in your films, but the dialogue never rubs me the wrong way,” explaining further that she finds them laugh out loud funny, and easy to drink to, yet because they’re so talky, “They make me feel less lonely.”  Byung-soo sadly informs them that his new oversees project that he had been working on for the last year was just rejected by his investors three weeks before shooting was set to begin, claiming films spend so much money on needless things, that it’s all about the money to them instead of making the best film, as they will never understand true artistic vision, thinking it’s all such a waste, that it’s a business model destined to fail.  This failure is mirrored by Ms. Kim acknowledging that Jeong-su was hired as her apprentice, but she left suddenly without a word before the first month had passed, with reverberations spreading like waves, as now the father and daughter are no longer on speaking terms.  These incidents reveal the temporality of things, like the changing seasons, where our understanding of the things that matter to us require viewpoint shifts and quick adaptation.  The more they drink a more palpable attraction builds between Byung-soo and Sun-hee, exchanging mutual admiration, and they remain together in the third chapter, with Byung-soo moving in to the third floor with her, but by now he’s experiencing health issues, growing concerned about his diet, trying to eliminate meat and eat healthier.  Sun-hee cares for him and at first they seem happy together, but there are signs that something is not right.  The ceiling is leaking (like something out of Tsai Ming-liang), yet their landlord, Ms. Kim, doesn’t appear concerned.  While she once salivated at the opportunity of such an esteemed artist living in her building, but Byung-soo’s career has taken a nosedive, apparently affecting his health, and Ms. Kim now feels burdened by his presence, routinely entering without permission, or opening his mail, and only grows more pathetic over time.  What was once a charming space now feels oppressive and claustrophobic, with the world closing in.  As he scales the building, floor by floor, story by story, we see a director age and become unwell, curling up in bed in a fetal position, where a a voiceover incident takes place in his head that may take place in the future or may be pure fantasy, as Byung-soo now starts to think he’d be better off alone, dreaming of making films on Jeju Island.

Next time we see him, he is living in an artist’s studio on the rooftop floor upstairs with yet another woman, Ji-young, (Cho Yun-hee), an emotionally supportive and motherly real estate agent who brings meat to grill and soju to drink, while also getting wild ginseng root preserved in honey, valued for their medicinal properties, which she offers to heal whatever is ailing him.  They eat on the outdoor balcony with a view overlooking the city, a quality that initially attracted the director to choosing this building to live, as it definitely has an aesthetic quality that would be pleasing to any artist.  Byung-soo has aged significantly, though we have no idea how much time has passed.  There are several moments when viewers can’t tell if Byung-soo is dreaming or if it is real, as scenes are narrated as he sleeps, or a text is dictated in his head as it is being composed.  In a carry-over from the earlier chapter, the roof still leaks and the toilet does not work, creating a sizable problem, yet all that seems to matter to Ms. Kim is that he changed the password to his electric door entry keypad (a familiar sound we keep hearing), as she took such great pride that the previous tenant kept his door unlocked.  Using structure as a focal point, each new chapter adds a deeper, more personal layer to the multi-talented artist who oversees nearly every aspect of its production, with echoes of multiple meanings where people connect or not with one another, reflective of the director’s own understanding, his desire, his empathy, and his curiosity, which sometimes provokes anger, regret, and rejection.  Time and time again, Hong uses a certain familiarity with his stable of actors in combination with the film’s plot device to bring out deeper, underlying aspects of the story, with an absence of any explanation or character psychology.  Byung-soo is, after all, a film director, so the unearthed revelations about him, as conversations move toward discussions of fandom, legacy, image, perception, or craft, lead to indications or clues about Hong’s true feelings on the subjects.  This is true about all his films going back to the mid 90’s, where there is virtually no beginning and no end to the list of possible entry points into the auteur’s filmography, as it really doesn’t matter, as each can stand on its own, yet all his films exist in conversation with one another, where it helps to be well-versed in the Hong Sang-soo aesthetic to appreciate what this film is doing, as it retraces where he’s been and offers insight into where he’s heading.  It doesn’t have the quirky fun of another film that lets the imagination go wild in imagining what transpires in the room of a house, that becomes a writing exercise in François Ozon’s In the House (Dans La Maison) (2012), which is more brilliantly inventive, instead this is more subdued, elusive, and ambiguously hard to read, where it’s remarkable what you can do in a small space, though nothing of any real interest happens, filling the spaces with an outpouring of everyday details spanning art, love, career, religion, dietary decisions, and home renovations, but it represents a tender journey through different stages of the director’s life with an open-ended honesty that is uniquely this artist’s own.