Berlinale 2013: Pluto (명왕성, Myeongwangsong) 2012

One of the ten Korean films screening at the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival.

Film festivals can be a great place to catch up with big films from established luminaries of world cinema but for the ardent cinephile, the most exciting thing is to make a fresh discovery. With patience and some discerning selecting, you will almost always come away with a few pleasant surprises but, while it is wonderful to stumble upon an accomplished debut or sophomore films from emerging talents in the field, every so often you will see something that gives you a special feeling. It is an unmistakable sense of being part of something new and exciting, in the presence of an artist with raw talent, effortless ability and an intuitive understanding of film. These spine-tingling moments don’t happen at every festival but when they do it makes all the searching worthwhile.

Shin Su-won’s second feature Pluto gave me this feeling. However, before singing too much of its praises, I should say that it is a flawed work. More than the film itself, it is the potential of the director that gave me goosebumps. Without a doubt, Shin is about to be a major player in Korean cinema and could well become a force on the international scene before long.

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Grape Candy (청포도 사탕, Chungpodo Satang) 2012

(by Rex Baylon)

Although it’s often seen as two different conditions, a fear of loneliness and an awareness of one’s mortality, in retrospect, are two sides of the same coin. In between birth and death we all struggle with defining ourselves and giving meaning to our lives. In Kim Hee-Jeong’s sophomore feature, Grape Candy (2012), that inner conflict is played out as a drama between three women, two adults and the third a girl perpetually frozen by death as a junior high student.

The first woman we meet, Sun-Joo, played by Park Jin-Hee, is the perennial girl who seems to have everything but actually has a secret that keeps her at arms length from everyone around her. Her nice job at the bank, charming fiancée, and comfortable life keep her distracted enough to not have to deal with her emotionally desiccated heart until an old classmate So-ra (Park Ji-Yoon) reappears in her life. Working alongside Sun-Joo’s fiancée Ji-Hoon (Choi Won-Young) to complete a new book, the film at first seems to be about a love triangle with So-ra and Sun-Joo competing for Ji-Hoon’s attention. But as quickly as that plot thread is introduced it is soon dropped and we get a series of mysterious scenes of Sun-Joo looking forlorn, So-ra rocking out to music, a woman in a bookstore who refuses to take the phone whenever So-ra calls, and most mysterious of all a flashback to three junior high girls outside, each with an expression of terror on their faces.

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Berlinale 2013: White Night (백야, Baekya) 2012

One of the ten Korean films screening at the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival.

South Korea’s rapid development over the past 20 years has been nothing short of an economic miracle but, though there’s no denying how far it’s come, not every element of society has progressed at the same breakneck pace. Various elements, particularly as they relate to social change, have stubbornly lagged behind. One such facet is the acceptance of homosexuality. As gay marriage is slowly becoming a part of daily life in various countries in the western world, gay rights are progressing haltingly in Korea. Given the nation’s advances in other areas, this, along with other social problems, seems a little incongruous when compared with the modern image projected through the nation’s media.

Through the prism of a highly developed film industry such as Korea’s, this divide seems that much more vivid. LeeSong Hee-il, Korea’s first openly gay filmmaker, has been busily working away on short films for quite some time but earlier this year he finally unveiled his sophomore feature White Night at the Jeonju International Film Festival, coming six years after his very well-received debut No Regrets. 

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The Isle (섬, Seom) 2000

(by refresh_daemon)

The Isle is the first film I have seen by the prolific Kim Ki-duk. It's a film that's light on plot, but heavy on conflict and angst and that results in a rather slow moving film, but one fraught with enough tension to drive patient moviegoers to its conclusion. What's particularly interesting about the film is how limited the communication is; characters have little dialogue and yet the struggle, especially for the main characters, is to connect, despite their personal problems. That said, the male protagonist is a little weakly drawn and there are also some moments that weaken the film's credulity, but I found the tension and internal conflicts of the characters and how they impact their interactions compelling.

In The Isle, a taciturn woman with a cruelty streak, Huijin (Seo Jeong) runs a set of fishing floats on a lake that are rented out to people looking to get away and fish for a bit or possibly hide from the law. In addition to selling them fishing supplies, she also makes a little extra money by selling her body to some of the fishermen. A new guest, the sullen and withdrawn man with a past, Hyeonsik (Kim Yu-seok), arrives and ends up drawing Huijin's attraction. However, when a local call girl who frequently does business on the lake also develops an attraction to Hyeonsik, Huijin's sadism and ability to relate come to a boil.

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Berlinale 2013: Behind the Camera (뒷담화, 감독이 미쳤어요, Dwitdamhwa, Gamdokyi Micheotseoyo) 2012

One of the ten Korean films screening at the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival.

E J-yong’s new feature Behind the Camera is a follow-up to his popular mockumentary Actresses (2009), which featured famous stars playing themselves as they took part in a Vogue shoot. That film poked fun at Korea’s entertainment industry and its willing participants were not scared to send themselves up on screen. Many of the same stars return here and are joined by numerous others, but this time E takes his game one step further as he includes himself as the main protagonist.

The conceit is simple: E J-yong is making a short film but there’s a catch, he’s directing it from Los Angeles via Skype. Things get more complicated as the film he is shooting concerns a filmmaker directing a film from overseas via skype.

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Berlinale 2013: Fatal (가시꽃) 2012

One of the ten Korean films screening at the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival.

Fragile and ephemeral, life is a series of moments, of complicated and random connections that constitute the fabric of our character. Each decision we make affects our path irrevocably: our actions may not always be consequential but they are nonetheless inerasable. Like a thin sheet of glass, our lives can shatter in an instant. The briefest moment can reveal our brittle fragility.

Fatal, a New Currents section debut feature from Lee Donku, begins with a life-altering moment for five people. A young woman has been drugged and raped by a gang of high school students, though one of them is an unwilling participant bullied into performing an act that will torment him for the rest of his life. Ten years later, this now 28-year-old man works for a low-rent clothes manufacturer. An encounter with a Christian group of missionaries on the street prompts him to seek some kind of salvation through religion but when he joins the group he discovers that one of his new colleagues is the woman that he and his friends raped a decade prior.

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KCN: Box Office Glory and New Glimpse at Snowpiercer (02/01-02/07, 2012)

2013 couldn't be getting off to a better start for the Korean film industry. It didn't take for local films to swiftly reassert their dominance as The Tower carried through from its December opening while gangster shaman comedy Man on the Edge surprised with a strong performance, However, the fireworks were really set off at the end of the month when prison drama Miracle in Cell No. 7 and spy thriller The Berlin File lit the charts on fire. The month's final weekend was particularly strong as the top two films drew over a million spectators a piece, check out MKC's full report here. February is looking like it will be exceptionally strong as a result of the latter two not to mention a slew of big new releases which are also expected to perform well.

Speaking of blockbusters, the first official poster for Bong Joon-ho's long-awaited Snowpiercer was revealed yesterday. The sci-fi extravaganza is a film I'm particularly excited about.

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