Passages of Time: Motifs of Past, Present, Future in Contemporary Korean Films

By Rick Curnutte

Richard A. Curnutte, Jr. is the Editor of The Film Journal. He has studied English and Film at Ohio University and The Ohio State University.

Historical Perspective

There was a time when the future of Korean cinema was incredibly bleak. During the Korean War, most early footage was destroyed. Not one complete film before 1945 exists today. During the Japanese occupation of Korea, theaters had been built and production companies formed, but the cinematic voice of Korea was stifled by intense Japanese censorship. (1)

Finally, in 1953, President Rhee Syngman made cinema tax-exempt, in an attempt to revive the industry. Between the years of 1955 and 1969, the time period generally considered to be Korea's "Golden Age" of moviemaking, a group of auteurs appeared and began to lay the groundwork for a national cinematic voice. Kim Ki-young (The Housemaid), Yu Hyun-mok (Obaltan), and Shin Sang-ok (Eunuch) were the most significant directors of this period, embueing Korean cinema with a new fearlessness and domestic flavor.

Along with the noteworthy directors of the 70s and 80s (Lee Jang-ho, Lee Man-hee, Im Kwon-taek, Park Kwang-soo), these filmmakers were responsible for opening the floodgates of the films that are currently flowing out of Korea.

Though this is but a very brief look at Korean film history, it is important to at least mention a bit of the sociopolitical climate that existed prior to today. It is especially significant in light of the tonal emphasis of contemporary Korean directors upon the passage of time. A look at even a small sampling of modern Korean films grants an eye-opening perspective of a people seemingly overwhelmed by the lessons of the past and the potential for the future.

Looking Backward and Forward

A common theme in contemporary Korean films is the idea of a character living his or her life surrounded by the events or implications of the past. In Hur Jin-ho's Christmas in August, the lead character (played by Korean star Han Seok-kyn) is dying of an unnamed ailment. His professional life is consumed with preserving the past: he is a professional photographer, while his personal life is always shadowed by that thing which is coming. He becomes romantically involved with a younger girl, Darim (Shim Eun-ha), a relationship which he treasures, but is doomed to fail. After a hospitalization, he forsakes the relationship to protect her from the death she does not know is coming. Hur's film is hardly ever melancholy, though his lead is distracted from his daily life by the small detail of dying: preparing his business for his absence, teaching his elderly father to use the television remote control, reliving memories with his sister. Strangely, the film is not really about the sadness of death. Rather, it is about how one man learns how to appreciate everything: the taste of watermelon, the way leaves fall, the way an old woman can look so beautiful when she takes her glasses off. It's a striking approach to a film about dying.

A film similar in theme, but entirely different in approach, is Lee Chang-dong's Peppermint Candy. Like Christopher Nolan's Memento, Peppermint Candy starts at the chronological end and works its way backward toward the beginning. Unlike that film, however, there is really no mystery to solve or clues to cloud the narrative. At the film's start, the main character throws himself in front of a train. From that moment on, we see a chain of events that lead him to that point: losing his family and fortune, cheating on his wife, fighting in the military, accidentally killing a civilian. Lee piles on plot devices that point toward an ending (beginning) that shows the protagonist joyfully contemplating the river next to the train track where he will die 20 years later. Peppermint Candy actually has the distinction of being two films at once. Taken in the order that it is presented, it's a cautionary tale about regret and how we make choices in our lives that affect everything that will come after. In this case, a man has so much regret that he cannot go on any longer. Conversely, if you view the end of the film as the narrative start and finish at the same time, it is a story of how we reflect on things that could be. As the "dead" man sits and weeps, you can envision his imagination taking him on the trip that we've just taken and realizing that he must be careful to not make the mistakes that will present themselves to him. In this regard, Peppermint Candy is as complex a film about memory and experience as I've seen.

Often, these motifs are presented humorously. In Kim Sang-jin's Kick the Moon, two high school classmates vie for the affections of the owner of a noodle shop. One, formerly the class tough guy, is now a teacher; the other, who once fled a gang fight, is now a feared gangster. When the two meet again, decades later, they have switched roles, in a sense, but neither wants to let go of the past, resulting in a teacher who still acts tough and a gangster who remembers being picked on. In the middle is a young woman who just wants affection, and her younger brother who struggles over who to look up to, the teacher who was once tough or the mobster who is now tough. Kim's breezy comedy is a whimsical look at how people cling to things they haven't been in years. The teacher tries to act tough, often which disastrous results. The gangster is still clueless about women. Ultimately, the two must team up to battle another local thug, in one of the most hilariously madcap gang fights ever staged. Films like Kick the Moon, have been common in Korea, with both youth and adult generations confused over their place.

Time (Travel)

Sometimes, the films of Korea deal with the passage of time in quite literal terms. InBungee Jumping of Their Own, a love affair is survives both romantic and literal death. A young couple meet and fall deeply in love. Then one of them dies. Years later, the man, now a teacher, begins to feel romantic feelings for one of his male students. Through a series of revelations, he comes to believe that the boy is his former love reincarnated. Ultimately, the surprising truth is revealed. A film about the eternal link of true love, Bungee Jumping of Their Own literally allows love to transcend death.

In the horror film, Memento Mori, three girls at an all girls' school discover a dead student's diary. Detailing the relationship between the girl and one of her friends (the lesbian overtones are present but slight), we find that one of them committed suicide. A cascading of flashbacks and ruminations on the past follow in what is an eerie and atmospheric horror film, with little blood and gore, but plenty of chills. Memento Mori, despite its frame story, is more concerned with the past than the present or future, but all three come together with frightening abandon.

Perhaps most literally of the three, Ditto, directed by Kim Jung-kwon, concerns time and two young students, one boy and one girl, communicating on the same college campus via HAM radio. The only snafu: one is in the year 1979, the other, the year 2000. While not entirely heavy-handed, Ditto does deal with the concerns facing two generations separated by 21 years. When you try to imagine two American youths, one in a segregated South, perhaps, talking to a modern urban youth, you may get the sense of the enormity of such a concept. What might you say to a person who doesn't know what it's like to not sit in the back of a public bus? Ditto never quite reaches the heights for which it is grasping, but it presents ideas poignant enough to spark discussion and debate.

Even breezy comedies such as My Sassy Girl often deal, even if fleetingly, with the implications of the future. In My Sassy Girl, two friends develop a strenuous relationship, one that suggest romanticism, but is flouted by impulsive behaviour. Only when the female lead meets who she believes is her friend as an old man does she realize what may happen if she lets her love slip away.

Where to Go?

Where does all of this leave a generation of filmmakers that is in love with cinema, but unsure, perhaps, of how to handle the past? Actually, it leaves them primed for a burgeoning indie scene. Short films, DV, experimental and documentary films are all gaining in popularity and quality in Korea. Korea's national cinema seems to be in fairly good shape for being so young (essentially the rebirth of the mid 1950s can be viewed as the starting point of the the "New Wave", despite its Golden Age status). Recently, Korean films have begun to perform extraordinarily well domestically. Abroad, they are increasingly more visible in festivals and retrospectives.

Cultural critic Hyangjin Lee has noted how contemporary Korean films reflect not so much a fascination with the past, but rather a fascination with how the past has shaped the present. Peppermint Candy certainly fits this profile, as its protagonist's life only makes sociological and cultural sense when filtered through everything that has come after. (2)

Even the North and South Korean conflict has begun to be portrayed differently. A film like Shiri presents things in black and white, while Joint Security Area was less concrete, with good and evil blurred more.

If anything threatens to undermine the current success of Korean cinema, it is the narrow focus of content. Though occasional entries like Memento Mori, JSA or Friend shake things up a bit, there is still a tendency towards melodramatic love stories. Though expertly crafted, a dependence upon this single genre could lower international interest in Korean films. (3)

However, the exceptions mentioned above, as well as the explosion of short and experimental films should help the Korean boom expand even further.

The only sure thing is that Korean filmmakers, perhaps better than any other, are well attuned with the importance of remembering the past and trying to affect change in the future.

As a country that almost lost cinema, Korea seems determined to hold on to it tight this time.

Notes:

1. Paquet, Darcy, A Short History of Korean Film. www.koreanfilm.org/history.html. January 6, 2002.

2. Hartzell, Adam, A review of Hyangjin Lee's Contemporary Korean Cinema: Identity, Culture, Politics. www.koreanfilm.org/hyangjinlee.html, November 16, 2001.

3. Renaissance of Korean Movies. www.kofo.or.kr/koreana/14_2/main/content1.html Summer 2000.

The following films are available to purchase on DVD at HKFlix.com. Click below for more information on each film.