09-15-2020, 10:23 AM
This is a documentary looking back on Kim Ki-Duk's film career.
It was shot during a 2-year span when Ki-Duk was holed up in a remote cabin with a bad case of director's block.
You see, during the filming of his last movie (Dream), an actress almost died. She was supposed to do a hanging scene in a jail cell. While Ki-Duk was elsewhere, she was apparently familiarizing herself with the setup, only she fainted. Lo and behold, Ki-Duk returned to the cell to see her hanging there. He did get her down, and she recovered, but it left him terribly traumatized, and he's been unable to direct since -- even though he knows the next project, and he even gives a synopsis, and he has Willem Dafoe interested in starring...
Oh, a couple of assistant directors recently left him to make their own movies, and some people think they betrayed him, leaving him like that, and using his ideas for their movies, but not him, no, he understands the need to seize opportunity, to leave the nest, to grow, and he's okay with that. Sort of.
Oh, he's actually living in a tent inside the remote cabin, as the cabin doesn't get warm enough, even with a fire. And he doesn't have a toilet, so he just goes outdoors with a spade to poop. And he grows his own food, and is frequently shown fixing meals, and eating.
And he talks. Occasionally he sings. And sometimes he cries.
His interviewer is relentless and deeply probing in drawing Ki-Duk out, ever pressuring Ki-Duk to face certain facts about his life, his international fame, his controversial films, and his interpersonal conflicts. The interviewer, by the way, is Kim Ki-Duk -- with a slightly different hair fashion. And no, we never really see the two in the same shot. So don't expect some whizbang FX. Eventually, we do see some of the interviews replayed on a monitor, closely watched by the film's editor -- who, by the way, is Kim Ki-Duk. At footage of Ki-Duk singing and ultimately breaking down crying, Ki-Duk the editor chuckles, bemused by his ridiculous show of emotion.
And so it goes, for 40 minutes, and likely onward to the end (total runtime 1 hr 40 min); but I stopped at 40.
BTW, this won best film at Cannes in 2011 in the "Un Certain Regard" category.
Let me borrow a couple reviewer quotes from the Reception section of the wikipedia article on Arirang.
Highly recommended for DOOM brethren, especially those into South African spy/action thrillers.
It was shot during a 2-year span when Ki-Duk was holed up in a remote cabin with a bad case of director's block.
You see, during the filming of his last movie (Dream), an actress almost died. She was supposed to do a hanging scene in a jail cell. While Ki-Duk was elsewhere, she was apparently familiarizing herself with the setup, only she fainted. Lo and behold, Ki-Duk returned to the cell to see her hanging there. He did get her down, and she recovered, but it left him terribly traumatized, and he's been unable to direct since -- even though he knows the next project, and he even gives a synopsis, and he has Willem Dafoe interested in starring...
Oh, a couple of assistant directors recently left him to make their own movies, and some people think they betrayed him, leaving him like that, and using his ideas for their movies, but not him, no, he understands the need to seize opportunity, to leave the nest, to grow, and he's okay with that. Sort of.
Oh, he's actually living in a tent inside the remote cabin, as the cabin doesn't get warm enough, even with a fire. And he doesn't have a toilet, so he just goes outdoors with a spade to poop. And he grows his own food, and is frequently shown fixing meals, and eating.
And he talks. Occasionally he sings. And sometimes he cries.
His interviewer is relentless and deeply probing in drawing Ki-Duk out, ever pressuring Ki-Duk to face certain facts about his life, his international fame, his controversial films, and his interpersonal conflicts. The interviewer, by the way, is Kim Ki-Duk -- with a slightly different hair fashion. And no, we never really see the two in the same shot. So don't expect some whizbang FX. Eventually, we do see some of the interviews replayed on a monitor, closely watched by the film's editor -- who, by the way, is Kim Ki-Duk. At footage of Ki-Duk singing and ultimately breaking down crying, Ki-Duk the editor chuckles, bemused by his ridiculous show of emotion.
And so it goes, for 40 minutes, and likely onward to the end (total runtime 1 hr 40 min); but I stopped at 40.
BTW, this won best film at Cannes in 2011 in the "Un Certain Regard" category.
Let me borrow a couple reviewer quotes from the Reception section of the wikipedia article on Arirang.
Quote:Leslie Felperin: "Further evidence, as if it were needed, that digital is both the liberation of low-budget filmmaking and the enabler of self-indulgence. [...] An experience that can be likened only to being stuck next to a drunk in a bar who keeps reminding you he used to be famous, all his friends are bastards and he now understands the meaning of life."
Peter Bradshaw: "It is the most extravagantly self-indulgent piece of pure loopiness imaginable – but gripping as well. A piece of experimentalism at odds with convention."
Highly recommended for DOOM brethren, especially those into South African spy/action thrillers.