Directed by: Sang-soo Hong.
Written by: Sang-soo Hong.
Starring: Jun-Sang Yu (Sungjoon), Sang Jung Kim (Youngho), Seon-mi Song (Boram), Bo-kyung Kim (Kyungjin / Yejeon).
Sang-soo
Hong’s The Day He Arrives is a quietly moving film. In many ways, I suppose, it
is autobiographical. It is about a filmmaker Sungjoon who returns to Seoul for
a few days visit from his teaching post in the country. He directed four films,
but apparently no one saw them, so he has taken up teaching. He has no plans
while in the city except to visit his old friend Youngho, a movie critic. But
he spends the first night alone, not being to get in contact with his old
friend, and instead going drinking with a group of film students before
confusing them by taking off on them. He then visits an old girlfriend, and
begs forgiveness.
Finally,
he will meet up with Youngho, and the rest of the movie plays like variations
on a theme. In each, Sungjoon and Youngho go to a bar with Youngho’s attractive
female friend Boram, a film professor, where they spend their time drinking
while the owner is away. Eventually, the owner Yejeon, comes back – and
Sungjoon is struck by how much she looks like that old girlfriend (since they
are both played by the same actress, he’s right). But what happens in each of
these variations changes slightly. They have similar discussions, but they take
on different meanings as one character will say or do something different.
Twice they will meet up with a former actor of Sungjoon’s – once he is angry
with Sungjoon for abandoning him for a bigger star after their first movie, and
one time he is a lovable, drunken oaf. In all of them, Boram seems to be
attracted to Sungjoon, even though he thinks she should be with Youngho, and
she flirts with him, oblivious to the fact that he is more drawn to the
bartender. And the way Sungjoon expresses that attraction to the bartender –
and the results – is also different each time.
The
movie is both funny and sad. As with other films of Sang-soo Hong that I have
seen (and I feel I should see more), the film is made up of a series of scenes
where the characters drink and talk – and then go somewhere else to drink and
talk some more. The film is shot in beautiful black and white, which gives an
element of sadness to the proceedings. Sungjun seems lost and aimless. He has
nowhere to go – either in Seoul or in his life – so he just keeps repeating his
day ad nausea. The film students recall what he once was – young and idealistic
– and while its fun to look back at that for a while, eventually he must flee.
His relationship with his girlfriend is over – but he has to go back and
revisit that as well. And then, when he meets the barmaid, who looks just like
her, he must repeat the pattern all over again. Some people have criticized
Sang-soo for simply remaking the same film over and over again – and I can’t
help but think that The Day He Arrives is a slight shot at those critics, as he
has made a film about a filmmaker who keeps living the same day, with slight
variations again and again.
The
movie is filled with Sungjoon’s longing for something more – something he will
not discover, at least not during the film’s fleet 79 minute running time. At
the end of the film, he’s still wandering around in circles, still melancholy,
still doomed to repeat his mistakes again and again. The Day He Arrives is a
deceptively simple little film.
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