Steel Cold Winter
Director: Choi Jin-sung
Year: 2013
Rating: 5.5
Country: Korea
Aka - Sonyeo
A
dark moody film with a sense of unease constantly just out of focus but that
sticks with you. Gnaws at you. Beautifully shot in the frozen winter of snow
and ice. The two protagonists - one prettier than the other - are stunning
in close-ups with the cold white background. Their faces even whiter and
nearly translucent except for their red lips. This chilly pristine look and
the sense of doom holds your attention for a long stretch but it begins to
take too long to get anywhere. It slowly slips into pretentiousness with
one glorious close-up followed by another, one desolate wintry scene followed
by another. I grew weary. Considering that in the opening credits interspersed
within them are quick shots of teenager Hyung-Jun bashing the brains out
of something and blood splattered all over his face, you expect it to not
be so lyrical. The audience doesn't know if this is of the past or the future
or just a fantasy. It takes most of the film to find out.
Hyung-jun (Oh Hee-joon) has just moved from
Seoul to a small pig village in the middle of nowhere. He is as remote as
the landscape - distant and in his own world of bad memories with his ear
plugs constantly in to block out social discourse. Being from Seoul he is
immediately considered cool by the other students. But he is mesmerized by
the girl in the back corner desk, Yoon-su (Kim Shi-hoo) who he had seen ice
skating on the lake looking like a mournful ghost. He is warned to stay away
from her - rumors abound - she is weird, stays to herself and may be sleeping
with her father. But they are two dark stars fated to crash into one another.
Two lost lonely souls more beautiful than a Pieta painting.
In the hands of John Hughes this would have
been a comedic teenage romance with pop songs. A part of me wishes it was.
There is no light here; no joy; only an inevitable trajectory towards tragedy
that plays out slowly - and yet too predictably. Both should have come with
a warning sign - Don't get too close. Everything in this village feels rotten,
corrupt, decaying - the shots of the pigs being corralled for slaughter feels
like an overt statement of the townspeople - living in a rural town where
there is no escape - just pigs in your future - where Seoul is an unreachable
dream. And so is love.
