In an age when we can watch movies anytime, anywhere without going to the cinema, film festivals seem rather anachronistic. While many have a gloomy outlook toward the future of cinema, there are still audiences who gather every year in this city at this time of year, and in other cities at other times, just to watch movies as if it were a kind of ritual. The Spirit of The Beehive (1973) by Victor Erice begins with the arrival of ‘a movie truck’, loaded with film reels and a projector in a rural Castilian village. The children, who have been waiting for Sunday when the movie truck arrives, run in a circle around the truck and shout in excitement. “The movie’s coming! The movie’s coming!” When I see audiences gathered at film festivals, these children spring to mind. Maybe this is why. As soon as I was given the privilege of selecting movies as Programmer of the Year at Jeonju International Film Festival, the first thing I thought about were the movies I saw in cinemas with excitement many years ago. Usually, film festivals are dominated by movies that have just come out, but I think those audiences who actively choose to be anachronistic, tend to appreciate these few older ones.
When I was in the 5th grade at elementary school, I went to see The March of Fools at Shinyang Cinema, a double feature cinema, in Eungam-dong in Seoul. That day was the first time I went to the cinema alone. I don’t remember exactly how I ended up going to see a movie that was not even suitable for teenagers by myself at such a young age, but the shock I felt after seeing the movie is still as vivid as if it were yesterday. The March of Fools is known as a work that sensually expresses the melancholy and futility of young people living in an era of oppression, but it was the freedom and romance of the campus, pleasantly portrayed by director HA Gil-jong, that left a greater impression on me as a youngster. That day, I felt that I wanted to grow up quickly, become a university student and an adult, while watching the movie sitting among adults, craning my neck. I feel more familiar with and more nostalgia for the taste and cultural sensibilities of the youth culture of the 70s, compared to those from the 80s, when I was a young adult. This may be partially due to the influence that particular movie had on me.
When I was a senior at university, I went to another double-feature cinema, Eunjwa Cinema in Morenae, Seoul. It was purely coincidental that I was a student in the same department at the same university as Byung-tae, the protagonist in The March of Fools, but the campus life I dreamt of was dull in comparison to the one in the movie. Then, one dreary afternoon, I discovered the film Paris, Texas, at a cinema, where it had the name as the Korean pronunciation of ‘Ginza’ in Tokyo. The moment Ry Cooder’s melancholic guitar melody rang out over the emotionless and slow-paced scenes, I was captivated by the film. Wim WENDERS brilliantly captured the fleeting moment when the gravity of the relationship shifts as the distance between the characters closes. On the way home, Travis and his son Hunter walk on opposite sidewalks, separated by the road, until they both stop and Hunter looks at his father. Then, Travis slowly crosses the road and stands next to his son, and they finally begin to walk side by side. There is no dialogue in this scene, which lasts about two minutes. At the time, I had no intention of becoming a film director, and I was a long way from a film enthusiast, but that day, I felt for the first time that there was a certain magic that only movies can create.
When I was thirty, I was staying in Paris, not the setting in Paris, Texas in America, but Paris, the capital of France. There was a special exhibition of OZU Yasujiro’s movies at an old cinema in the Latin Quarter, where the Sorbonne University is located. I saw Tokyo Story there. I did not understand a single word of dialogue, as I was watching this Japanese movie with French subtitles. It was the images that were important clues to understanding the story. If you have ever paid attention to how the pace of the characters’ fanning changes when they are hiding their true feelings in OZU’s movies set in summer, you can enjoy his movies without subtitles. As a director, OZU takes a long look at the transient and accidental things that can be easily overlooked. In his movies, things like a train passing, or laundry swaying slightly in the breeze, incense smoke wafting into the air on a dark night, or sunlight shimmering and breaking on the surface of water, speak to the truth of life. Subsequently, I have had the opportunity to see Tokyo Story again with Korean subtitles in Korea, but my opinion has not changed.
I am thrilled to be able to bring together in 2024 a selection of movies from my personal history. I hope that the audiences who sit at same cinemas as me and watch these movies in Jeonju this spring, will shout out inwardly, “The movie’s coming! The movie’s coming!” in the brief silence before the lights go down and the shows start.
Programmer of the Year HUR Jinho
less -