[HanCinema's Hall of Fame Review] "Nobody's Daughter Haewon": Daydreaming and the Human Condition Confined

In the Spotlight this Week: Hong Sang-soo's "Nobody's Daughter Haewon"...

Advertisement

Hong's devotion to cinematic realism and his unburdened appreciation of the human condition is uncanny. The ontological valleys his films straddle appear delicately real, but come peppered with an understated magic that is uncomfortably grounded within the frame's abyssal regard. In "Nobody's Daughter Haewon", the auteurs 14th cinematic entry, Hong depicts the woolgathering of a young woman cycling around inert fantasies of love and companionship. It's an absorbing trip that comes inscribed with many of Hong's eternal signatures, a filmic fathoming of a loose soul who wanders and writes her own reality in sand and soft sadness.

Hae-won (Jung Eun-chae) is Hong's daughter of dream, an attractive and free-spirited student whose grounded imagination we follow in an enchanting rendition of a reality gone awry. Hae-won's mother will soon be heading back to Canada, and the film opens its act with our young heroine waiting at a restaurant to say her goodbyes, but not before a dreamy and awkward encounter with Jane Birkin (who Hong invited to appear in the film on a whim while she was in town) that helps to establish the film's decent in oneiric otherness. After a stroll around the neighbourhood, visiting her mom's old school, browsing books, and a goodbye sob, Hae-won makes contact with a neurotic professor (Seong-joon played by Lee Sun-kyun) she dated the year before. The two meander around the chilly streets reminiscing about the past and romanticising about the present, but Seong-joon's sensitivity and insecurity threatens to derail their newly rekindled relationship.

Like much of Hong's filmography, "Nobody's Daughter Haewon" is comprised of enigmatic motifs, repeating scenes, and familiar compositions that gathering weight the further down this rabbit hole you fall. Hong ponders moments from single vantage points and lingers on them with calmness and cause. They are slow ruminations of rocky relationships that come primed with a dull determinism that many may feel frustrated by, but when allowed to ferment fizzle into intriguing insights into real magic. Hong's awkward character encounters are second only to his preferences for zany zooms, re-framings of his subjects that standout and cement his desire to probe his characters' conditions in a steady light. Filmic graphologists will no doubt confirm such cinematic signatures, as Hong's Hancocks are indeed present and pertinent in this his 14th entry.

"Nobody's Daughter Haewon" left me sleepy and calm, with a gentle giddiness that, if not for the film's bold bookend, demanded my mind wonder some more despite the lurid credits that started to roll. Cathartic closure is not Hong's style or aim, for without the rush of rising action such comedowns are moot and meaningless. Instead, Hong's film, like much of filmography, represents a rather crafty cinematic extension of reality, a film stretched over a short period of our time that exposes the grain of a romanticised reality. It's textured and many will find it too tough to tackle, but it comes recommended for those intrigued with the softer side of the frame's regard, magic, and reel dreams.

- C.J. Wheeler (chriscjw@gmail.com; @KoreaOnTheCouch)

 

Available on DVD from YESASIA