Latenight Film Club no. 1
Return to Seoul (2022), dir. Davy Chou
Another format? She can barely keep up with her articles! Yes, dear reader, we’re adding a short-form segment to the fold. I enjoyed forcing myself through the three-part Biennale review series so damn much that I now yearn for the taste of critique. I also live with a filmmaker boyfriend and we already spend about 25% of our time together watching and arguing about the weird and wonderful films we watch.
As you may imagine, the views of A) a sociologist who was raised on Czech fairy tales and period dramas and B) a film graduate who enjoys horror & harrowing war epics, do not always align. Expect highbrow, lowbrow, applauded and disgraced nuggets of gold (or shit) on celluloid. We do not discriminate on the basis of genre.
There will be spoilers! There will be detail! In contrast to much of my other work, what you’ll read here are not long-marinated analyses, but our thoughts from the minutes after the credits roll. If you really want to get into the discussion, I strongly suggest giving them a watch yourself first, and giving your two cents in the comments. Don’t take our word for it.
Title, release date: Return to Seoul (2022)
Directed by: Davy Chou
Starring: Park Ji-Min, Oh Gwang-Rok & Guka Han
Chosen by: Paula
Synopsis: Twenty-five-year-old Freddie, who was born in Korea and adopted by a French couple as a baby, returns to Seoul for the very first time. A snap decision to track down her biological parents whilst in the city changes her life trajectory.
Our synopsis: Freddie, a Korea-born French adoptee returns to Seoul and asks for local friends’ help in tracking down her biological parents. When she receives said help, she enters a self-destructive spiral and tells everyone to fuck off whilst being very French, simultaneously disrespecting the local culture and misbehaving at every opportunity.
The verdict
N: I don’t know how this film made it to Cannes. It’s boring. How many people worked on the script? 6? Too many, that’s why. I liked the first half, though.
P: It was super difficult to sympathise with a character this self-destructive and cruel to the people who care about her. It also doesn’t help that she’s an arms dealer. The plot has some great ideas in principle, and it’s such an important topic. But I think a big part of the reason it falls flat is relying on a newcomer1 to do a role justice which requires a ton of emotional complexity, microexpressions etc. I’d be interested to hear whether IRL adoptees feel seen by this film.
N: Actually, Ji Min Park has said that she was very reluctant to do the film, unless she had some input on the script.
P: Makes total sense, when you watch her performance. A character that really did stay with me was the biological father (played by Gwang Rok Oh). He perfectly captured this desperation you feel when someone is slipping from your grip - I felt the tragedy of it all, with a side of Fremdschäm2.
N: Yes. The film didn’t need to be two hours long, though - it could have been one hour and twenty. You know, the problem with this film is that there’s too much space for emptiness. You could have cut the whole section with the tattoo parlour. They also misused Schwefelgelb’s music and made it look lame.
P: Agree - using a tattooed guy with a shaved head as a plot device and including a techno party in a basement to hammer home that a character is going through a self-destructive period is just…
N: Too many clichés in this film. And she’s just a bit of a dick.
In three words
P: Bitter, frustrating, tragic. 2/5.
N: Pretentious as fuck. 1.8/5
Return to Seoul is Ji Min Park’s first acting gig - she’s a visual artist by trade.
German for vicarious embarassement.
Love this - can I make film suggestions?