THE people in Busan were all keyed up to watch the opening film, Beautiful Days. It was the world premiere of a film that is a Korea-France coproduction venture. Lee Na-young who plays the lead is making a comeback after a more than five-year hiatus. On the red carpet, the actress possessed what the other female Korean actresses seem to be wanting—gravitas. She walked that red path and the audience roared in applause.
The film is about a son who is getting to know his mother for the first time. Jang Dong-yoon plays the son and given the reception to this young actor, he will soon be one of those über-popular Korean actors. If there is a difference, Jang Dong-yoon carries a masculinity that is not common among Korean matinee idols. But, you may say, he is no matinee idol.
The story is current: it is about a North Korean woman sold to be the bride of a Chinese-Korean man.
With all the massive publicity and anticipation created prior to its premiere, the ticket to Beautiful Days was one of the most difficult to source.
The Busan International Film Festival was a lesson in synopsis-making. There were no time for trailers or individual press conferences. One relied on the plot as spelled out in the program that was released everyday.
Here are the films that I considered but, sadly, missed.
From Hong Kong and China came First Night Nerves. The film is about a former star and has-been actress who is planning a comeback in the theater after her husband’s demise. She opted to join a play called Two Sisters, written and directed by a transwoman. Her biggest rival, a rising star, is also part of the production. As the synopsis goes: “With the opening night at Hong Kong’s City Hall Theater just seven days away, tensions at rehearsal increase and tempers flare as actresses Xiuling and Yuwen’s buried resentments rise to the surface.” Now, who would not be charmed by the possibility of viewing that film.
Indonesia offered 27 Steps of May. The synopsis reads: “After a brutal childhood rape, May has shut herself off from the world. When a magician moves in next door, the sense of wonder he brings with him chips away at her walls, compelling May to confront her past and move into the future.”
Lebanon had Capernaum. The plot relates about “kids without ID card and left in a harsh condition.” Zain, a 12-year-old boy is one of those not protected by his parents. He ends up in prison. He decides to sue his parents. The film premiered in Cannes this year and, according to the releases, “shocked the audiences and juries.” It was given the Jury Prize.
From the Philippines, the entries under the section “A Window on Asian Cinema,” were Brillante Mendoza’s Alpha, The Right to Kill, Mike de Leon’s Citizen Jake, Alec Figuracion’s The Eternity Between Seconds, Chito Roño’s Signal Rock, Dwein Balthazar’s Gusto Kita With All My Hypothalamus, and the trilogy Lakbayan by Lav Diaz, Brillante Mendoza and Kidlat Tahimik.”
There was another entry, titled Come On, Irene.
The film’s topic had something to do with the Philippines. Based on a Japanese manga, the film is about a Japanese man who pays ¥3 million for a bridal tour to the Philippines. He brings home a Filipina, Irene, who is not exactly welcomed by the man’s newly widowed mother. Directed by Yoshida Keisuke, the film stars Nat Sitoy.
There was another film that got my attention:
The Spy Gone North. This is one of those films that smelled success—a cinema meant for crazy commercial release.
The whole festival was one seductive title after another. I felt like a kid looking at the thousand and one pastries and not being able to decide. And before I knew it, the bell had rung and I was off to the many significant, special events setup by FDCP. Not that I was complaining—it was an honor to moderate sessions and manage press conferences with the main Philippine delegations.
On October 5 I decided to watch Lakbayan with Teddy Co and no less than Kidlat Tahimik himself.
The film was having its premiere in Busan that day. An omnibus film, the three episodes were directed by Diaz, Mendoza and Tahimik.
The first episode, which runs for some 40 minutes (a short, short film endeavor for Lav Diaz), serves as the quiet, meditative intro for the trilogy. The film is about miners going home with their earnings. Two of the miners get killed and only one survive. No one knows who killed who. As with killings in the land, mothers and wives weep and turn their heads away and go somewhere else. The episode is titled “Hugaw” (Dirt). Most elliptical and most mysterious, Lav Diaz lives up to his reputation as a filmmaker of the inscrutable.
The second episode is megged by Brillante Mendoza and bears the title “Desfocado” or Defocused. The film follows the march of the Sumilang farmers. Using real footages and inserting real actors, the episode is, in the traditional way, the most moving. When the female farmer, played by Fe GingGing Hyde, stops and shows the sore on her feet, the Korean woman beside me started weeping. All throughout from that scene, the Korean woman had her shawl covering her face, and wiping the tears from her eyes.
The title is an homage to the photo journalist who has to focus and refocus his camera as the march or the action moves on. Joem Bascon is a compelling journalist in the film.
The last episode relieves us of the hopelessness and the tragic in the Mendoza episode. Kidlat Tahimik’s film follows his son as he travels on land from the North to Davao. Along the way, he meets or recalls the memories of his life with his father and the ethnic communities of the Cordillera. At once playful, eccentric and breathtakingly intellectual, “Travel of Kabunyan” is a search for the light—from that of the bulb to the sun and wisdom.
Wilson Tieng of Solar Films, the producer of the omnibus, was there in Busan. I shared with him my thoughts about how the three directors were able to infuse synergy in that undertaking. Kidlat said they didn’t talk among themselves how they would create the film. The finished product is nothing short of a creative miracle or serendipity.
There was a talk—I’m not sure now who started it—that the three directors would be given the chance to expand their episodes into full-length feature film. As for me, I was emphatic in saying how I love the rhythm of the omnibus, the beat, mood and meter all coming from these three quirky—good quirky—filmmakers.