Dir. Im Kwon-Taek, 2002, Rest of the world, 117 mins, subtitles
Cast: Ahn Sung-Ki , Choi Min-sik, Ho-jeong Yu, Min-sik Choi, Son Ye-jin, Sung-kee Ahn
Perhaps the most internationally recognized filmmaker from Korea, Im Kwon-taek is a prolific filmmaker with a career spanning four decades. His films frequently explore issues of Korean identity, holding up Korean rituals and beliefs for examination. Sometimes referred to as "Korea's Spielberg," Kwon-taek's evocative visual style and lyrical storytelling have earned him awards at festivals from San Francisco to Singapore. Last May 2002, Im Kwon-taek won the best director prize for Chihwaseon at the Cannes International Film Festival in France.
Im Kwon Taek tells the extraordinary biopic of 19th century Korean painter and national legend Jang Seung-up, of whom very little is actually known, famous for his revolutionary work, addiction to alcohol and convoluted love affairs with women. What starts out as a slow-burning journey from Seung-up's (who worked under the pseudonym Oh-won) impoverished youth, blossoms into a visually stunning, wryly humorous, sensuous piece of cinema, as his reputation and temperament develops in a turbulent political era.
Chihwaseon is a truly epic portrait of an extraordinary artist whose life and work embodied both the chaotic and dangerous conflicts of his time. Set in 19th Century Korea, a struggling young artist, Seung-up (Choi Min-sik) befriends a local respected nobleman, Kim Byung-moon (Ahn Sung-Ki), who he recognises from his youth. This meeting sparks a friendship that will span both their lives as Kim helps his young friend discover and develop his gift. Working and studying in the homes of eminent Chinese and Korean scholars and courted by wealthy and powerful art collectors, Seung-up's reputation quickly spreads and he begins to defy conventional style and authority, becoming intoxicated by his art and passionate relationships. As his infamy grows, Seung-up quickly becomes one of Korea's most influential and celebrated artists but at a growing personal cost. Only through pleasure can he find the inspiration to paint, and so his life becomes embroiled with alcohol and women - his beautiful paintings sitting uneasily with his drunken, whoring lifestyle.
As a chronicle of part of a nation's history Chihwaseon is very effective as it does an excellent job of conveying Korea's political status at the time and his place in that shifting environment. An artists' attempt at liberated and objective forms of expression in the midst of political upheaval is a very real concern in modern day Korea, a country long divided, both geographically and socially, between two diametrically opposed ideologies. Chihwaseon provides an illuminating background to the current political dichotomy in Korea, tracing the roots of this unsettled land back to the second half of the nineteenth century, where a far from unified Korea was a country much coveted by foreign invaders.
Chihwaseon is deeply embedded in the vast territory of South East Asian culture, both in terms of its subject matter and its stylistic influences, however it is an accessible and familiar rendition of themes explored in biopics of the past. The artist over-burdened with talent and expectation, and the damaging implications arising from this, has been visited with regularity by filmmakers in the west. Vincente Minnelli took on Vincent Van Gogh with his 1956 film Lust For Life, Michelangelo was seen on his back tussling with the Pope and the Sistine Chapel in The Agony and The Ecstasy and, most recently, Ed Harris wrestled with that ultimate tortured soul; abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock in his directorial debut. Transferring the life of the tortured artist to film is a perfect opportunity for an intense and dramatic character study, and it is remarkable how many parallels can be drawn between Chihwaseon and the examples listed above. The emotions remain the same, and the single-minded commitment to the expression of the self clearly exists, but Chihwaseon is infused with the stylistic vibrancy of Eastern culture throughout its entire creation, that which is so alluring and so exotic to audiences in the west, a tale that remains true to the values of pastoral Asian cinema instilled in the work of filmmakers such as Akira Kurosawa, Chien Kaige and Yoshujiro Ozu.
Arsim Canolli
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