Suyoocheon

Given Hong Sangsoo’s astounding prolificacy and predilection for repetitions and reversals, it is sometimes said that the pleasures of his work are to be found in the recognition of pattern, and that the director is best appreciated by a loyal viewer familiar with the recurring obsessions that mark the more than thirty films he has made since 1996’s DWAEJIGA UMUL-E PPAJIN NAL. While this is not wrong, Hong’s thirty-second feature SUYOOCHEON is proof that his works can also stand alone. The incomparable Kim Minhee plays Jeonim, an art teacher who calls upon her estranged uncle Sieon (Kwon Haehyo), an actor-turned-bookseller, to help with a student performance after its director’s romantic entanglements with multiple cast members forces his departure. With deceptive simplicity, SUYOOCHEON follows the currents of love and friendship that run through its small group of actors and artists, constructing a subtle, moving study of how interpersonal relationships shift almost imperceptibly, and how the unspoken past shapes lives in the present. In one of Hong’s signature scenes of sojufuelled conversation, Sieon asks a question that might encapsulate the film as whole: “What kind of person do you want to become?” (Erika Balsom)

Hong Sangsoo: VIRGIN STRIPPED BARE BY HER BACHELORS (2000), TALE OF CINEMA (2005), WOMAN ON THE BEACH (2006), NIGHT AND DAY (2008), HA HA HA (2010), IN ANOTHER COUNTRY (2012), NOBODY’S DAUGHTER HAEWON (2013), OUR SUNHI (2013), HILL OF FREEDOM (2014), CLAIRE’S CAMERA (2017), THE DAY AFTER (2017), GRASS (2018), HOTEL BY THE RIVER (2018), THE WOMAN WHO RAN (2020), INTRODUCTION (2021), IN FRONT OF YOUR FACE (2021), THE NOVELIST’S FILM (2022), WALK UP (2022), IN OUR DAY (2023), IN WATER (2023), A TRAVELLER’S NEEDS