On December 11, 2020, the most unpopular alternative director passed away. In a foreign country, he brought his controversial works and said goodbye to this conservative world!
It seems difficult for us to give a systematic positioning of Kim Ki-duk's style. Each of his works is very similar but very different, and each of his perspectives is puzzling but extremely real. This is why his works are not accepted by the people in South Korea, but they can sweep the three major European film festivals.
Curious lust, human ugliness
I remember that when I was in high school, I often watched Kim Ki-duk's movies as erotic movies, thinking about satisfying my growing physical needs. But in the end, he found that it was not the case at all. His works often appeared subversive images of the senses , and some even caused physical discomfort. At the same time, the men and women under his camera always gave people an indescribable filth and filth. evil. Rather than focusing on the suffering of the marginalized, he is using these symbols to outline an already grim world.
When everything goes to the extreme, it may be the purest beginning. The public thinks that Kim Ki-duk is constantly offending, hurting, and venting, but on the contrary, he does not want to declare war with the world, but uses the most essential human nature to tell the world that this is our real existence.
"The Diary of a Crocodile" opened Kim Ki-duk's thinking about human nature. That feeling of powerless struggle, that kind of sympathy after sexual violence, that kind of moaning from the bottom of society, isn't that the fate that most people cannot escape? In reality, we obviously don't want to believe in Kim Ki-deok's lens world, but seeing the essence through phenomena is indeed the reincarnation of human nature's inherent evil.
"The Young Prostitute" and "The Drifting Room" are still full of Kim Ki-duk's thoughts on desire. "Sex" always seems shameful and dirty in East Asian culture, but when the camera is pushed to the root of human nature, to explore the desires of the people at the bottom, it represents everything. It can be cathartic, it can be passed down, it can even be a survival skill. Kim Ki-duk's obsession with the female carcass is not disrespectful, it's more of a sacred religious belief that guides something to move on and Kim Ki-duk's quest towards a purer essence.
In "Samaria Girl" he expresses himself more "unscrupulously", and you even find a lot of thinking in his messy narrative. From incomprehension to understanding to redemption, the men and women under the camera are lost on their own paths. The most terrifying thing is that Kim Ki-duk never leaves you with a corner of hope. In the end, his father was taken away by the police and his daughter was driving into a quagmire. Such an inhumane ending hits the heart directly.
Twisted world, endless pain
Kim Ki-duk's world has never changed, and it can be said that in this dynamic era, his attitude towards the world has never wavered. From obscure to rough, his essence is still pure in his constantly changing lens language.
"Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter, Another Spring" is Kim Ki-duk's most tender film, where the ugliness and reincarnation of human nature are relieved and understood here. Reincarnation is sometimes a kind of destiny, and redemption is often just to seek self-comfort. Kim Ki-duk never judges, he just presents the facts, and you will never get used to it when you watch it, and finally realize that the world that he believed to be true is false, and all the "dao" that has been preached are false .
In "Bad Boy" , he opened up an unbelievable twisted love. There are no perfect people in his works, and even the symbols are incomplete, which also indicates that love is also full of loopholes in his stories. Even the poignant and beautiful love that the world has praised has become dilapidated here. It is no wonder that in the eyes of the Korean people, Kim Ki-duk is so "heinous".
In the later stage, Kim Ki-duk became extremely surly, and the uncontrollableness of the whole "Mobius" seemed to be venting an emotion . The sadness after the metamorphosis is irreversible, and there is really no hope for the heart-wrenching ending. . Kim Ki-deok, whose essence has not changed, seems to have changed.
never explain, no need to understand
We always want to fully understand Kim Ki-duk, but there are always hidden changes in each of his seemingly identical works, so that we are even more at a loss when we see it at the end. He never throws questions or gives you answers. He despises the business people who please the majority, and also disdains to please the literary and artistic minority. "Kim Ki-duk" itself is a symbol of contradiction. He keeps searching in his self-struggle, even if he gets lost, he will not withdraw.
South Korea couldn't hold him, he went to Europe, to Russia, to Estonia, to Latvia...
In his bones, he was still the boy who was afraid of his father, the young man with low self-esteem, and the perverse middle-aged man. But under the camera, he is that pure teenager, a young man who is not ashamed to show his desires, and a middle-aged man who dares to express his catharsis.
He left forever, he will never make his movies again, he left with the world's confusion, and he led me to talk to God in my own way.
If the mortal world can't hold him, will God take him in?
Maybe Kim Ki-duk's world doesn't need any understanding, just himself is enough!
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