In a sense, Kim Ki-duk is South Korea's Zhang Yimou. In the 1990s, Zhang Yimou made a series of local films, which were favored by foreign awards, but also criticized by domestic film critics for flattering the West.
The same is true for Kim Ki-duk. He became the first Korean film director to receive honors from the world's three major international film festivals with works such as "Samaria Girl", "Empty Room" and "Saint", but because he exposed the reality too much, the theme Dark and dark, he was called a "prostitute director" by his own people, and he was discredited in the metoo movement in 2018.
Today, Zhao Shanhe takes his most metaphorical "Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter and Another Spring" to analyze Jin Jide's creative style and even the desolate background behind it.
People are reincarnated like the four seasons
There is a temple in the lake, and there are old monks and young monks in the temple. The spring, summer, autumn and winter here, all seasons of the year, in the picturesque empty shots, are the interweaving of lust and redemption.
In spring, all things are born, and the wind is full of the taste of life. The little monk didn't do anything more, and he didn't know the importance of the attack. He tied the stones to the fish, the frog, and the snake in turn, watching them struggle in pain.
The old monk couldn't bear it any longer, so he tied a stone to his apprentice, hoping that he would feel the same pain. Unfortunately, the old monk still miscalculated.
Summer is here, and the little monk has grown into a strong young man. At this time, a young girl was brought to the temple. The girl's mother hoped that the old monk could cure the girl's strange disease.
Young and young, dry wood and fire, the little monk and the girl had a relationship. This was seen by the old monk, but the old monk did not punish the two. Because the old monk saw that, because of the young monk's company, the girl's illness gradually recovered, just as he said: " This is the best medicine ", and also added the sentence " Lust awakens the desire to possess, which will lead to murder. Woe. "
When they meet, they will always leave. The girl is sick and it is time to go back. The little monk couldn't help burning his passion and left the temple hand in hand with her. Until the autumn, the little monk finally returned, at this time he committed the felony of killing his wife. It turned out that when they came to the world, there were more and more conflicts between the little monk and the girl. The little monk who did not understand love killed the girl because of jealousy and fled back to the temple. Two policemen followed.
Strangely, the old monk did not expel the young monk, but let him engrave Buddhist scriptures. The little monk who finished carving Buddhist scriptures finally found peace and surrendered himself. The old monk was also on the boat, covered his mouth and nose with paper, and set himself on fire.
In winter, the little monk who had been released from prison returned to the temple again and inherited the mantle of the master. He was topless, holding a Buddha statue in his arms, dragging a grinding wheel, and climbing the mountain road to the top, hoping to redeem his sins in the same way. But the little monk adopted in the distance also abused small animals with the same cruel method, and the story returned to the original point.
reach the heart with metaphors
In this film, Kim Ki-deok uses various metaphors to let us see growth from a young monk, and also see the immortality of reincarnation from the changing seasons.
The temple is isolated from the world, and that mountain gate is useless. But it is precisely because of this mountain gate that separates the secular world from the Buddhist gate, and the Huzhong Temple is also the heart of people.
In this segment of spring, both fish and frogs represent life, especially fish, which represent immortality in various religious cultures. But the two little monks didn't care and abused them in various ways.
This is ordinary evil. The little monk did not experience death, but simply felt the pleasure of abuse. This kind of evil is the most terrifying. Adults do evil for a few pieces of silver or for blood. Only this mundane and ignorant evil is difficult to judge, and they will only reply: " I find it fun and exciting. "
The old monk hoped to use his own way to repay his own body, but the evil factor did not disappear. This is the first level of pessimism of Kim Ki-deok - people always have the instinct to do evil. In a state of isolation, the little monk could not feel the value of other people's lives in the process of growing up, and only acted on his own desires, so he soon committed lust and precept as an adult. As Kant said, man is driven by desire and eventually becomes a slave of desire.
Especially at the end, another little monk repeats the same mistakes, which makes us feel the horror of reincarnation, and a new round of tragedies will be staged again.
Can the master change? No, neither of the two masters escaped Kim Ki-deok's second layer of pessimism - people always think from their own perspective.
The young monk picked a bunch of herbs, and the old monk warned him that some of them were poisonous and should not be eaten. Between heaven and earth, grass is poisonous or not, it is a natural selection, not to make itself poisonous for the sake of harming others. But in order to survive, people have preferences, and then conflict, which has become an endless cycle of conflict.
The master grabbed the cat's tail and applied paint to the Buddhist scriptures carved by the little monk. Cats are sensitive and suspicious creatures, as jealous as people. The little monk once rebuked loudly, why did his wife cheat? In fact, they all stand from their own perspective and find that the other party is not under their control, so they become jealous and angry, and thus make a big mistake. Therefore, people will fall into their own cognition and make various mistakes.
It can be said that at the end, the little monk continued to use that kind of abusive physical and mental methods to redeem himself, and he could not be liberated in the end. Without feeling the beauty of life and lacking the package of love, how can people grow up correctly?
Abandoned child tyranny returns
The literary director seems to use his works to reproduce the pain of his youth. Kim Ki-duk grew up in a loveless family.
Insults and scolding are the basic operations of Kim Ki-duk's father's treatment of him. He wrote to Park Chung-hee many times to no avail. His father felt abandoned by the government, so he spread his grievances to his family, often scolding Kim Ki-duk: "What kind of talent can you be when you grow up?"
During meals, Kim Ki-deok only ate one piece of each dish, and when he was hungry, he went to the vegetable field to pull a cabbage to eat, and even hid in the toilet to avoid his father.
He was scolded in the family and ostracized in the army. Kim Ki-duk shot himself in the factory where he worked. Such a growth experience is destined to suppress despair as the background of Kim Ki-deok's life.
In the 1990s, under the influence of "Silence of the Lambs" and "Shinqiao Lovers", Kim Ki-duk chose movies to examine his own life. He injects the experience of life into the script, so in his works, the characters are basically in a highly abstract environment, repeating killing and lust. Kim Ki-duk hopes to be rescued, but to no avail.
Falling into social anxiety, he hid in the mountains and made the autobiographical documentary "Arirang". The camera is aimed at himself, and he speaks his heart. For me, life is to harm me, harm him and grief. We are always bound in reality, and understanding and forgiveness take time.
Fromm mentioned in "The Art of Love" that sadism and masochism are often concentrated in one person, Hitler is so, so is Kim Ki-duk.
In 2018, three actresses appeared on the Korean MBC TV current affairs program "PD Handbook" to expose the scandal of Kim Ki-duk's sexual harassment and assault. Although he was found not guilty, Kim Ki-duk also betrayed his family, divorced his wife, denied his children, and died completely socially in South Korea.
So he did the same, just like in "Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter and Another Spring", he bought a house and settled in a small overseas country, in order to avoid world affairs. Kim Ki-duk didn't wait for this day, because he was infected with the new crown and died at home for many days before being discovered.
Fate always seems to joke with Kim Ki-duk, who once tried to kill the dragon in the movie, became another dragon on the set. Good and evil depend on each other, fortune and misfortune depend on each other, Jin Jide lives himself as a reincarnation.
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