Flappy the mackerel teaches a greenling about life and survival in Lee Dae-hee’s PADAK
PADAK (Lee Dae-hee, 2012)
Tribeca Cinemas
54 Varick St. at Laight St.
Tuesday, January 29, free, 7:00
212-759-9550
www.koreanculture.org
www.tribecacinemas.com
In June 2011, the Korean Cultural Service’s Korean Movie Night series presented Lim Woo-seong’s Vegetarian, a film that we said “is likely to put you off your lunch.” On January 29, the free biweekly series at Tribeca Cinemas will be screening Lee Dae-hee’s Padak, an animated film that might put you off sushi for quite a while. Lee’s twisting of Pixar’s Finding Nemo focuses on a small group of fish in a tank outside a seafood restaurant, desperately hoping they will not get scooped up and become someone’s dinner. A microcosm of Korean society, the fish are led by a grumpy old flounder who is protected by a sly eel; the handful of others just fall into line until a mackerel named Flappy is dumped into the tank. Flappy comes from the sea, while the others were farm raised, so they are intrigued by his tales of freedom and his desire to break through the “invisible walls” and return to the ocean, which is so close on the dock yet so far away. While most of the fish resent Flappy’s constant yapping and continued attempts to escape, a young greenling falls under his wing, deciding he too would rather not just keep playing dead in order not to get chosen for dinner and instead do anything and everything he can to get out and live a real life. Using a compelling animation style that combines hand drawing with CGI, Lee holds nothing back in Padak; when a fish from any of the tanks gets selected, Lee shows the sushi chef slicing him or her up with his sharp knife, then being served to hungry families who dig in, the fish’s head still alive, eyes crying out in pain. Lee does a good job establishing the main characters, voiced by Kim Hyeon-ji, Ahn Yeong-mi-I, Hyeon Kyeong-soo, Lee Ho-san, and Si Yeong-joon, who represent various classes and political beliefs. The film also features a trio of musical numbers with surreal animation that is just plain crazy. Padak is a heart-wrenching tale that is definitely not for young children, and adults are likely to find it extremely sad and disturbing as well. The Korean Movie Night series continues February 12 with The House and February 26 with Yuen Sang-ho’s The Window and other animated shorts.