Park Gang-du (Song Kang-ho) is searching for his missing daughter in THE HOST
THE FILMS OF BONG JOON-HO
BAMcinématek
BAM Rose Cinemas
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
February 25 – March 1
718-636-4100
www.bam.org
In 2006, South Korean writer-director Bong Joon-ho burst onto the international cinematic landscape with the sleeper hit THE HOST, a modern-day monster movie with a lot of heart. He followed that up with the touching segment “Shaking Tokyo” in the compilation film TOKYO! and now is back with the highly anticipated MOTHER. BAMcinématek is paying tribute to the director with a five-day festival that includes all of his work, from 2000’s BARKING DOGS NEVER BITE through 2003’s MEMORIES OF MURDER, THE HOST, and a collection of shorts. Bong will be on hand for the February 26 screening of MOTHER and the February 27 6:30 screening of THE HOST, introducing the films and participating in postscreening Q&As. Bong will also take part in a special program at the Korea Society on February 25, featuring a reception, clips from MOTHER, and a discussion moderated by film professor Michael Atkinson ($15, 212-759-7525, 6:00)
Local detectives are searching for a serial killer in MEMORIES OF MURDER
MEMORIES OF MURDER (SALINUI CHUEOK) (Bong Joon-ho, 2003)
Thursday, February 25, 7:30
www.magpictures.com
Inspired by actual events, Bong Joon-ho’s MEMORIES OF MURDER is a psychological thriller set in a rural South Korean town. With a serial killer on the loose, Seoul sends experienced inspector Suh (Kim Sang-kyung) to help with the case, which is being bungled by local detectives Park (Song Kang-ho) and Cho (Kim Roe-ha), who consistently tamper with evidence, bring in the wrong suspects, and torture them in both brutal and ridiculously funny ways. But as the frustration level builds and more victims are found, even Suh starts considering throwing away the book and doing whatever is necessary to catch the killer. Bong’s first major success, earning multiple awards at film festivals around the world, MEMORIES OF MURDER is a well-paced police procedural that contains just enough surprises to overcome a few too many genre clichés. The film is beautifully shot by Kim Hyung-gu, from wide-open landscapes to a busy, crowded factory. But the film is dominated by Song’s (THE HOST, THIRST) big, round face, a physical and emotional wonder whether he’s goofing around with a prisoner or dead-set on catching a criminal.
THE HOST (GWOEMUL) (Bong Joon-ho, 2006)
Saturday, February 27, 6:30, 9:30
www.magpictures.com
Several years after the government improperly disposes of chemical waste, a huge monster appears under a bridge on the Han River. The lazy, childlike Park Gang-du (Song Kang-ho), who works at his grandfather’s food stand on the shore — that is, when he’s not sleeping — tries desperately to save his young daughter, Hyun-seo (Ko A-sung), from the creature’s grasp, but when the monster runs off with her, Gang-du does everything in his limited power to try to get her back — if she’s even still alive. He gets help from his well-dressed brother and Olympian archer sister, who are determined to rescue their niece, but the creature has no intentions of just coughing her up. THE HOST wants to be more than just another monster movie, injecting humor and strong family bonds, but it never quite pulls itself together. For every great scene with the creature, there’s a silly scene with the family that misses the mark. Still, Song is a hoot to watch, and the special effects folks have created one heck of a cool monster.
Writer-director Andrea Arnold follows up her brilliant, harrowing feature debut, 2006’s RED ROAD, with the brilliant, highly perceptive, and emotionally gripping FISH TANK. Katie Jarvis, a seventeen-year-old discovered by Arnold while the girl was arguing with her boyfriend on a train station platform, had never acted before and was not a dancer, but Arnold cast her in the lead role of Mia, a fifteen-year-old troubled kid who dreams of becoming a professional hip-hop dancer as her only way out of her drab life. A loner quick to curse and fight, Mia lives with her mother, Joanne (Kierston Wareing), who loves to drink and party, and her little sister, Tyler (Rebecca Griffiths making her acting debut as well). When her mother starts dating Connor (Michael Fassbender), Mia soon turns to him for help and advice, but their relationship threatens to grow much too close and far too dangerous. Arnold shot the film in chronological order, giving each actor only parts of the script at a time, so virtually every scene of FISH TANK feels fresh and genuine, with natural, believable actions and reactions. While Wareing and Fassbender (HUNGER and 300) are excellent, the film belongs to the remarkable Jarvis, who will break your heart over and over again. BAMcinematek will be hosting an advance screening of FISH TANK on January 7 at 7:00, followed by a Q&A with director Arnold and star Fassbender. The film, which won the Jury Prize at Cannes, opens at the IFC Center and Lincoln Plaza on January 15.
In 1985, the Cure released a song called “Inbetween Days” that included the line “And I know I was wrong / when I said it was true / that it couldn’t be me and be her / inbetween without you.” On the flip side of the single, “The Exploding Boy,” Robert Smith sang, “I knew if I turned / I’d turn away from you / and I couldn’t look back.” In 2006, South Korean native So Yong Kim made IN BETWEEN DAYS, the tender story of Aimee (Jiseon Kim), a young Korean immigrant on the cusp of her burgeoning sexuality who spends most of her time with her best friend, Tran (Taegu Andy Kang), who is ready for more as well. But as Tran starts hanging out with more Americanized Korean girls, Aimee seems unwilling and unready to share her true feelings, complicating their relationship. IN BETWEEN DAYS is a gentle, touching coming-of-age film that So Yong Kim made with her husband, Bradley Rust Gray, who served as producer, cowriter, 16mm cinematographer, camera assistant, and editing supervisor. Three years later, Gray made what he calls the flip side to IN BETWEEN DAYS, the gentle, touching coming-of-age drama THE EXPLODING GIRL, with Kim serving as one of the film’s producers and editing it with her husband. In THE EXPLODING GIRL, Zoe Kazan stars as Ivy, a young woman who comes home from college break ready to spend time with her best friend, Al (Mark Rendall). While Ivy attempts to see her new boyfriend, Greg, her relationship with Al threatens to unravel as she is unwilling to face her real feelings. Both films are beautifully paced slices of life shot in a cinema verité style that adds to their believability and charm.
François Truffaut shot out of the blocks in 1959 with the classic 400 BLOWS, and he followed it up with this magnificent noir about a virtuoso saloon piano player and his always-in-trouble brother. French crooner Charles Aznavour is super-cool as the secretive, shy piano player with a hidden past who gets caught up in his crooked brother’s dangerous predicament, against his better judgment. Comedy mixes with pathos, dance-hall jollies lead to murder and kidnapping, and lost love holds a curse in a dark, haunting film you will never forget.
After getting a biopsy taken and drawing the death card while consulting a fortune-teller, popular French singer Cléo (Corinne Marchand) begins looking back at her life — and wondering just what’s left of it — while awaiting the dreaded results. The blonde beauty talks with old friends, asks her piano player (Michel Legrand, who composed the score) to write her a song, and meets a dapper gentleman in the park, becoming both participant and viewer in her own existence. As Cléo makes her way around town, director (and former photographer) Agnès Varda shows off early 1960s Paris, expertly winding her camera through the Rive Gauche. Just as Cléo seeks to find out what’s real (her actual name is Florence and that gorgeous hair is a wig), Varda shoots the film in a cinema verité style, almost as if it’s a documentary. She even sets the film in real time (adding chapter titles with a clock update), enhancing the audience’s connection with Cléo as she awaits her fate, but the movie runs only ninety minutes, adding mystery to what is to become of Cléo, as if she exists both on-screen and off, alongside the viewer. A central film in the French Nouvelle Vague and one of the first to be made by a woman, CLÉO DE 5 À 7 is an influential classic even as it has lost a step or two over the years. Varda, now in her eighties, has also made such well-regarded films as LE BONHEUR (1965), VAGABOND (1985), THE GLEANERS AND I (2000), and THE BEACHES OF AGNÉS (2008), among others.
