Cinema: Jiseul + Extremely Short

Hello all. Time for more movies.

Our short is “Extremely Short” by Koji Yamamura.

Beautiful punkish, frenetic short. The animation is fantastic, it gives the sense of a very rustic technique, while being polished and rhythmic.

Full review by smallafol here.

Watch here.

Our feature is “Jiseul” by O Muel.

Jiseul is a movie of opposition; it is at once elusive in its story and clear in its message, consisting of imagery which is often dark and beautiful and ideas which are terrifying. It depicts the experience of a small group of villagers during the Jeju massacre of 1948, but assessing the film’s historical accuracy is difficult. Like the documentary The Murmuring, Jiseul deals with a history of Korea that has been both willingly and forcefully forgotten. Yet, where The Murmuring shares explicitly the context of its violence, Jiseul does just the opposite. The viewer is given a brief context with title cards at the beginning and end, but is otherwise thrown into the story with little knowledge of the situation and characters. By the end, the viewer has witnessed suffering, violence, and cruelty, but has not gained a deeper understanding of why. Through the film’s soldiers, we see the depravity and brutality which men are capable of committing when simply given the power, as well as the moral struggle of compliance, but we never discover from where this conflict stems.

Full review by harlanthater here.

Watch here.