|
CHUNHYANG Send This Review to a Friend
An elegantly filmed Korean period piece, "Chunhyang," shown at the year 2000 Toronto and New York Film festivals, is something of a Romeo and Juliet tale in traditional wrapping. The love story set in 18th century Korea has a classical tone, and in fact is sandwiched as cutaways from an auditorium in which a storyteller, a "pansori" singer, narrates the tale, which the audience presumably knows. Without the narrator, the film would lose much of its aura. With him, you can get one big headache, as he shrieks the accompanying commentary about romance and woe.
But the saga itself that unfolds is beautifully realized through Jung Il Sung's eye-filling cinematography, striking settings and the impassioned acting of the principals, Lee Hyo Jung as the lovely Chunhyang, who is the independent-minded daughter of a one-time courtesan, and Cho Seung Woo as the privileged son of a governor. The lovers are married in secret before the son is sent away to pursue his education, but he faithfully promises to return.
The drama takes a grim turn when a new governor of the province wants to bed Chunhyang. Her adamant refusal results in her arrest and sentence of death. There are brutal scenes in which she is mercilessly beaten in public, but no matter what she stands by her principles. Will her lover return as he has promised and rescue her?
Director Im Kwon Taek and screenwriter Kim Myoung Kon approach the story with reverence for classical tradition and provide a rarified atmosphere that does justice to the age-old theme of love subverted, deepened by awareness of class differences and conflicts. The film packs strong emotional power, but I wish it could have been separated from the narration, or that for film purposes the narration could have been toned down. Admittedly, that result would have probably fallen short of what the subject and the style properly demand. A Lot 47 Films release.
|