nimwoo
Germany
This review may contain spoilers
Just like another user, I will review this miniseries separately because they're all completely different:
1) Love Set: I believe this is the most difficult short film to rate or even describe because it probably looks (or is) meaningless. I understand that cinema doesn't always need to have a meaning and I love directors who understand this and simply film something with no plot or story, it's an interesting point of view about this industry. However, I tried to give it a meaning, and this may be a reach, but to me it was about giving your all to something and how tired or hurt you can get in order to achieve that. We see IU falling down and scratching her knee, one of the tennis balls even hits her chest but she keeps going. She's tired, Doo Na is tired too, but IU wants to keep going because she wants to achieve her goal. However, Doo Na tells her that she wont' marry her father, even though IU lost. I took this as that sometimes you don't even need to work that hard to get something, maybe you just need to let things happen and follow the flow they will naturally have, whether you get it or not, don't try too much or hurt yourself trying to achieve something that may just naturally come to you.
2) Collector: I have to admit that I didn't know where this was going but I was loving it simply for the horrible character that IU was. But as the story progressed, I understood that this was about an abusive relationship. A woman who ghosted her partner for 10 days, a man who was nervous because he couldn't reach her and when she finally appears, he's trying his best not to be a bother, not to show his true emotions and concerns in fear that she may leave again. They spend the entire day together, but she's out of it, she's physically there but her mind and heart are somewhere else. He notices it, but he doesn't want to do anything that may make her go away. Shots from what looks like his mind appear with what seems to be his ex-girlfriend, blaming him for leaving her and telling him he brought this upon himself, he can't complain (someone who made a mistake and went into an abusive relationship trying to convince himself that he deserves the abuse). But at the end of the day he can't hold it any longer and expresses his fears, concerns, emotions. He wants to know what he means to her, but to his misfortune, he's nothing more than just another man in her life, and he knew. She asks him to be cool, to be someone that he's not, to give her something more. He eventually ends up pulling his heart out of his chest, meaning that he was willing to give her everything even if that meant that he would die just so she could be happy. That's the best interpretation of an abusive relationship that I have ever seen. At the end, she's shown with a bag of hearts from other men who she had abused before and she gives him a box with what seems to be himself trapped in his own mind, again, this time his ex is not there. I'd take this as a way to show that after someone gives their all in an abusive relationship they're left alone, tired, drained, with no energy, emotions (heart) to give to another person. Completely loved this one.
3) Kiss Burn: This one was the most fun and light short film, about two girls trying to revenge the mistreatment that one girl's abusive father has done. They try several ways but end up failing with all of them. It's about friendship and discovering new things (kiss, sexual arousal, smoking). They spend a few days trying to do it but at the end they give up and decide to go to the beach to release their stress. A mountain is shown catching fire through the ending scene and the credits, and we learn that the abusive father is a forest fireman, so we can say that the nature's way to avenge the father's abuse is by giving him work(?). To be honest, I couldn't find any deeper meaning in this one, nothing more than just an innocent friendship. Still, loved the acting and story.
4) Walking at Night: This is my favorite short film of the mini series. When I finished it, I literally thought in my head I did an standing ovation because of how vastly beautiful and deep this one was. A story about a couple reminiscing their old times, the times when they fell in love and spent a beautiful time together. However, the boyfriend is suddenly reminded that his girlfriend is dead and what he sees is not real; they're in a dream. I loved the director's portrayal of a dream in black and white, magical and mysterious. The fact that he suddenly remembered that she was dead was so accurate because sometimes when we're on a dream we forget things that happened in reality and suddenly remember them, that's exactly how they portrayed this and I loved it. He asks her why she died and she says that she was lonely, he wants to know if he made her feel like that (in a suicide, the people who are left often blame themselves wondering what wrong they did), she assures him that he was always for her, that it was the people who knew her that made her like that. I don't want to sound like I'm romanticizing suicide in no way, especially not when hers was so brutal, but I do love the perspective they give from a person who committed suicide and how lonely they were that they made this decision. The boyfriend starts to mumble what she said because he doesn't want to forget it when he wakes up, he knows in the dream that it's not his fault but he also knows that he will continue to blame himself if he doesn't remember it when he wakes up. I know many people have done this too, try very hard in the dream to retain as much as possible so that when we wake up we remember it. At some point he's saddened because he won't remember her, but she calms him by saying that at least they are together again. I just think this was way too beautiful, maybe I'm biased because of the topic but I loved it way too much. The quote at the end is the cherry on the cake, "dreams and death lead to nowhere. They will end up nowhere and eventually be forgotten. We are here, but no one will remember us. Everything is gone, and only the night remains."
Overall, I really loved this series. It was art, in the way that it leaves the door open for one's interpretation depending on one's life experiences and conceptions and I just truly love this type of cinema and I'm grateful to IU for portraying these wonderful roles, and also the rest of the cast and crew for all the films.
1) Love Set: I believe this is the most difficult short film to rate or even describe because it probably looks (or is) meaningless. I understand that cinema doesn't always need to have a meaning and I love directors who understand this and simply film something with no plot or story, it's an interesting point of view about this industry. However, I tried to give it a meaning, and this may be a reach, but to me it was about giving your all to something and how tired or hurt you can get in order to achieve that. We see IU falling down and scratching her knee, one of the tennis balls even hits her chest but she keeps going. She's tired, Doo Na is tired too, but IU wants to keep going because she wants to achieve her goal. However, Doo Na tells her that she wont' marry her father, even though IU lost. I took this as that sometimes you don't even need to work that hard to get something, maybe you just need to let things happen and follow the flow they will naturally have, whether you get it or not, don't try too much or hurt yourself trying to achieve something that may just naturally come to you.
2) Collector: I have to admit that I didn't know where this was going but I was loving it simply for the horrible character that IU was. But as the story progressed, I understood that this was about an abusive relationship. A woman who ghosted her partner for 10 days, a man who was nervous because he couldn't reach her and when she finally appears, he's trying his best not to be a bother, not to show his true emotions and concerns in fear that she may leave again. They spend the entire day together, but she's out of it, she's physically there but her mind and heart are somewhere else. He notices it, but he doesn't want to do anything that may make her go away. Shots from what looks like his mind appear with what seems to be his ex-girlfriend, blaming him for leaving her and telling him he brought this upon himself, he can't complain (someone who made a mistake and went into an abusive relationship trying to convince himself that he deserves the abuse). But at the end of the day he can't hold it any longer and expresses his fears, concerns, emotions. He wants to know what he means to her, but to his misfortune, he's nothing more than just another man in her life, and he knew. She asks him to be cool, to be someone that he's not, to give her something more. He eventually ends up pulling his heart out of his chest, meaning that he was willing to give her everything even if that meant that he would die just so she could be happy. That's the best interpretation of an abusive relationship that I have ever seen. At the end, she's shown with a bag of hearts from other men who she had abused before and she gives him a box with what seems to be himself trapped in his own mind, again, this time his ex is not there. I'd take this as a way to show that after someone gives their all in an abusive relationship they're left alone, tired, drained, with no energy, emotions (heart) to give to another person. Completely loved this one.
3) Kiss Burn: This one was the most fun and light short film, about two girls trying to revenge the mistreatment that one girl's abusive father has done. They try several ways but end up failing with all of them. It's about friendship and discovering new things (kiss, sexual arousal, smoking). They spend a few days trying to do it but at the end they give up and decide to go to the beach to release their stress. A mountain is shown catching fire through the ending scene and the credits, and we learn that the abusive father is a forest fireman, so we can say that the nature's way to avenge the father's abuse is by giving him work(?). To be honest, I couldn't find any deeper meaning in this one, nothing more than just an innocent friendship. Still, loved the acting and story.
4) Walking at Night: This is my favorite short film of the mini series. When I finished it, I literally thought in my head I did an standing ovation because of how vastly beautiful and deep this one was. A story about a couple reminiscing their old times, the times when they fell in love and spent a beautiful time together. However, the boyfriend is suddenly reminded that his girlfriend is dead and what he sees is not real; they're in a dream. I loved the director's portrayal of a dream in black and white, magical and mysterious. The fact that he suddenly remembered that she was dead was so accurate because sometimes when we're on a dream we forget things that happened in reality and suddenly remember them, that's exactly how they portrayed this and I loved it. He asks her why she died and she says that she was lonely, he wants to know if he made her feel like that (in a suicide, the people who are left often blame themselves wondering what wrong they did), she assures him that he was always for her, that it was the people who knew her that made her like that. I don't want to sound like I'm romanticizing suicide in no way, especially not when hers was so brutal, but I do love the perspective they give from a person who committed suicide and how lonely they were that they made this decision. The boyfriend starts to mumble what she said because he doesn't want to forget it when he wakes up, he knows in the dream that it's not his fault but he also knows that he will continue to blame himself if he doesn't remember it when he wakes up. I know many people have done this too, try very hard in the dream to retain as much as possible so that when we wake up we remember it. At some point he's saddened because he won't remember her, but she calms him by saying that at least they are together again. I just think this was way too beautiful, maybe I'm biased because of the topic but I loved it way too much. The quote at the end is the cherry on the cake, "dreams and death lead to nowhere. They will end up nowhere and eventually be forgotten. We are here, but no one will remember us. Everything is gone, and only the night remains."
Overall, I really loved this series. It was art, in the way that it leaves the door open for one's interpretation depending on one's life experiences and conceptions and I just truly love this type of cinema and I'm grateful to IU for portraying these wonderful roles, and also the rest of the cast and crew for all the films.
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