| Bilgi : I'm starting to realize that as I grow older, I dislike ambiguity more and more.
This film is another of the recent Antonioniesque art films to come out of Asia (the first of these I remember seeing was 1994's Vive L'Amour, from Taiwan, which seemed tolerable back then); Korea, specifically. In it, people stare into space or at each other interminably without moving or saying a word. They have sex to express their dispassion or hostility towards one another. They laugh hysterically at the slightest pretext, then just as quickly stop or burst into tears. I guess I'm supposed to arrive at some deep understanding of human nature and relationships, but the truth eludes me.
It's about an erotic triangle -- a married couple, and a young man who sleeps with them both (separately). This trio is clearly unhappy, and they torment each other cruelly over the course of the movie. It ends on an uncertain note (ambiguous to the end), and I'm left wondering at the motivations and thoughts of these three very odd people.
Ambiguity had its heyday in the late 1950s and 60s, with the European art cinema movement. But it quickly became an easily imitated technique that used vagueness as a mask for vapidity. The latest Antonioni film that I saw, an episode of the Eros trilogy, revealed that Antonioni had become an imitation of himself -- not a very good one, at that.
I think ambiguity works best when there is a recognizable human element at its core. Then it becomes real; then it connects. Ambiguity as demonstrated by characters who resembles robots or ideas (as opposed to people) quickly becomes a bloody bore. |