Review of Poetry (2010) by Kenneth L — 07 May 2014

This South Korean drama, which won the Best Screenplay award at Cannes, is quite a brilliant movie. It's beautifully understated and restrained, but quite powerful and sad. In terms of films about aging, it's so much better than Michael Haneke's brilliantly acted but ultimately ugly and empty Amour. This is one of the best films about an older (mid-to-late 60s) female protagonist I've ever seen, if not the best.

The film follows a tough month in the life of Mija (Yun Junghee), a quiet woman who is just beginning to suffer from signs Alzheimer's disease. She's got a lot of issues to deal with; in addition to the onset of Alzheimer's, she takes care of her grandson, an ungrateful little monster; she works part-time taking care of an elderly stroke victim; and other problems surface which I won't mention here. In spit of it all, however, she still decides to take a 1-month adult-education class on poetry writing; her greatest ambition is to write just one good poem.

This is the first film I've seen by any of the people involved. Chang-dong Lee wrote and directed it, and his work is quietly masterful. You wonder how or if he's going to tie all the various story strands together; but trust me, he does, in subtle and unexpected ways. Most of the other South Korean films I've seen so far have been either violent thrillers or horror movies; this movie, while surprisingly dark, has more in common with neorealist cinema than with the pulpy genre-driven films South Korea is best known for. Yun Junghee plays Mija, and she is really terrific. We never quite get into the character's head, but she remains fascinating to watch, and easy to care for. I read than Junghee was a major star in Korea in the 1960s and 70s, but hadn't acted in 16 years before making this film. That's amazing, considering how natural and convincing her work here is.

I've probably made this sound like an eat-your-vegetables type of movie, something respectable but dry. Trust me, this movie is completely absorbing and a great experience to watch. It's on Netflix Instant.