Breathless
Director: Yang Ik-june

Our Beloved Month of August
Director: Miguel Gomes

SOUTH Korean writer-director-producer Yang Ik-june makes an impressively swaggering debut - in more ways than one - with his unapologetically violent and relentlessly foul-mouthed drama Breathless. Not only does his first turn behind the camera result in a picture that's won critical acclaim and film-festival awards from Singapore and Tokyo to Rotterdam and Austin, but Yang is also the star of the movie, and his entrance - nonchalantly wielding a baseball bat to break up a street-demo - is among the more startling introductions of a film protagonist in recent memory. 
   Yang's Kim Sang-hoon is, as this spectacular entrée indicates, rather more "anti-hero" than conventional leading-man. A small-time, utterly amoral muscle-for-hire hoodlum working mainly as enforcer for loan-shark Man-shik (Jeong Man-shik), Sang-hoon's first resort in pretty much every situation is violence, usually accompanied by a volley of four-letter strewn verbal abuse. An unreconstructed bruiser of the old school - he uses a pager rather than a mobile - Sang-hoon has a certain wayward, bad-boy charisma, but is fundamentally unsympathetic and unredeemed in his thuggery.
   Until, that is, he meets precocious schoolgirl Yoon-hee (Kim Kot-bi) - and, after a decidedly inauspicious start (he accidentally spits on her in the street and, when she remonstrates, assaults her), Sang-hoon's softish centre gradually emerges, along with the belated dawnings of conscience, responsibility and maturity. What ensues is a kind-of romance between two individuals who seem to come from entirely different (though adjacent) urban worlds, but who turn out to share deeply dysfunctional family lives.
   In a movie which is much concerned with issues of  "blood", the underlying malaise being diagnosed and illustrated turns out to be a strain of domestic violence which seems to be endemic in contemporary Korean society - as has been chronicled in several films from the nation over the past few years. Breathless, though somewhat overlong at 130 minutes - is a worthwhile addition to their ranks, unstinting in its exploration of the worst sides of human nature (alongside some unexpectedly lyrical evocations of big-city street atmosphere, murmuringly scored by the band Invisible Fish.)
   Though Yoon-hee and Sang-hoon's touchingly platonic friendship forms the emotional core of the picture, the dramatic focus coalesces around her volatile brother Yeong-jae (Lee Hwan), a seemingly mild-mannered sort who ends up working for Man-shik's gang. This leads to an uncompromising climax of extreme brutality - all of a piece with a picture that, whatever its faults, never pulls its punches.
   Of course, it takes a certain degree of brass neck to choose "Breathless" as the English-language title of one's first movie - exactly half a century after a certain Jean-Luc Godard did exactly the same thing (with A bout de souffle.) Yang almost certainly won't end up having the same impact on world culture as his Gallic comrade-in-arms, but anyone seriously interested in contemporary crime movies or transgressive east Asian cinema should certain seek him out.

ANOTHER rising star on the film-festival circuit is Miguel Gomes, the Portuguese writer-director who has made one feature (2004's The Face You Deserve) and a handful of shorts, but whose Our Beloved Month of August now becomes the first to obtain commercial UK distribution - albeit limited to a small number of arthouse cinemas. Certain influential highbrow critics regard Gomes as one of the major younger film-makers in the world right now, and August certainly gets full marks for ambition and originality.
   A genially sprawling exercise in post-modernity, it combines documentary and fiction to craft a multi-layered portrait of a certain corner of the Portuguese countryside. The place comes alive each August when it hosts a series of travelling music bands that go from village to village staging outdoor concerts, playing cheesy pop with romantic lyrics. The first half of the film - and it is divided into to discrete parts - is fairly "straight" documentary with an ethnographic and anthropological bent, immersing us in the particularities and peculiarities of place.
   The second half sees the emphasis change, and a wispy story develops about one of the bands, ‘Stars of Alva', in which singer Tania (Sonia Bandera) edges towards a romance with her cousin Helder (Fabio Oliviera). Gomes seems to be probing the gaps between humdrum reality and the creations of art - be they "low" (the pop-songs) or "high" (art cinema.) His playful, self-referential approach - Gomes pops up from time to time, playing a version of himself, along with his producer and crew - works up to a certain point, but after a while a certain smart-alec, patronising atmosphere starts to intrude.
   The incorporation of an incest sub-plot is particularly awkward, and in the end there isn't enough substance to sustain the elaborate structure Gomes has so impishly devised. There's considerable talent here, but it's still very much in a wayward, rough-formed state. Like Yang, Gomes is clearly a name to bear in mind, though with the proviso that the extravagant praise heaped on Our Beloved Month of August from certain quarters may well lead him down unproductively pretentious culs-de-sac.

Neil Young
19th January, 2010

written for the 28st January issue of :  


OUR BELOVED MONTH OF AUGUST : [5+/10] : Aquele querido mes de agosto : Portugal (Por/Fr) 2008 : Miguel GOMES : 149m (timed) : seen at Gartenbaukino, Vienna, 24th October 2008 (public show, complimentary ticket) and again on DVD in Vienna later the same week : Viennale (Vienna International Film Festival). Original report. {14+/28}

BREATHLESS : [7/10] : Ddongpari : (South) Korea 2009 : YANG Ik-June : 130m : seen at Londres cinema, Lisbon, 28th April 2008 (public show, complimentary ticket), IndieLisboa film festival. Original report. {18/28}

























































A PROPHET : [6/10] : Un prophète : France 2009 : Jacques AUDIARD : 155m (BBFC) : seen at Gartenbaukino cinema, Vienna, 25th October 2009 (public show - complimentary ticket) Viennale / Vienna International Film Festival : [16/28]
Jigsaw Lounge Viennale 2009 index-page

THE BOYS ARE BACK : [4/10] : USA/Australia 2009 : Scott HICKS : 104m (BBFC) : seen at Empire cinema, Great Park, Birmingham, 2nd October 2009 (press show - 52nd CinemaDays event) : [9/28]