The film begins with the main character Sung-nam Kim fleeing the country because his name has been turned in for smoking marijuana. To Americans this seems more like an excuse to run away from a dulling life than a legitimate reason to pack up everything and move to Paris, abandoning all those close to you. In the discussion after the film, however, I learned that the laws in South Korea were, indeed, strict enough to send a man running across the border.
Throughout the film, Kim periodically reads the Bible, but when asked about it he claims he reads it more as a history book than as anything spiritual. This made me question the importance of Christianity in South Korea. I wondered if Hong put the element in to play off of an important part of the Korean culture, or if it was simply a character quark to incorporate. In my research iI found that “approximately 18 percent of the population of South Korea consider themselves Protestant and nearly 11 percent Roman Catholic…23 percent Buddhist and 47 percent ‘no religion’” (www.newworldencyclopedia.org). With this in mind, Kim seems to fall into a very large percentage of the population, therefore allowing the greatest group (those who do not have a religion) to identify with him. While it seems to me that Hong did not necessarily have this in mind when making the film, it did target the larger audience, as opposed to alienating it.
The style that Hong used to approach Night and Day was very interesting. Clair O’Connell described it as “a naturalistic diary style account of Sung Nam’s experiences” (www.londonkoreanlinks.net), which is a very accurate comparison. Various scenes and sequences in the film are separated by the date appearing in very plain, bold letters on the screen, making the film seem like it was recorded day by day in chronological order. Hong was so successful in incorporating this style into the film that he is able to confuse the audience with a dream sequence towards the end of the film. Everyone is puzzled by the fact that there is no date that appears to show the passage of time, yet Kim is married to a completely different woman (one from his past who has already killed herself throughout the course of the film), and is suddenly divorced from his other wife.
The diary style of filmmaking also allows Hong an excuse to explore the smaller incidents in life, those that a person would record in a diary because they have some personal significance but nothing more. O’Connell wrote in her review that Kim is “finding a way to live, making acquaintances, working out where to buy cigarettes, figuring out where his life is going next” (www.londonloreanlinks.net), which are things that most people do not think about putting into a film. For example, Kim does spend a lot of time not only locating a place to buy cigarettes, but one that is open when he needs it to be. This small little detail would be left out of most films because it does not drive the plot, but in Hong’s film the small things are the plot. Buying cigarettes, watching dog poop be washed down the gutters, and sending a hand-made origami boat down the storm drains are all small parts of the larger story, which is Kim’s search to figure out his own life. And even the larger picture in Night and Day, searching for one, is very ambiguous in this film. It is explored so subtly that at the end of the film, the viewer is left to question what it is that Kim really learned through his experiences, something that most Hollywood films would not do.
For my word study I decided to look up the world “artist” because it seems to play an interesting role in the film. According to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language Fourth Edition, and artist is:
1. One, such as a painter, sculptor, or writer, who is able by virtue of imagination and talent or skill to create works of aesthetic value, especially in the fine arts.
2. A person whose work shows exceptional creative ability or skill: You are an artist in the kitchen.
3. One, such as an actor or singer, who works in the performing arts.
4. One who is adept at an activity, especially one involving trickery or deceit: a con artist.
In the film, Kim is always talking about being an artist, but is never seen painting, which poses the question of whether or not he is actually an artist. Under the first definition here, Kim barely makes the cut. While he does appear to have talent (in the already complete paintings), he is does not seem to have the much imagination. The fact that there are always clouds in his picture becomes a reoccurring statement on his work, suggesting that clouds are the extent of his creative ability. By the second definition Kim sits even more on the fence between being an artist and being a copy machine. While he does have skill, he lacks the basic and fundamental creativity associated with being an artist.
According to the third definition, Kim is not an artist throughout the course of the film because he never actually participates in the act of creating art. For all the audience knows, he is a want to be painter may or may not have painted the work he calls his own.
This bring us to the final definition, one that definitely suits Kim in Night and Day. According to this definition an artist is good “at an activity, especially one involving trickery or deceit”. Throughout the film, Kim seems to have an aura of suspicion around his circumstances. He seems to be over emphasizing many of his situations to make them seem much worse than they are, and he never tells the whole story. When talking to his wife, he leaves out his love for the young art student, and when he leaves he claims he is going home for his sick mother and not his supposedly pregnant wife. Even when on the beach with two women Kim tries to manipulate both of them. In this sense, he is indeed an artist.
O'Connell, Claire. "Night and Day: Hong Sang-soo in Paris." London Korean Links. World Press, 7 Nov. 2008. Web. 4 Oct. 2009.
"Christianity in Korea." The New World Encyclopedia. Paragon House Publishers, 17 Sept. 2008. Web. 4 Oct. 2009.
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