"While the film deals with Buddhist themes and elements, I made this film without having studied anything about it at all." - Kim Ki-duk
Films that leave me feeling spiritually uplifted are often subtle and understated in their evocation of the transcendence of the human spirit. On the other hand, those that "try" to impress us about how spiritual they are often fail to achieve their desired goal. Such is the case for Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring, a South Korean film by Kim Ki-duk that works hard at conveying a spiritual experience but comes across as labored and self-conscious. While the shots are beautifully composed, the film offers little more than pre-packaged enlightenment, reiterating the accepted clichés about the long and painful process, the uphill battle full of struggle and effort, and so forth.
Set in monastery on Jason Pond, an artificial lake in North Kyungsang Province in Korea surrounded by a forest of ancient trees, each season represents a chapter of life and the achievement of a hard-earned lesson. An old monk (Oh Young-Soo) teaches his young charge (Kim Jong-ho) about the value of all sentient beings. After the boy playfully ties a rock to a frog, a snake, and a fish, the old master shows him what it feels like by tying a huge rock to the boy's back while he is sleeping. In the morning, he is told to find the animals and free them or he will have to carry a rock in his heart the rest of his life. Unable to do so, the boy grows up with a burdensome guilt.
By the following season, the young monk has become a 17-year old adolescent and is mesmerized when a beautiful teenage girl dressed in blue jeans shows up in his floating paradise, She has been brought by her mother because she is "sick" and wants the monks to "cure" her. After some time spent in prayer, the old monk tells the mother, "When she finds peace in her soul, her body will return to health." The soul cure is found pretty quickly when the young monk undoes his robe, letting us know that all women need to do to achieve health is to find a man. The old man confuses love with lust and utters such strange teaching as "lust awakens the desire to possess, and that awakens the intent to murder". When the girl is sent away following her cure, the boy also leaves the monastery and the film takes a non-Buddhist turn toward obsession and revenge until the cycle comes full circle.
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring cultivates a mood of serenity but, from the opening moment to the final credits, it struck me as inauthentic. Buddhism is a disciplined system of mental and spiritual development designed to develop compassion and loving-kindness for all beings. Its practices include daily meditation that calms and clears the mind and allows us to gain a clearer sense of who we really are. This does not guarantee that we will never make mistakes but it is not credible to me that a boy raised from birth in the Buddhist tradition would be capable not only of cruelty to animals but to other human beings as well. At the end of the film I felt neither moved, uplifted, or even involved. If enlightenment means to lighten up, the best medicine for this sort of hokum is to laugh gently. After all, this too will pass. There is a cycle to everything -- even bad movies about spirituality.
Films that leave me feeling spiritually uplifted are often subtle and understated in their evocation of the transcendence of the human spirit. On the other hand, those that "try" to impress us about how spiritual they are often fail to achieve their desired goal. Such is the case for Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring, a South Korean film by Kim Ki-duk that works hard at conveying a spiritual experience but comes across as labored and self-conscious. While the shots are beautifully composed, the film offers little more than pre-packaged enlightenment, reiterating the accepted clichés about the long and painful process, the uphill battle full of struggle and effort, and so forth.
Set in monastery on Jason Pond, an artificial lake in North Kyungsang Province in Korea surrounded by a forest of ancient trees, each season represents a chapter of life and the achievement of a hard-earned lesson. An old monk (Oh Young-Soo) teaches his young charge (Kim Jong-ho) about the value of all sentient beings. After the boy playfully ties a rock to a frog, a snake, and a fish, the old master shows him what it feels like by tying a huge rock to the boy's back while he is sleeping. In the morning, he is told to find the animals and free them or he will have to carry a rock in his heart the rest of his life. Unable to do so, the boy grows up with a burdensome guilt.
By the following season, the young monk has become a 17-year old adolescent and is mesmerized when a beautiful teenage girl dressed in blue jeans shows up in his floating paradise, She has been brought by her mother because she is "sick" and wants the monks to "cure" her. After some time spent in prayer, the old monk tells the mother, "When she finds peace in her soul, her body will return to health." The soul cure is found pretty quickly when the young monk undoes his robe, letting us know that all women need to do to achieve health is to find a man. The old man confuses love with lust and utters such strange teaching as "lust awakens the desire to possess, and that awakens the intent to murder". When the girl is sent away following her cure, the boy also leaves the monastery and the film takes a non-Buddhist turn toward obsession and revenge until the cycle comes full circle.
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring cultivates a mood of serenity but, from the opening moment to the final credits, it struck me as inauthentic. Buddhism is a disciplined system of mental and spiritual development designed to develop compassion and loving-kindness for all beings. Its practices include daily meditation that calms and clears the mind and allows us to gain a clearer sense of who we really are. This does not guarantee that we will never make mistakes but it is not credible to me that a boy raised from birth in the Buddhist tradition would be capable not only of cruelty to animals but to other human beings as well. At the end of the film I felt neither moved, uplifted, or even involved. If enlightenment means to lighten up, the best medicine for this sort of hokum is to laugh gently. After all, this too will pass. There is a cycle to everything -- even bad movies about spirituality.