Apologies to woquinoncoin for

May 29, 2006 12:20

blatantly ripping a page out of her expertly done book, mediadiary. :) (I just got a program that lets me take screen captures from my DVD program and OMG was I excited)

취화선 Chihwaseon [Painted Fire], dir. 林權澤 Im Kwon-taek, starring 崔岷植 Choi Min-sik, 2002 ( Read more... )

art, movies, choi min-sik, im kwon-taek, korea, history, chosun dynasty

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minsun July 14 2006, 02:19:09 UTC
I haven't seen the movie, but I remember watching the previews in Seattle and wanting to watch it a lot. Reading your essay makes me really want to watch it now :).

I remember being in Seoul last year and wanting to see classical Korean paintings at the museum. I was saddened to discover that most of the really good paintings were appropriated by Japan either in the Hideyoshi invasions or during the colonial period; I was infuriated, frankly. I still got to see a couple in Tokyo and there are a few at Seoul National Museum that are worth looking at though.

The heartbeat of Korea in a painting; quite eloquent you are. I felt that statement. There is no Korea now; everything pure and beautiful and true about Korea ceased to exist after the Japanese occupation. We can only glimpse true Korea in movies, old paintings, and its poetry, which unfortunately has not been preserved as well as T'ang poetry has.

Have you seen Chunhyang? It's a beautiful reenactment of a traditional p'ansori - I loved it! Thanks for the link to your

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bafooz July 14 2006, 02:46:32 UTC
Oh, definitely rent it. It's heart breakingly beautiful. I haven't seen Chunhyang - I've jotted it down. I'll see if I can find it in Taipei. On a tangentially related note, I really love traditional Chinese kunqu opera; I watched a neat film called 游園驚夢 [Peony Pavilion] that is set in the 1930s, but has kunqu woven in with the film quite beautifully. I waver back and forth on my opinion of the film - the first time I watched it, I said "Hm. That was lovely, but the plot was a bit 'eh'". Then I watched it a second time and forgot about the plot and looked at the technical/artistic aspects and said "Oooh, that was gorgeous." Then I watched it a third time, and keeping my laoshi's philosophical pronouncement on classical Chinese - 'you read it with your heart!' - in mind, promptly bawled through most of it. But it's a film worth watching, especially if you like classical Chinese poetry (all the songs are from the actual Peony Pavilion ( ... )

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