WOMAN IS THE FUTURE OF MAN - DVD review

South Korean director Hong Sangsoo begins "Woman is the Future of Man" with the simplest of premises: two old friends meet for drinks. Hunjoon (Kim Taewoo) has spent the last several years at an American film school. Munho (Yoo Jitae, the vengeful brother in "Oldboy") is an art professor who has recently gotten married. At a noodle bar, they catch up with each other's lives, get a little wasted, and reminisce about old times. That's their first big mistake, creating an abrupt rupture in this apparently light-hearted "buddy" film that will never heal, or at least not by the end of the film's slim 87 minute running time.

The trip down memory lane inevitably leads both men to the same destination: Sunhwa (Sung Hyunah), the pretty young artist each of them has previously dallied with and then abandoned. Once sufficiently drunk, they decide to visit her and claw open every old wound they can still reach. Time hasn't healed much for Sunhwa either, who carries a bitter grudge against Hunjoon for so cavalierly leaving her behind to pursue his American dream. Over a day and a night and another day and then part of another night, the three yuppie artists rebuild their old love triangle and then bang and kick at it until it's deformed beyond recognition.

Hong's film is about the deformation, not only of the love triangle but also of narrative structure. His story doesn't unwind so much as it wriggles, like a mass of worms flushed above ground by a sudden downpour. The occasional unmarked flashbacks aren't even the half of it. After sitting still to observe a six minute conversation between Hunjoon and Munho, Hong's camera suddenly swivels to follow a Chinese waitress who makes a few snide comments about the two men. After a night of alternating passion and isolation, the three protagonists walk through the city on their way to a spring. Munho stops at a soccer game where he sees several of his students. Hunjoon and Sunhwa continue on to the spring… and right out of the story as we stay with a bitter and lonely Munho who holds court over his attentive, but not entirely respectful, pupils. As for the denouement, it's as if Hong found an American textbook on screenplays and read it backwards, choosing to end his film in media res.

The film is so serenely filmed, it is easy to miss the complexity lying just below the placid surface. In just a handful of scenes, Hong traces a detailed geography of the relationship between the two men, and Sunhwa's relationship with each of them. It's not quite accurate to call this observational cinema, though that isn't entirely off-base. I think it more as exploratory cinema, with Hong landing his adventurers at base camp and then following along as each carves his or her own path through the wilderness. Of course, Hong has a plan in mind for each of them, but he also leaves ample room for improvisation. The performances are uniformly superb: naturalistic and completely believable; even Sunhwa's dog gets a laugh when she demurely exits stage right as Sunhwa and Munho get hot and heavy in the living room.

Hong has been a critical favorite for the past decade, but only in the past few years have his films really drawn the attention of a broader festival audience. "Woman is the Future of Man" was a modest success, and his most recent film "Woman on the Beach" (2006) played to much acclaim at Toronto and the highly selective New York Film Festival. Among contemporary filmmakers, Hong draws comparison to Hou Hsiao-hsien and Tsai Ming-liang, though I think the latter comparison is a bit of a stretch. Critic Michael Atkinson goes old-school by comparing him to Antonioni and Resnais which sets the bar awfully high for a director who has only made seven films. Out of the choices, Resnais makes the best match, but it's just too early in Hong's career to pigeon-hole him that way.

Though the film appears at first to be a gentle and sentimental look at old friends, the emerging story takes a more critical turn. Munho and Hunjoon are both self-absorbed and immature, and though Sunhwa fares somewhat better than her male counterparts, she is hardly idealized. "Woman is the Future of Man" delineates its characters and their relationship with warts and all.

Video

The film is presented in an anamorphic 1.85:1 widescreen aspect ratio. The transfer is not progressive, and shows some instances of combing though it's not too bad. The colors are particularly rich, and except for a few soft moments the image quality is sharp. A solid transfer from New Yorker.

Audio

The DVD is presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 and an option Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound track. Optional English subtitles support the Korean audio.

Extras

A brief (2 ½ minutes) and deeply appreciative video introduction by Martin Scorsese sets the stage for the film.

A substantial "Making of"" featurette (38 min.) presents an unusually intimate portrait of life on the set with Hong Sangsoo and his actors. The fly-on-the-wall footage captures the spirit of a collaborative and playful film set. This is much better than the usual "making of" offering.

Interviews with each of the three principal actors (32 min. total) don't offer any real surprises, but will be of some interest to fans. The DVD also includes Korean and French Theatrical Trailers.

The slim insert includes a brief essay by Michael Atkinson and an excerpt from a presentation by scholar Kyung Hyun Kim.

Film Value

Bittersweet, funny, both easy-going and intense, "Woman is the Future of Man" invites multiple viewings. Hong's ability to create such complex, richly drawn relationships in such a brief period of time is at least a minor miracle of modern cinema. Don't miss this one.