Berlinale 2015, Day 8 (Ode to my Father)

This year, the Berlinale was barely showing any Korean films. Originally I thought that “End of Winter” sounded more interesting than the pathos-laden “Ode to my Father” (which it really was), so I only scheduled for the former. Then my plan was to see the previous Golden Bear winning short films which would have run right after “Ode to my Father” at the International, and there was nothing in this time slot so I decided to add it in. After getting sick, I kicked the short films out of my schedule because I didn’t want to stay up too late, and finally I ended up just seeing “Ode to my Father”. But since it was a very memorable experience (so much so that I revisit the film in my head again and again), it turned out very well this way.

Ode to my Father
South Korea 2014, Youn Je-kyun, 126′

While trying to flee from the Chinese troops, Duksoo loses his sister which makes his father go back to look for her. With only his mother and two younger siblings left, he promises his father to take care of his family. Instead of pursuing his dream of becoming a ship captain, Duksoo goes to Germany to work in coal mines, takes over his aunt’s store on Gukje Market, marries a girl he met in Germany and goes abroad again, this time right into the Vietnam War. In the 80s, he finds his sister through a television program. In a timeline told from today’s perspective, Duksoo reminisces about these times and finally comes to terms with the fact that he will never find his father anymore.

I should have known that the film would be intriguing for me. Just like I adore evil women, love triangles and adultery in film, I love stories spanning an entire lifetime (or almost a lifetime). It’s the reason why I like “Huo zhe” so much, and why I was so deeply in love with Capek’s “An Ordinary Life” which I just finished reading. Interestingly, the fictionary lives in all three examples are parables; they are not exactly realistic or individual, but these people’s lives are the product of their time. They are designed to be mirrors of society and everything major in history had an impact on their lives (the Cultural Revolution, the Korean War, World War I respectively). At the same time, there are strong personal influences going into these protagonists: Capek has similar parents as his nameless character’s (especially the overbearing mother), Youn even gave his main characters the names of his own parents. While these three works are ultimately not comparable at all (and I feel a little ashamed for mentioning Capek and “Ode to my father” in the same sentence), the similarities are still striking and oh, I love these stories for that aspect.

At the beginning of the film, I wasn’t so sure I would like it. It starts off with an unbearably sappy scene in which Duk-soo’s family flees which is basically a “Lord of the Rings”-sized epic tearjerker. You are supposed to feel oh so sorry for these poor people running for their lives, and of course I did, except that I was rolling my eyes constantly and actively kept myself up from succumbing to the sappiness. Soon after, Duksoo’s accident in the coal mines in Germany were not much better. The scene in which Youngja kneels down in front of these very Nazi-looking Germans, pleading “These poor Koreans came all the way from their country to work for you!” Oh God, that line is so bad on so many levels that just thinking of it makes me cringe. At least they saved that scene a little bit by not allowing the Germans to suddenly have a heart, but the Koreans staged a nice little revolt which made the whole thing a tiny little bit more realistic. The whole first part of the film was about having mercy for those poor Koreans, it was simply embarrassing.

Afterwards, however, “Ode to my father” became one of those few films for me which actually turns better rather than worse towards the second half. While saving the sister of a little Vietnamese boy was way too blatantly reminiscent of Duksoo losing his own sister, I thought that most other callbacks to previous elements of his life were pretty lovely. The movie actually expects you to have some sort of memory while watching the film, you will find the old Duksoo say “I told you before” about how he wanted to be a ship captain and then some half an hour later, we see Duksoo on his first date with Youngja many years before, telling her about his dreams for his future. The film walks the fine line between overly pathetic and painfully touching, and for the second part of the film I was just crying non-stop. The KBS show in which families found each other hit a nerve somewhere, and after I had a stuffy nose the entire day, it was finally emptied out through a 20 minute long constant stream of tears. It was so darn touching! Oh and the end was wonderfully beautiful. I thought it was utterly satisfying yet bittersweet because, really, Duksoo’s father would have been so proud seeing his son uphold his family traditions, however pointlessly conservative they may be. I was touched by how he achieved everything in his life that his father could not do, and yet remained lonely and misunderstood even by his wife.

There was one scene which I found especially memorable, much like Sasha’s horse from “Under Electric Clouds”, which is that Vietnamese boy who saved Duksoo from an attack just because he gave him chocolate before. To me there was something so simple and touching about it, much more so than some of the other aforementioned tearjerker scenes. I think the movie does well in these details, apart from the obligatory humorous tidbits (which of course must be done well since this is a big blockbuster after all).

Somehow Korean movies manage to hit my heart’s weaknesses like Chinese or Japanese movies never do. “JSA” makes me cry every time I see the film, “Silmido” completely broke my heart (shudder), and the movie whose touching story comes closest to “Ode to my father” is “Welcome to Dongmakgol”, another wonderful story with many weaknesses. Bottom line: I don’t care about the naysayers of this movie, for me it was actually an awesome experience.