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Soom (2007) More at IMDbPro »
34 out of 36 people found the following comment useful :-
Passion and poetry in a carefully sculptured mix, 21 August 2007
Author: Chris Docker (eyeforfilm) from Scotland, United Kingdom
In Dancer in The Dark, Lars von Trier told the story of a girl who could create such a vivid interior life that it could soar over any misfortune, even death. In Breath, Director Ki-duk Kim tells the story of a girl who tries to transfer a similarly strong vision to a condemned man on death row.
What do you do to raise your spirits? Listen to a song? Walk through the countryside? Go on holiday somewhere nice? Take any of these things, and they are heightened if love and desire are added.
When I was seventeen, I used to walk five miles every night. Just to hold my sweetheart's hand and kiss her goodnight. Even in winter, I felt as if I were walking on air. Sounds kinda stupid, looking back. Especially as it didn't last. But those miles disappeared in seconds.
Breath opens unremarkably. Jang Jin is on death row and attempts suicide by sharpening a toothbrush and stabbing himself with it. (He's played by Chen Chang, the sexy outlaw suitor to Zhang Ziyi in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.) The incident makes the evening TV news.
Yeon's husband is having an affair. He tells her to get out and meet people instead of staying at home making sculptures. On an impulse, she goes to visit Jang Jin. On a subsequent visit, she decorates the visiting room with blown-up pictures of spring, fills the area with artificial flowers, and sings to him. She wears a summer dress even though it is mid-winter. Yeon's poetry of life has a profound effect on Jang Jin. They fall passionately in love. But trouble brews from Jang Jin's jealous cellmates and Yeon's violent husband.
When Breath started, I admit I found it less than engaging. But suddenly these scenes that Yeon constructs for Jang Jin explode with a powerful emotional force. Have you ever been on one of those simulator machines where you step in and it starts moving about, replicating sensations that match the screen in front of you? It's that sudden. One second you are watching an ordinary prison drama, interspersed with inconsequential domestic stuff. Then Wham! You are suddenly catapulted, knocked sideways, jolted out of your seat. And that, of course, is a pale reflection of the effect we realise it must be having on Jang Jin. We start living for these intense (yet emotionally draining) moments in the film, just as Jang Jin does.
Throughout precisely architectured cinematography, Ki-duk Kim weaves a poetry of life and death. "We are already crazy inmates on death row. Until we can breathe no more." Contrasts between the two protagonists' lives outside the meeting room and what goes on inside are mirrored in verbal contrasts where one person will speak and the other stays mute. Breathing in and breathing out. Locked in a passionate kiss. Or holding one's breath underwater.
Breath also has a bitter edge. Is she preparing him for the moment when he takes his last breath? (South Korea is one of the very few fully developed democracies where the death penalty is still allowed.) Don't expect any nice redemptive ending. Like Dancer in The Dark, Breath mostly gets darker. "Even though I call with sorrow, Only the white snow falls." It may also be too laboured – even artificial – for some audiences.
Breath is an icy, chilling love story. It looks at a bond that goes beyond the simplicities of life and death. And it's as finely chiselled as a piece of sculpture. Some scenes contain a rare combination of animal intensity and poetic tenderness. The whole unfolds as a dazzling testament to the artistry of Ki-duk Kim.
23 out of 28 people found the following comment useful :-
Another Kim Ki-duk gem, 26 July 2007
Author: Paul Martin from Melbourne, Australia
This is the third film I have seen by Kim Ki-duk. Each one has been very different to the other, and I have loved them all. Address Unknown was bleak and emotionally challenging, Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter… and Spring was beautifully poetic, while Breath is hard to describe. It has aspects of the earlier films - it's visually poetic and bleak - but it's very different to both most notably for its surreal/absurdist devices combined with very black humour (slightly reminiscent of some of the work of Raúl Ruiz).
Sparse dialogue makes for great intrigue as we attempt to make sense of the two main protagonists and what they have in common. One, a man on death row, the other a suburban mother who follows news of his exploits on the TV. To discuss how the story unfolds is to spoil the film if you haven't watched it. However, the story is so elusive, that even with the details, much remains unexplained, adding to the mystique of the film. The prisoner does not speak during the film and the mother does not speak to her family; she is on screen for about twenty minutes before we hear a word uttered from her mouth.
There is a really competent and confident film-maker at work in Kim Ki-duk, and he's not afraid to experiment. Beautifully photographed in winter, the use of steel/blue tones indoors accentuates the sense of cold and contrasts some of the surreal aspects. The film is contemplative, giving one ample opportunity to appreciate the superb visual aesthetics and make sense of the narrative.
I enjoyed this film immensely, and highly recommend it. It screened as part of the Melbourne International Film Festival, where Kim Ki-duk's films are always well-received.
6 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Gotcha!!, 8 April 2008
Author: fradaddabbo73 from Italy
Kim Ki Duk knows how to catch you. At the beginning, when you watch this movie (as when you watch other Kim's movies), you need some time...hold your thoughts, don't express your opinion yet, just wait. After a few minutes, you'll find yourself in another world, watching single details in the images, discovering colors, following characters you already love, and feel related to. "Breath" doesn't make any exception: the wife and the condemned become your friends, or relatives, and you feel their emotions, you are happy, and then sad, and then again happy, and in the end really sad. And you do it with these characters. Be careful, you'll bring them home after the show, and this movie (and its feelings), they wont leave you, for hours.
3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
Ki-duk goes to prison, 17 October 2008
Author: Onderhond from http://www.onderhond.com/archive/onderhond/category/movies
It's no secret that I have little affection with Korean cinema. It's just not my cup of tea. But among the rubble of popular Korean cinema there's a true cineast pumping out brilliant cinema at a dazzling rate. Kim Ki-duk is a regular art-house favorite and rightfully so. This weekend I had the pleasure of watching his latest effort on the big screen. screen cap from breath
So far, I've seen all of Ki-duk's films. Over the years he's made little changes to his success formula, only visually his films have become a lot more mature. Breath continues this tradition, ignoring the little misstep of his previous film Shi Gan. Ki-duk reaches back to his "quiet cinema" and with success.
Breath has it all. Troubled characters, little dialog, rough around the edges and strange happenings. But underneath that barren surface lies a more subtle, warm interior. Not exactly new, but it's the first time Ki-duk plays with this emotion so openly and the change of heart is notable throughout the film.
At its core, Breath tells the story of four broken characters. No director that is more able to create a setup where unlikeable characters can win the sympathy of an audience. Because not a single one of the characters in Breath is free from sin. The prisoner killed his wife and kid, his fellow prisoner hurts him because he can't express his love, the mother cheats on her husband with the prisoner and the husband mistreats his own wife and has a flirt on the side. And thus starts a story of a love between four people.
Ki-duk brings his characters alive with rather unknown actor, though they are really some of the best modern Asian cinema has to offer. Especially Chen Chang bring a lot to this film, adding yet another strong film to his impressive list of acting jobs. Chang's wife is also very strong in her role, hardly speaking but playing her emotions instead of telling them. Class-A stuff. screen cap from breath
Visually, Ki-duk is still improving with each film. While his earlier films were too unfinished to be considered visually impressive, his newer work has this delicate touch that enters every shot. Ki-duk's timing is also improving, and his eye for interesting compositions is still functioning rather well. The film is never absolutely stunning but the quiet, subtle images bear well with the rest. He matches his visuals with a soundtrack that enhances this delicate feeling.
As an interesting surprise, Ki-duk inserts several musical intermezzos. He also revives his seasonal structure and couples a song to each season. The happy mood coming from those scenes is in sharp contrast with the actual feelings of the characters. A nice addition that reliefs, but at the same time hurts just as much.
I guess Breath is a little more playful than his previous films overall. There's of course Ki-duk himself playing director behind his screen in prison. It's an interesting extra layer that made me smile when I noticed it. And it leads to a strong scene where he cuts from the love scene in prison to the father and kid playing outside in the snow. I also liked the "acted" musical intermezzos, which add a second level of acting. Beautiful scenes with very contrasting feelings.
Breath is a strong entry in Ki-duk's ever growing list of films, positioning itself among his best work. While progress between his films is slow and his work hardly brings anything new to the table, his unique position in the world of cinema makes this of little importance. He keeps improving himself and Breath illustrates this well. Awesome film, not really my preferred kind of cinema and because of that all the better for making me love this film and its characters. 4.5*/5.0*
4 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Kim Ki-duk continues to be less than satisfying, 8 November 2007
Author: Harry T. Yung (harry_tk_yung@yahoo.com) from Hong Kong
*** This comment may contain spoilers ***
In commenting on Kim's (that is his surname) movies, I am aware of my limitation of not having seen "Spring, summer, fall, winter….and spring" (2003) which purported is his best film. "Samaria" (2004) I really like, seeing it as a depiction of polarization (in more ways than one) as well as a touching father-and-daughter story. "Bin-jip" (2004), unfortunately, I cannot bring myself to join the general chorus to praise. If found it unconvincing and shallow, "4 clever ideas adding up to a prank" as I put in my summary line.
"Breath" (or "Soom") I found to be a distant cousin of "Bin-jip" although more serious and less haphazard. Like any of Kim's movies, "Breath" has things enigmatic that seem to require explanation. But Kim is a director that had openly declared that he won't bother explaining his movies. Indeed, explanations are not even required.
Shot with imaginative camera work and Kim's usual attention to details, this movie tells the story of how a woman whose marriage is on the rocks starts visiting a prisoner on death roll and gradually develops a subtle relationship with him. Her family life is however not entirely unbearable. Although it is unfortunate that her husband has an affair, he is not depicted as a particularly despicable character. He genuinely cares about their pre-teen daughter and reacts with restrained sense when he discovers his wife's strange routine. He even drives her to the prison on her final visit.
The prisoner's story is grimmer. We are told that he is on death roll for murdering his own wife and children. He hardly ever speaks, his lifeless eyes seem always indicate a trance and his attempted suicide has led to advancing of his execution date. One of the three prisoners in the same cell, a young man (who doesn't speak either), harbors homosexual desires for him and becomes obviously jealous as the situation progresses.
The audience, depending on the POV they place themselves, can see many different things in this movie: a threatened marriage salvaged by some bazaar action, absolution and reconciliation, unpredictable ways a relationship between two individuals can develop, mental anguish of a prisoner on death roll, absurdities in a prison cell – these are among the more obvious.
Talking about POV, it is interesting to note that the key scenes that take place in the visiting cell are seen through the eyes of the security officer who monitors the close-circuit TV in the prison. We only see this character as a refection on the monitor. As director Kim's name in on the IMDb cast credit, I wonder if he is the one who plays this security officer. If it is indeed the case, is he consciously doing the M. Night Shyamalan thing?
9 out of 38 people found the following comment useful :-
A Nutshell Review: Breath, 22 December 2007
Author: DICK STEEL from Singapore
Of the limited number of Korean auteur Kim Ki-duk's movies, I have only seen a handful of them, and mostly they are the relatively contemporary movies, like The Bow, 3-Iron and Time. The feeling I got from them all is consistent - that it's not your usual storytelling, as he seemed more often than not to obscure any intended message, or meaning in his tales, much like searching for an Easter Egg, or worse, that needle in the haystack to get something out of it. If I can summarize his movies in a statement, then it'll be to expect something that's totally unexpected, though not necessary always in a good way.
The main draw here for his 14th film, Breath, is Taiwanese actor Chang Chen. I was curious how Kim would be directing him in one of his movies, and as it turned out, because of the obvious language barrier, it's a convenient cop out to have his death row inmate Jang Jin (even his character's name bears semblance to his own) made a suicide manic, choosing to maim his voicebox so that there isn't a necessity to speak at all. Why he's in jail we're not sure, and in true Kim Ki-duk style, his inmate buddies who share the same cell, are not your ordinary gangster looking characters with big tattoos. While two of them are quite bland, there's an effeminate inmate who has a liking for Jang Jin, but gets time and again brushed aside when he demonstrates and emotes jealousy.
Housewife Yeon (played by Park Ji-ah) discovers that her husband is cheating on her, and given the media attention on Jang Jin and his suicide attempts incessantly hitting the news, she decides to get back at her husband by striking a relationship with him, posing as an ex-girlfriend, and finding therapy in Uncle Jang. But before you say "boring", what made her character a little bit impossible to believe is the lengths she'll go to just to spice up the visitor's session according to seasons, and of course, add some colour, life and song to a meandering dull movie. She does impossible feats of wallpapering, which I thought would be more credible it they weren't so well done.
For half the movie, we see a one way street between Yeon and Jang Jin, she finding an outlet to vent her frustrations, while he finding it amusing to have a total stranger bring forth some fresh air, though artificial, injected into his imprisoned four walls. While there are of course issues of morality here that could be made for points of discussion, by the time the ending rolls around, these are indeed tossed out the window in double quick time. I suspect that 90% of the 10 members of the audience were here because of the tantalizing poster of Chang Chen's mouth on boob (the film has an M18 rating by the way), and it's not rocket science that the ah-peks were probably here for only one thing.
But alas, that, it doesn't deliver, but what it does cement very surely, is that you'll never know what to expect from a Kim Ki-duk film, who becomes his own voyeur as he spies on the duo from the CCTV Cameras fed back to the confines of his security office. Unfortunately, Breath turns out to be a time waster, and you'll find yourself cheering at any moment that could have possibly breathed life into a dull movie. Perhaps art movie lovers out there could find some meaning if they look hard enough, but here, I'm calling out that the Emperor is naked.
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