Watching this movie is for Song Seung-heon. The era of the movie is set between the 1970s and 1980s, South Korea's participation in the Vietnam War, has sent more than 300,000 troops, it is said that, on the battlefield of Vietnam, South Korean soldiers are more ferocious than American soldiers.
War is always cruel, whether it is the victorious side or the defeated side. People who experience war rebuild not only their homes, but also their spirits and hearts.
Based on this background, the emotional tone and ambience of the movie is rather dark and depressing.
The movie begins with a military party, where the chief laughingly forces the hero, Kim Jin-pyong (played by Song Seung-heon), and the hero of the Vietnam War to finish their boots full of wine, and the whole place boils over with boos and applause. Kim Jin-pyong refuses in vain, citing the prohibition of alcohol, but eventually finishes the wine in the boot to satisfy the entire crowd. While everyone is dancing and making love with their chaperones, Kim Jin-pyong silently hides in the outer corridor, vomiting, smoking, and listening to the ridicule of his colleagues, looking forlorn.
This opening is very important, and directly sets the overall tone and emotional scale of the movie. The hero, the hero of the Vietnam War, but he is very unhappy, the identity of the hero seems to make him carry some kind of heavy pressure. Moreover, he is very lonely, very out of the group, there is a kind of "everyone is drunk I wake up alone" desolate.
He plays tennis alone, he has insomnia at night, he is distracted by his wife's conversations, he hides from everyone and goes to the doctor, a neurologist, who has many visits in his record book, with insomnia, panic disorder, and insanity as his symptoms. When the doctor asks him what dreams he's been having lately, the dreams explain the source of his distress.
In the dream, he was walking alone in the jungle, blood flowing under his feet, the head of an enemy in his hand, looking around in bewilderment. This is the scene of war and the nightmare that haunts him. Although he returned as a hero and was admired and courted by the crowds at times, inside he was like a trapped animal. He can't get out of the trauma of the war, and he can't fit into the normal life away from the war.
When people talk about his heroism with envy and admiration, he always hangs his head down and keeps silent, or shows impatience and a hint of shame. Obviously, he was very reluctant to recall that experience, much less to be mentioned. Though, now, he owed his honorable life to this military service, he did not seem to want it much. His wife, a warm, kind, and vivacious person who seemed to love him dearly, did not notice his insomnia or alert him to his mental distress. The couple is having fun and is only maintaining their domestic responsibilities because she wants children.
Throughout the narrative of the movie, he has always been outside his life, uninvolved and unengaged. It's not until he meets the heroine that he starts acting differently. There is that hint of being alive.
The heroine is the wife of a subordinate, pretty, clean and quiet.
The first encounter with her was on an insomniac night, he walked faithfully to her doorstep, teasing the many cages of small birds she raised. When he saw her, his brow was relaxed, his eyes bright, still and peaceful.
The second time was at the hospital, when he saved her from someone's gun. From this accident, their feelings slowly fermented.
He went to visit her in the hospital, looking for vases in all departments of the hospital, for her to bring the flowers hand-arranged, in the face of her innocent face and request, he did not refuse to give her to put on the earrings that fell off.
She and the officers' wives are so different, the officers' wives are keen to move the right and wrong, wantonly make up, and she is never quiet, serene and delicate. The officer's wives are eager to climb up the ranks and socialize for the sake of their husband's career, while she is always alone, dignified and quiet. Officers' wives to compare with each other, hypocritical entertainment, and she has always been frank and sincere, innocent. The officers' wives, how vulgar, she has how dusty.
He was attracted to her, he began to think of her every day. She, it seems, became his daily motivation to live.
He goes out of his way to offend his bosses for her, he gifts her his own personal belongings, he starts learning to dance, and they start dating. In order to spend more time with her, he uses his authority to transfer her husband and even sets him up. And each time, she didn't say no, and although there was a slight struggle in between, it was more like a tease and a seduction for him.
She, who was weaving a very big net for him, and he thought that she was the air in which he lived, the fresh air to get rid of the trauma of the war.
Both he and she have hobbies and temperaments that are different from those of the people in their circle of life. He likes to listen to Western music, and she likes to raise birds.
They both have unknown traumas. He is trapped in the aftermath of war and seeks salvation. She seeks to forget the pain and displacement of her family's destruction and seeks stability.
His wife doesn't understand him, her husband doesn't understand her, and they are alone in their lives. However, they are y attracted to each other. Nonetheless, caught up in their feelings, they are not in the same box.
Both sides of the love, who love deeper, who naturally passive, dependent. Scattered hands, torn are blood and tears and heartache.
So when she refused to go to Seoul with him, he went crazy.
He went out of his way to question her over and over again in front of everyone: "Why are you like this? You're just going to walk away, you're going to leave me like that, why are you like that? Why do you like me?"
He was not afraid of losing his reputation, not afraid of the crowd.
He lost the rank of general and will run to Vietnam again. The night he packed his bags, he knocked on her door.
He asked her, "Have you ever loved me?"
She says, "Loved."
"And now?"
"I love you."
He's relieved, but says he's not going to Vietnam, he's going to Thailand. He asked her, almost pleadingly, "Won't you come with me? ...... I'll go first, you come back later ...... I'll write you a letter, you come back later ...... hmm? ......"
But the heroine replied to him, "I won't get in your way anymore ...... And the extent... . the degree of all put down ...... I ...... don't love you that much."
He laughed bitterly and burst into tears.
Crying, "can not live without you ...... can not sleep ...... can not eat anything ...... can not breathe! ......" patted the heart and said, "paralyzed here, can not live." After saying that, took out a gun and fired at the heart.
This suicide, he did not die, but with death is no different. Like he said, he couldn't breathe without her, he couldn't live.
Life, status, future, came to an abrupt end.
Because, ever since he met her, he thought she was the breath of fresh air that could save his life. He clung to her because she, could make him forget the war, forget his sins.
In the end, he returned to the battlefield, like exile, like redemption.
The second time, dying on the battlefield, he carries the thought of her. In his hand, he held a photo of them together, with an inscription on it and a tattoo of her name on his arm.
When the heroine receives the news of his death, she cries until she can't contain herself.
By this point, the tragedy of the movie comes crashing down.
He's poisoned by her, and she's not his breath of fresh air.
This incestuous love affair has cost him his life twice.
If you don't understand the context of the movie, don't understand the past experiences of the hero and the heroine and the resulting state of mind and psychological needs, this movie will be slightly pretentious, and it's hard to appreciate the hero's love, which is so strong that it can't be melted and burns fiercely, and likewise, it's hard to judge the heroine's choice. Any woman, in the face of such a hero, it is difficult to be indifferent. Just like the group of officers' wives in the movie, when asked, "If a man says he likes you and is willing to die for you, will you follow him?" They genuinely feel that "that woman has lived like a human being for once", as do the officers' wives in the movie when asked, "If a man said he liked you, would you follow him?". Let's just say that the female lead probably didn't love her enough. Because, the male lead can't give her what she wants, and she, too, is not the male lead's antidote, it's poison. The hero has actually been giving her the love he thinks she wants from his own standpoint, without thinking about what kind of love she wants from the heroine's point of view. She has hinted at it, but he avoids it. She wants a stable life, she thought about marrying him, she doesn't want him to give up his career as an officer, she doesn't want to repeat the upheaval and parasitism of her childhood, she needs security, the security of a complete home, so she won't go to Seoul with him to continue this kind of incestuous love, and she'll never wander with him to an exotic place. As for the hero, who is mentally troubled, he needs to be saved, and how can he give the heroine a sense of security when he is unable to save himself. Such two people, such character of two people, even if together, it is difficult to be happy, right? And the so-called love, but also just take what you need.
Love, it should be across the sea of people, walk through thousands of mountains, and then hand in hand **** life, only this mold, is the most genuine mode, other perhaps are all needy to ask for.
Because there is something in the wrestling with love, can not be together, only shows that in this wrestling, love can be abandoned and replace the party, complete defeat. If you can't be together, it's because you don't love it enough, and there's no reason why you can act as a cover for the defeat of love, and there's no need to do so, not to mention the self-condemnation of being a lover and a lover's saint in the memories of the lost love.
True, no matter how the result, love, always a thing that can be relieved.
The poison, drunkenness, love and hate sea, floating and sinking, but ultimately the ear.
There is a saying: "I don't care about the sky, I only care about what I used to have".