Do you remember what safety precautions to take when you're going away for a couple of weeks, leaving your apartment or home empty? Yes, you keep the bedroom light on, you don't put a "We're away on vacation" message on your voice mail, and you make sure to suspend newspaper deliveries for the time you're away. Hopefully, the bad guys will think you're in residence. There's a way around this, though. An enterprising housebreaker can put menus on doors, block after block, returning the next day to check out which papers have not been discarded. The stranger enters the house and empties the contents.
Something similar happens in "3-Iron," an arty, partly surreal, though fully accessible new film from Kim Ki-duk. Kim's "Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring," which opened not long ago, is a colorfully lush, meditative peace about an old monk who lives in the middle of a lake and teaches his young son the trade. "3-Iron" is beautifully photographed as well, featuring two lead characters who say not a single word to each other until the story's end. (Perhaps that's a good way to prevent arguments in a marriage: it works for these two.)
Kim's story opens on young Tae-suk (Jae hee) who, despite his charm and good looks is a lonely fellow with a strange hobby to relieve his feeling of emptiness. He attaches commercial notices to doors around a well-to-do neighborhood, presumably on the outskirts of Seoul, returns the next day on his bike to ascertain which papers have not been removed, then picks the front lock and enters. He's not a bad guy at all. Stealing nothing, he instead fixes whatever is broken–scales, clocks, radios–washes the absent tenants' clothes, takes a shower and sacks out for the night. On one of his excursions he enters the well-appointed home of an attractive woman, Sun-hwa (Lee Seung-yeon) who is victimized by an abusive husband, Min-Kyu (Kwon Hyuk-ho). The woman, who is home but hiding, secretly watches the man fix her scale and makes her presence known only when Tae-suk has gone to bed for the night. By listening to a phone call she receives from her husband, he realizes that she is being abused and is determined to save her.
As with "Spring, Summer, Winter, Fall...and Spring," director Kim is concerned with digging into the human psyche to see what lies beneath the surface. He discovers violence within the home of a man with a lovely wife, a fellow who drives a Beemer, wears bepoke suits, and dresses for bed in silk pajamas. He discovers considerable violence, as well, where you'd expect to find it: inside a police station and within a jail cell.
Though Sun-hwa and Tae-suk say not a word of dialogue to each other until the very end of the 95-minute film, Kim is not being pretentious. He knows that silence can often reveal far more about human nature than mere words, or to go a step further, he hints that when a man and a woman are on the same page, there is no need for talk. This is true at least during the moments of ecstasy that find them on a prolix "date" involving the breaking in to several houses where the residents are on vacation and leaving the houses in better shape than they had been. In one instance, for example, they discover a dead man in his living room, his small dog sitting anxiously by his side, and does for the poor fellow more than his own son might have done for him.
The title, "3-Iron," refers to a golf club used by the hero of the story to pelt the abusive husband, that particular iron being significant for the tale in that the 3-iron is the one that's rarely used. Kim does not elicit a Panglossian ambiance: he is aware that there is cruelty in the world. Despite the violence both within the home and within institutions such as prison, he has hope for humankind, particularly since a man who appears barely out of his teens is able to restore a victim's energy and happiness, if not for all time, then for at least the moments they spend wordlessly together. "3-Iron" was shown at festivals at Sundance, Toronto, Venice and Valladolid, an ethereal work that will find an audience attuned to its lovely, meditative spirit.
By : Harvey S. Karten
Source: rec.art.movies.reviews newsgroup
Rating: 3
3-IRON (BIN-JIP) is a lovely little film by Ki-duk Kim, the writer and director of SPRING, SUMMER, FALL, WINTER... AND SPRING. 3-IRON is about a young man, played with a ballet dancer's delicate movements by Jae Hee, who tends houses, and a battered wife, not his, played touchingly by Seung-yeon Lee, who accompanies him. The guy, whose name is almost never, if ever, spoken, does laundry and minor repair work while the houses' owners are off on trips. The owners, however, don't know anything about him unless they happen to come in before he leaves.
The man and the woman do not speak, although they appear to have the ability to do so if they ever thought it was necessary. The movie is completely dialog-free for long sections. The guy discovers that he has various talents including using a golf club and ball like a bow and arrow as a weapon to use against bad spouses and other villains. He also finds that his "harmless" adventures can sometimes get him in trouble. But his most unusual talent is the ability to hover behind someone so quietly that they never realize he is even there.
An exquisitely filmed picture, it is as sumptuous as it is unusual and is a delicate tone poem for your eyes.
3-IRON runs 1:35. The film is in Korean with English subtitles. It is rated R for "some sexual content" and would be acceptable for teenagers.
By : Steve Rhodes (http://www.internetreviews.com/)
