[Guest Film Review] "Hyeon's Quartet"

Winner of the Vision Director's award in Busan, Ahn Sun-kyoung's "Hyeon's Quartet" is an almost experimental combination of docudrama and indie film, dealing with the concept of acting.

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Hun, Eun, Jun and Kyeong are members of an acting workshop, headed by Mirae, an actress currently in the play "The Quartet" that has initially inspired the four to take the class. Hun, as the youngest employee of a theater company, is assigned only chores. Eun spends tedious hours tidying up in a secondhand bookstore. Jun spends most of his time acting in short films, and Kyeong is a photographer who aspires to be an actor. Mirae believes that one has to know and be able to reveal himself in order to act, and in that fashion, has extensive talks with each member, asking them personal questions and giving them advice on how to implement their characters into their roles. Eventually, and as a part of a character-building session, Mirae presents them with the diary of a person named Hyeon, and asks them to read it and to try to act this person. The four of them begin their efforts and in the process, reveal even more of themselves.

Ahn Sun-kyoung directs a film that functions as a stage play (even retaining the concept of different parts) about acting. In that fashion, the four aspiring actors learn how acting is different from what they thought before experiencing it. As the process involved in one becoming an actor is presented in detail, like an actual training workshop, the film becomes a docudrama.

The narrative is a bit confusing, because the borders between fiction and reality are quite blurred, and at times, is very difficult to discern if the characters are acting of if they are being themselves. This aspect becomes even more complex in the final part, when they present their version of Hyeon. This sense, however, was actually planned, since Ahn wanted to show that when actors act, they portray their characters, but also present a part of their actual selves. However, since she used to work in theatre before becoming a filmmaker, she seems to know her subject very well, and with the help of Lee Jong-woo's cinematography, manages to portray a very compelling spectacle, despite the fact that, at times, it seems to address people who have some experience in acting.

One scene stands out from the general aesthetics of the film. Jun goes to meet a director in a club in order to try to persuade him to be in his next film. However, the director is drunk and lashes on Jun, mocking and insulting him, even stressing the fact that he would prefer casting someone famous, who would bring him sponsors and audience in cinemas. This scene seems to present Ahn Sun-kyoung's opinion of mainstream cinema in S. Korea.

The acting is on a very high level, as the script demands of them to portray people who want to become actors, almost constantly shifting from being actors to being themselves. However, the one who stands out is Kim So-hee as Mirae who manages to portray different images of herself according to whom of the four characters she is interacting with.

Despite the confusing narrative, "Hyeon's Quartet" presents a thorough analysis of what is acting, and in the process becomes a very interesting spectacle, in distinct, indie fashion.

Review by Panos Kotzathanasis

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"Hyeon's Quartet" is directed by Ahn Sun-kyoung, and features Kim So-hee, Lee Kwan-hun, Kim Kang-eun and Sung Ho-jun.

The film is released by M-Line Distribution.