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[Interview] Albert Shin, 'I Thought That There Was Something Very Strange and Beautiful But Also Oxymoronic About Committing An Act Like That'

Albert Shin is a Canadian filmmaker, best known for his critically acclaimed Canadian Screen Award-nominated films "In Her Place" (2014) and "Disappearance at Clifton Hill" (2019). Shin has also founded the Toronto-based production company Timelapse Pictures with producing partner Igor Drljaca.

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On the occasion of his short film, "Together" premiering at Toronto International Film Festival, we speak with him about the rate of suicides in Korea, the concept of the suicide pact, the impressive party scene, the location and the casting of the movie, and Korean cinema at the moment.

The interview contains significant spoilers

Why do you think people commit suicide?

I think the reasons are very personal each time. However, I find it very interesting that Korea has a very high rate of suicides, especially among the developed nations, where it is the highest of all and has been for a very long time. I think that is a question the country and the people are trying to figure out for themselves and it actually touches on the whole age spectrum. Elderly suicide is high, youth suicide is high, adult suicide is high. It is an interesting question; I don't know where the reasons come from, but obviously, the government and the people are doing their best to stop it as much as possible. Even the topic my movie is focused on, the suicide pacts, of people finding each other on the web and scheduling simultaneous suicides, if you go on Google of Naver here in Korea and type in anything that has to do with suicide, you get a pop up that says 'please call this hotline'; essentially they blocked any material on the internet that deals with sucide. Furthermore, the bridges in Korea are suicide-proof and there are hotlines everywhere, it is very conscious in the minds of society there. However, where there is a will there's a way of course, and even these tactics have not changed the overall mentality, the suicide rate is still very high.  

Can you give us some more details about the suicide pact concept?

Several years ago, I shot a feature film titled "In Her Place" and in the movie, there is a component that deals with suicide. Therefore, I did a lot of research in Korea about the subject matter, and I found about this internet suicide pact concept where people that are suicidal or thinking of commiting find themselves on message boards, find each other and then decide to go at it together. I thought that there was something very strange and beautiful but also oxymoronic about committing an act like that, which is essentially a very personal "journey" since nobody can actually go with you, but wishing to do it with other people, in some sort of solidarity about leaving this life. It was actually an issue some years before in Korea, since employees would go into hotel rooms and find four or five people together dead. When the police would look into the people, they would find that they were all strangers, from different parts of the country, and that they gathered there specifically to do that. It was an issue that I wanted to explore, hopefully in a sensitive manner, not trying to be sensational or judgemental.  

In the film, the protagonists never mention the reasons they want to kill themselves. Why did you make this choice?

I think everybody's reasons are different and I thought that, by giving a reason, I would essentially trivialize the whole concept. Instead, I wanted it to be a reflection on ourselves, rather than the two specific people in the film, that is why I kept them nameless and knowing about each other as little as the audience of the movie knows about them. To create this subjective idea of ' stranger '. I also think that if people have already made the decision to go through it, they would not try to conceptualize it during the act, they would have conceptualized it before, they meet with each other to make sure that they go through with it. They are not meeting to try and change each other's minds, they have already made up their minds, the reason is almost irrelevant at that point.

How old is Ahn So-yo, the female protagonist of the film, supposed to be in the story? The man makes her 21 but she is surprised by that estimate.

(laughter) I do not know if she would want me to tell you. I shot this movie a few years ago, before the pandemic, but she was not 21. Her reaction to him making her 21 is quite appropriate to how old she actually is, sorry Ahn (laughter)

Can you give me some details about the party scene in the movie, also on the way you shot it, because it is rather impressive with the intense red colors?

You do not see exactly how they get in the room, in the hotel, but all I suggest before getting to that scene is the door opening up a little bit. The situation is very awkward and very tenuous regarding what they are doing there; the tension and the awkwardness in the room would probably be very palpable. The actors that I chose and the characters that I made are a man and a woman, and thus, there are potentially other connotations that could arise from a situation like this. All of these unspoken tensions in the room, I wanted them to go in a bit more benevolent path than a sinister or darker one; to lead into a kind of a final 'hurrah!'. We are not exactly sure how it got there, but hopefully, we can see how it got there, possibly, using our own imagination, into drinking and partying as if there is no tomorrow.

The process I shot this movie is based on addition by subtraction; it is a very small movie, shot only in one room, with two actors, a mirror, a burner and some coal, and that's it. So my question was how to extrapolate drama from these elements and how to shoot it in a square room in essence. I gave myself very few elements, and the red lighting was something I discovered when I was scouting different locations, in these motel rooms in remote places. Sometimes, they have these mood setters, mood lights that can be intensely red, or dalliances of different kinds. I thought this would be an interesting component in a visual way, part of using the few tools I had to change the overall visual language of the movie a little bit.

What about the song that is heard in the scene?

It is a very famous song from the 60's, titled "Beautiful Rivers and Mountains" by Shin Joong-hyun. I really love it. I think it has different meanings for different people; for people in Korea, it is really famous, like a Beatles or Rolling Stone song, it is definitely part of the zeitgeist. Furthermore, the artist was very much influenced by Western music, and I thought that the song had an interesting sensibility that kind of matched myself, since I was born and raised in Canada but I am a child of Korean immigrants, therefore I am somewhat between spaces and that is why this artist really spoke to me.

Why doesnt' the girl commit suicide in the end?

For me, it was really important to have a hopeful ending, because, obviously, the film is very sad. I wanted to comment on how tenuous it all is, because, evidently, this is a decision you cannot take back. This whole ritual, of finding someone on the internet, taking the trip to a place that is not your home, essentially aims into building yourself to go through with this act. However, if something deviates from this process, it might throw you out, you might want to press the pause button. And maybe the pause button is what saves your life, maybe the course of your life changes. Or maybe not, and two weeks later, she will try it again with somebody else, but I wanted to show how fragile this decision can be, that even the smallest deviation from the process can change the whole thing.

So, if you continued the movie, would she change her life completely or would she commit suicide later on?

(laughter) Actually, the film started as a feature that followed this specific character, and it was a bit more fantastical, not as neo-realistic as this movie is, but she does go on a journey. In my mind, she still goes on this journey, that becomes strange and sad and horrifying, but in the end, hopeful, she finds a reason to live.  

Can you tell me a bit about the location the film was shot? Was it difficult persuading the people in charge of the hotel to let you shoot a suicide scene in their room?

(laughs) We shot in off-season, in December, so I think they were happy for the business and they did not care that much. We shot in Kanghwa Island, which is on the border with North Korea. It is kind of close to where Lee Chang-dong shot "Burning", when you look at the horizon, North Korea is just over the bay. I spent more time finding the location than anything else, but when I found out that place and the view, and the geometry of the room, which was not exactly square, I thought that this was the place that would tell the story.      

So the view from the window in the end is North Korea?

It could be, yes, not directly in the front, but the mountains in the background could be North Korea.  

Could you give us some details about the casting?

One of the excuses for me making the movie was to work again with the actors I worked in my feature film. The female protagonist, Ahn So-yo acted in that film and is also a friend of mine whom I adore. The man, Kim Jae-rok, also had a small part there, and I thought the two of them would make an interesting combination. Even the people behind the scenes are the ones that I worked with before, it was kind of fun to bring the band back together.  

What is your opinion of the Korean movie industry at the moment?  

Right now, the movie industry is in disarray due to the pandemic, but in general, the Korean industry is in a good place because they have a very robust and strong domestic market. The people in Korea watch and love local movies and they have their own star system. And for a small country with such an isolated language, doing so well on an international scale is something impressive. Obviously, Korea also had a nice streak the last few years, with "Parasite" and "Burning" and all those festival auteurs who brought the spotlight on local cinema.

On the other hand, Korean filmmakers do not shoot films so frequently, we see movies that are years apart, as in your case for example, in contrast to Japan, for example, where a number of directors shoot even more than a film per year. Why is that in your opinion?

Without going too deep about my personal feelings for the Korean film industry in certain respects, I would say that, despite what I just mentioned, it is still difficult to shoot movies in Korea. All these masters of Korean cinema, the Lee Chang-dongs, the Park Chan-wooks, the Bong Joon-hos, they came up during the infancy of the New Wave of Korean cinema. The studio executives and the big conglomerates that fund these movies, at the time, did not know what worked in terms of profit, so they gave a lot of power to the filmmakers to try even crazy things. Out of that, you got all these great, weird, idiosyncratic movies and these filmmakers, which are internationally renowned. But now that the industry has developed, it is much more of a studio system now, where the funders have a lot of control on how these movies are made. Because of that, filmmakers have a harder time making the movies they want to make, in the way they want to make them. And furthermore, as the industry becomes more robust, it also becomes more expensive and therefore, it also becomes harder to make movies on a smaller scale.

So, are you working on anything new at the moment?

(laughs) Yes, I am working on a Canadian feature film, with a Canadian and US cast, which will be shot in Newfoundland. It is very different from this short; it is a big fantastical movie that deals with a lot of social issues, an allegory for the times we live in. I am very excited, and I am hoping to shoot next year.

I am also writing a Korean-American film at the moment and I also have this dream project which I hope I will shoot in Korean one day. I want to do both things, shoot films in North America, but not forget Korea, because I really enjoy making movies there, more than anywhere else.

Interview by Panos Kotzathanasis

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"Together" is directed by Albert Shin, and features Ahn So-yo, Kim Jae-rok. Release date in Korea: No release date in Korea yet.

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