Desensitizing National Identity, a Flaw of Dramatic Films

     Through the movie Aimless Bullet director Hyun-Mok Yu critiques and positions himself against the practice of romanticizing reality in cinema to shape the publics' sense of nationalism. As Alan Williams states in his introduction, mass media plays “[...] an absolutely crucial role in this ongoing process of sustaining and [...] redefining nationalisms” (Williams 4). Understanding the critical role films hold on a society's perception of self, director Hyun-Mok Yu opts for realistic representations of reality to illustrate life, throughout history, accurately so as not to warp the public's fragile sense of national identity. Director Hyun demonstrate's his disapproval of overly romanticized films in the scene where Song Young-Ho is interviewed for an acting role in a Korean film. Once Young-Ho is accorded an interview with an assistant director Young-Ho quickly becomes defensive as the director blatantly demands him to showoff his battle scars in the movie. The assistant praises Young-Ho for his “marvellous” battle scars until he irrupts into a fit of rage. Young-Ho angrily protests that he “did not get these wounds in some children's game [and that] they're not for sale” as he storms off (Aimless Bullet). In this scene, through the character of Young-Ho, director Hyun openly criticizes the over dramatization of history in movies which often desensitize the viewers to the factual horrors of history and gives them a false impression of history.

The sheer insensitivity of the assistant director's demand, upon a war veteran, to expose his emotionally traumatic scars for entertainment purposes also creates viewer sympathy for Young-Ho, who struggles to find his place in the post war society. Throughout this scene director Hyun argues that film should be used to accurately represent the realities of a time in order to create a historically sensitive and aware audience. Film, Director Hyun suggests, should never romanticize history as it desensitizes viewers and creates a false sense of nationalism based on misrepresentations. 

Sources Cited:

Williams, Alan, eds.“Introduction.” Film and Nationalism.Rutger's University Press, 2002.
Aimless Bullet. Screenplay by Lee Jong Ki. Dir. Hyun-Mok Yu.1961.