Do you want to go back?

If you could go back in time, would you? If so, what time of your life would you decide to go back to? During our lives, everyone lives with regrets, guilts, disappointments, and anger against society. Peppermint Candy successfully depicts the Korea's past society. Just as many believes, I also believe that this film is an allegory of the nation's past and it reminds the audience what has happened before.

This chronological way of narration was unique and confusing at the same time. The addition of train moving backwards, to symbolize travelling back in time, could be to allow the audience to think about what happened and to connect the stories. Or perhaps it is present for the audience to take in the message and self-reflect after each scenes. The story is told inversely, starting from the point of Young Ho's suicide. As we go back in time, we see different reasons of what made Young Ho chose death to escape. We also see the different historical events such as KwangJu massacre. I think it was at this point when Young Ho's life started to roll downwards. He gets shot in the leg and accidentally kills a girl. After coming out from the army, he gets a job as a cop, torturing the suspects. These events go against his morals and bothers his conscience and he knows he is not naïve and pure anymore (symbolized by feces on his hands).

What I did not quite get is, what is the point of going back if Young Ho's 'fate' has already been decided? Near the end of the movie,Young Ho is back to the place he was at in the beginning of the movie. It is when he first meets his true lover, Sun Im, but he is still separated from the group and looks up at the train bridge and cries. Perhaps Young Ho did succeed in going back to the past. However, failed in returning to where everything was naïve, pure, and simple. This is shown by his tears. His tears really made me feel bitter because it was as if he knew his future. He knew what lies ahead and there is nothing he can do in order to change it. He is so broken by the society, he does not have 'himself'. He is like a robot, living a pointless life.

I was looking forward to watching this movie because of the famous scene of where Young Ho yells 'I want to go back!' To be honest, this was not the most interesting movie I have viewed. However, I realized why this movie was such a hit. It might have been because it reminded the Korean viewers of the past. Or it could have been because the audience felt some sort of connection to Young Ho. But I personally believe Young Ho is a fool. No matter what the society throws at you, you should not lose yourself. It is pretty clear Young Ho had choices that could have changed his life to a better one. He just did not take the chance.