Time to Face the Music

 

The heart wrenching tale of Sopyonje revolves around inner struggle with post-traumatic grief, which is reflective of the Korean nation's grief at this time. The climax of the movie is the final reunion scene between Dongho and Songhwa in which they free themselves from their grief through the art of Pansori. As Julian Stringer remarks in his article, in this climactic scene, “at the very moment the central characters are most connected to each other, at the very moment they express their familial bonds most passionately through song [...] Sopyonje gives its audience mood music” (164). In this scene, although the music is no longer Pansori but mood music, the audience witness Dongho and Songhwa's liberation as many close ups of their faces, wet with tears, make up this scene. In this climactic scene the director consciously eliminates the Pansori's music in order to draw the viewers focus away from the symbolic meaning of Pansori, in the national context, and focus on the individual healing expressed by both siblings. By doing this the director takes the attention away from the national experience of grief for a moment to state the importance of family and self healing.  

 

 Although the lack of Pansori music in this scene creates a powerful and intense mood it also provokes many questions. Are the close ups of the characters' teary faces, coupled with the non-diegetic music, the director's way of stating that Pansori is solely an art of grief, not one of healing? Is the fact that Pansori is lacking in audible representation yet present in spirit, during the most crucial moment of emotion in the film also indicative of it's sole existence in grief? After this climactic scene of emotional healing between the two siblings Songhwa cannot outwardly come to terms with the experience and fully heal, is this caused by her fear of losing her Pansori abilities? Seeing as Pansori and grief are important symbols of the Korean nation throughout the film, what does Songhwa's refusal or incapacity to heal say about the condition of the nation? Is the nation unable to make the move away from it's position as victim of the passed colonial powers?

Source Cited:

Julian Stringer, "Sopyonje and the Inner Domain of National Culture,” Im Kwon-Taek: The Making of a Korean National Cinema. Eds. David E. James and Kyung Hyun Kim. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2002. 157-181.