Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (2005)
November 26th, 2006
Also known as “Lady Vengeance,” this is the third part of Korean director Park Chan-wook’s Vengeance trilogy. The other parts are Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002) and Oldboy (2003).
Like a musician performing variations on a theme, Park reuses many of the ideas and situations from the other parts of the trilogy: Long imprisonment, a kidney transplant, a kidnapping gone bad, a lost daughter, a visit to an old school, and of course, vengeance. But the handling of each motif is completely different.
This film is softer, funnier, more subtle, and more intricate than the others, but its treatment of the revenge theme is vastly darker. The act of vengeance when it comes is clear and unambiguous, with chilling moral implications. This is no video-game battle but a sombre, deliberate act of assassination, carried out offscreen by nine regular citizens wearing vinyl raincoats.
There is no ambiguity about the guilt of the victim, Choi Min-sik from Oldboy. He kidnapped their children, collected a ransom for each one, and then killed them all. He did it because he wanted to buy a yacht. Then he blackmailed Lee Geum-ja (Lee Young-ae), the “Lady” of the title, into taking the fall for one of his murders. That is why she spent 13 years in prison.
But this is vigilante justice. How can we feel sympathy for this cold-blooded execution? Do we? Should we? I don’t have the answers, but I don’t hesitate to say that this film is the best of the trilogy. At least it asks the questions.
The plot is so intricate that I will need to see it again before I feel that I understand it well enough to comment. Much of it is told through flashbacks, and I know there are parts I didn’t get. For example, there is a sub-plot in which Lee Geum-ja takes a much younger lover. Why? I don’t know. It is the kind of touch that shouldn’t be random in the hands of a skilled director. If it is, it represents a problem with the movie. But more likely I just didn’t get it.
Update Nov.27: I watched it again. This time I got that the young lover is the exact age that the murdered boy would have been. I don’t find this illuminating. I also picked up on the “prison love” theme: subservient lover as slave. The boy is commanded to make sure the candles don’t go out, and other than that, he is to touch nothing. (One reviewer summed up the appeal of this film in four words: “Asian chicks in prison.” Clever! But I don’t agree.)
More significantly, Lee Geum-ja locates her lost daughter Jenny in Australia and brings the girl back to Korea against the wishes of her foster parents. (In effect she kidnaps her, although Jenny does want to go. In fact Jenny demands to go, and finally kidnaps herself at knife-point.) But soon Lee Geum-ja sends her back again. Either I didn’t get it or it isn’t developed well enough. I’ll have to watch it again to know for sure.
In a funny vignette, the Australian foster parents turn up in Korea looking for Jenny. Sweet and doddery, they speak no known language, not even Japanese. One wonders if this is how all westerners are viewed in Korea. If so I think we better stay home.
Update Nov.27: Even after a second viewing, I don’t really understand the ending. I’m getting a little closer. Now I understand that young Jenny didn’t go back to Australia. I thought Jenny and her foster parents all died, but now I don’t think anybody died. (Not anybody new.) It’s a good thing I like this movie. It looks like I’m going to have to watch it again.
This film is extensively reviewed at Rotten Tomatoes, where it gets a 75% approval rating. Those critics all understood it better than I did. I recommend you read their reviews.
And see the movie. Watch the whole trilogy, in order. Like it or not, Park’s Vengeance trilogy is an important contribution to world cinema. And it really does out-Tarantino Tarantino. Although they have similar themes (a woman’s vengeance), this is a much better movie than “Kill Bill.”
Leave a Reply