Wow.
So even having read the negative reviews and the fact that it was booed at the Berlin Film Festival by critics, I decided to watch this movie simply because Hyunbin was in it.
I didn’t expect myself to be in tears by the end of this very slow-moving, frustrating film. This was even more surprising given that I am so incredibly impatient. The film centers around a couple that is preparing to break up after 5 years of marriage. The entire movie takes place over a one day period - the last day the couple has together, as the female lead is packing up to leave the house for another man.
“Come Rain, Come Shine” (the English title), or “I Love You, I Don’t Love You” (the Korean title), is so strikingly different compared to a typical Korean film or drama in that there is minimal emotion shown, and even less dialogue. There are many long shots of objects, a focus drawn to the two characters’ (rather dull) interaction with items and absolutely no explicit explanation of their feelings or even their past memories. There is no screaming (albeit a very small outcry by the female lead), no frantic tears over a lost love (as is very common in the Korean entertainment world), minimal conversation between the two.
But there is definitely a presence of deep feelings. Deep, deep feelings and an incredibly heavy mood that I found it difficult not to be sunk into the movie despite its slowness.
It’s clear by the first half of the movie that the female character is struggling over her decision to leave - and although the ending is very inexplicit and vague, I think the fate of their relationship is made very clear through various shots and hints given throughout the film
The film moved me in such a way and managed to completely break my heart despite the lack of dialogue or outward emotion. I ended up going on Naver to see what Korean people thought, and it was given pretty negative reviews - but I honestly think the characters were developed well, and the movie is one of the most thought-provoking ones I’ve seen in a long while.
I would not watch it again, however. I think the novelty of the film is reserved only for the first time.
I realized this toward the end of the film, but I think one of the reasons the movie impacted me so much is because…it reminded me so much of a particular relationship in my life that I had in the past.
I think this was largely due to the unspoken nature of our relationship - like the couple in the movie, we never fought or verbally acknowledged that there was something wrong, even though both of us recognized that countless things were wrong. There were so many long pauses in between sentences as we struggled to choose our next words. The mood was always so heavy, so frustrating, so full of emotion. I wanted to scream and yell, tell him how much he hurt me, tell him how he’s broken so many things. Instead, like the couple in the film, we were just there, carefully choosing our next words, smiling softly at one another, being courteous, offering to help each other - even during the time period when things were most strained.
In reflection upon it now, I wish we had had the courage to argue, to yell - a display of outward emotion that would have made very clear of our inward feelings, that would have broken the incredibly dense mood before it was too late. Instead, we were too busy being nice. I remember that particular day - OUR very own last day together - and how I worked to suppress my emotion, occupy myself busily in helping him clean up his place as he was getting prepared to move hours away from the location where we had spent most of our time together. How ironic is it that I can find so many parallels between this day and the day portrayed in the film? Throughout that day, we exchanged no words for the broken relationship that was to happen in a matter of hours, no display of emotion despite the fact that in my mind, I had already broken into a million different pieces, a total mess. I didn’t shed a single tear.
The relationship has been over for a while now, and it doesn’t affect me nowadays at all. It’s interesting, though, that I never noted this particular element of the relationship until I watched this movie. I was not the usual, bubbly, happy self in this relationship. Instead, I had been transformed into someone deeper, someone struggling to find her words, someone forced to keep her deepest emotions locked up inside. It’s really interesting what life does to you sometimes. And it’s even more interesting when life takes a movie to help you recognize it for what it actually was.
