‘In Water (mul-an-e-seo)’ review: Hong Sang-soo blurs the lines of his own self-reference to middling effect  | Berlinale

What’s a year without a Hong Sang-soo film? Does a film festival even exist, if it does not feature a regular slot for the prolific South Korean filmmaker and his lo-fi signature auteur look? In Water is the 29th title in his filmography and had its world premiere at the Encounters section in this year’s Berlinale which feels like a downgrade from the main competition slot of his Introduction in 2021. The film clocks in just 61 minutes and delivers a formal experimentation which feels novel to the now-streamlined inconspicuous aesthetics. 

Again, the main character is a filmmaker, but this time he’s young and just starting out. Seoung-mo (Seok-ho Shin) travels to the seaside with his longtime friends Sang-guk (Seong-guk Ha) and Nam-Hee (Seung-yun Kim), who are in charge of camera and acting, respectively. But what the film is about, we don’t know. In fact, Seoung-mo himself struggles to find the meaningful thread he’d want to explore, and instead focuses on potential locations and shots: alleyways where the actress would “fit”, rapeseed flowers that are “pretty”, but the conviction is always to find what’s “not too pretty”. 

From the opening shot, excessive blurriness and low quality dominate the scene, stretched on the enormous cinema screen. What seems like a video-within-the-film, based on a static singular point of view and the nonchalant way in which characters walk in and out of the frame, turns out to be a disarming formal choice. In Water is blurry on purpose, but to various degrees. For a long time, the plot is equally unclear, but Hong has made an art of his meandering narratives, so every knowledgeable viewer will expect a profound turn towards the end, but not before. The fact that the film’s format is listed as “QuickTime ProRes” attacks the institutionalized idea of high quality and what’s considered acceptably cinematic, and can be considered yet another of Hong’s aesthetic revolts, alongside his particular use of black and white, contrast, zooms, and more. 

This is a very rich concept, debating the surface of the image. Hong’s gesture puts to the test the whole history of the moving image and the ways representability has suffered through changing technologies. A big fan of digital himself, the Korean filmmaker has always tried to subvert the expectations that with less technological aptitude comes lesser artistry. Through witnessing Seoung-mo’s ponderings, we get glimpses of the chaotic, intuitive process behind probably every film made by the director himself. Shooting without a script, inspired by the locations, and working with equally intuitive friends has always been a Hong trademark. In this one, expect less appreciation for soju, but more Pepsi, sandwiches and pizza.

In Water aims to be a prick in the fabric of both film history and Hong’s filmography, but even in the hour-long duration, the blurriness does not fully hold up to its experimental potential. Combined with the slow-evolving plot—which we know is always moving towards some revelation against the expectation of true avant-garde—the film’s lack of sharpness devolves from ethical statement to shtick very quickly. The film, as in most of Hong’s, relies too heavily on the viewer going along with it: this demand for previous knowledge is now starting to feel unwarranted, and with the growing number of self-referential films and meta-narratives about filmmaking, all of it seems less capable to deliver the heartfelt catharsis carefully tucked away in a drunken dialogue which made the cinema of Hong Sang-soo so daring and delightful. 

Grade: C-

This review is from the 73rd Berlin International Film Festival.