‘What Does That Nature Say to You’ Review: Hong Sang-soo’s Latest Remains Disarmingly Observational Yet a Touch Out of Focus [B] – Berlinale

South Korean auteur Hong Sang-soo is losing his sight as he ages into an old man. For many directors, this would cement their retirement, but for Hong, he has utilised his new found blurred perspective on the world to create art that stays true to his vision, or lack thereof. For his 2023 film In Water, a young filmmaker creates their first film. The amateur film stylings thematically reflect that filmmaker’s process, with the entirety of In Water being shot out of focus. Hong continues this experimental conceit with his latest, What Does That Nature Say to You, where instead of a teenage artist failing, he follows a man in his early 30’s who has recently been prescribed glasses that he fails to wear. This means a prominent portion of the film is shot just outside the standard sharpness you’d expect from a film that has been placed in Competition at one of the world’s biggest film festivals. 

The man is Dongwha (Ha Seongguk), a poet from Seoul who lives a deliberately simple, frugal life. He works a small job that helps him to just about get by but his world is art, of poetry, of emotions and feelings rather than joining the business of capitalist society. We first meet Dongwha in his second-hand vehicle, a Kia Pride from 1996, as he drops his girlfriend Junhee (Kang Soyi) back at her home in Yeoju. As the couple sit there discussing how Junhee’s father built the house from nothing, a car pulls out of her driveway, revealing that her mother (Cho Yunhee) is leaving for work.

The couple have been dating for three yearsthree years of dating history, yet Dongwha has never allowed Junhee to let him meet her parents or family. As the mother leaves, Junhee suggests driving up the hill to show Dongwha the house. At first, he is reluctant, but when she says they aren’t going inside, he begins driving up to the huge house Junghee calls home. Before they can reach the house, they are ambushed by her father (Kwon Haehyo) who quickly strikes up a conversation with his daughter’s partner about the car he drives. 

Across the 108 minutes and eight chapters of What Does That Nature Say to You, Dongwha converses with Junghee’s family as they attempt to learn who the man who loves Junghee is. As they talk, he is placed under light scrutiny by the family, who only have tidbits of information until this point. Her younger sister, who is introduced as suffering from depression as she sits playing on a gayageum (a traditional Korean musical instrument), knows that Dongwha is the son of attorney Ha, whom we are to assume is famous by the reverence imparted upon his name. After Dongwha and the father bond over the ‘classic’ car, sip some makgeolli (an alcoholic Korean sparkling rice wine) together and give thanks to a tree that represents the families late matriarch, the duo and the sister leave to go eat lunch before returning for the fathers home-cooked chicken baeksuk.

The film begins as what we know and expect from Sang-soo – the director’s motif is a form of extreme naturalism, often a static camera observing from a low vantage point – as the characters appear to be in a hangout movie where a man is slowly but surely forced to spend time with his girlfriend’s family. But there is an acidity that gurgles underneath, and the film matures into something much more witheringly amusing to see unfold. We learn that Dongwha has rejected the popularity and wealth of his father but the privilege he grew up with becomes apparent through his responses and his actions, such as eating other people’s food on the table at the restaurant. 

The script has these layers in abundance for Donghwa, where each banal conversation seems to accidentally reveal a little more fallacy about the part-time employed 30-something unpublished poet who can’t fathom that his girlfriend of three years has such a rich homeworld. A drunken poem recital is worthy of enough second-hand embarrassment to put down an elephant. But while the script has so much interest in Donghwa, it doesn’t have the same respect for Junghee, who gets too little opportunity to reveal more character than timid daughter, girlfriend and sibling. 

That said, one must remember that the film is shot in the literal optical lens that Donghwa views the world. Hong is cleverly keeping us at arms length from viewing these conversations as anything but from inside the prism of Donghwa’s privilege and myopic worldview. This culminates in a fiery finale of alcohol-infused indignation at his lifestyle being put in question as something not appropriate for Junghee to be involved with. What is remarkable about how each person performs in this scene is that it manages to capture a pithy sense of sympathy for everyone involved.

What Does That Nature Say to You is a strain on your eyes through its choice to shoot in low-resolution, where the skies are blown out like your phone camera is set on max exposure and faces are soft like you have necked three shots for dutch courage. It’s also a strain on your attention, with his trademark lounging-around style sometimes a real struggle to keep up with. The conversations in Hong’s 33rd feature film languish but there is a deviousness to them that foster a fair bit of intrigue. The power dynamics are swirling and shifting from conversation to conversation, resulting in real nuggets of reflexive curiosity within the uber-naturalism on display. As difficult as Hong’s style may be, there are intricate layers to be unwrapped if one is willing to look a little closer.

Grade: B

This review is from the 2025 Berlin Film Festival where What Does That Nature Say to You had its world premiere. There is no U.S. distribution at this time.

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Connor Lightbody

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