[HanCinema's Film Review] "Still and All"

During the Korean War, refugees from the North Korean invasion were pushed back as far as Busan. So, it became common for family members to promise to meet each other on Yeong Island, the main distinct landmark in that region. Years dragged on- some people left. Others stayed, and built up a sort of shantytown, even as the bridge to the mainland fell into disrepair. Business was eclectic. Some labored, some became fortunetellers, others became laborers. But slowly, everyone got old. "Still and All" is their story.

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In broad perspective "Still and All" is a documentary exposition of Yeong Island's people pre-gentrification. As far as I know gentrification has not actually happened yet, but the latter part of the documentary makes clear that this is the reason why director Kim Young-jo started filming these stories in the first place. The restoration of the Yeong Island Bridge has improved the property value such that the land owners want to start development. Maybe. Eventually. In the short term the weird old people all need to be kicked out though.

It's an inherently ironic situation because the people profiled in "Still and All" are all survivors. But the main element they fight against is poverty, which can be fought by gathering together meager informal income. "Still and All" is, if nothing else, an important look at the long term lower classes of South Korea, who are not terribly ambitious and are mostly satisfied with just having enough to get by.

Elder issues also take important prominence. The main fortuneteller who is profiled is very hard of hearing, and constantly misinterprets the conversation subjects her daughter brings up in increasingly convoluted ways. The daughter, who finds all of this hilarious, responds with jovial stories about the specific type of burial procedure her mother wants. The ability of all these people to maintain such a positive tone in all circumstances is impressive- if morbid.

In general the older people, aside from the whole prospect of losing their homes that only comes up in the latter part of the documentary, are oddly happy and self-reliant, as if they're proud to have gotten this far. They take joy in all the little eccentricities in life, such that even their gossip comes off rather warmly. When we finally meet the deaf woman diver, after all, we're actually already well-primed to think she's cool, if nuts, because diving is the kind of physically intensive skill you would not expect an old woman to do, and yet there she is, irrepressibly cheerful.

Younger people are more stressed out- I'm thinking in particular of a couple of workers just shooting the breeze about how it doesn't seem possible to earn the necessary money to do anything anymore. This is couched in more ambitious terms. On one level, this feels like a cynical commentary on how proposed development, even if it happens, is unlikely to help the lower classes. Although on a more emotional level, it's an odd contrast how the older people seem so much more easily satisfied with so little.

Review by William Schwartz

"Still and All" is directed by Kim Young-jo.