Speaking Through Art

Poetry was a pretty awesome movie. The more time I put between me and seeing the movie, the more I appreciate it. There was a lot happening in this movie; it's almost like it's an extremely subtle and extremely less violent Inception--you had to think a lot to keep up with the multiple elements introduced and put the pieces together.

My favorite element to the movie was the introduction of poetry to Mija, the main character. Mija was a very empty character. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's, so her spacey-ness should be excusable, but I don't think that is the whole reason for why she was constantly absent from reality throughout a lot of the movie.

What struck me right away was that Mija had figuratively had no voice, and neither did Agnes, the girl who killed herself. Both are silent--not by their own means, and while Agnes found a way to finally scream, Mija didn't know how to, she'd seemingly accepted being hushed. As the movie progresses, viewers are able to see Mija start to unearth this type of strength that allows her to start putting her foot down and trying to speak.

But in the end, her attempts at words weren't enough.

Wook, her grandson, disrespects her still even after she tells him she knows what he did and demands to know why. Her most powerful word towards Wook: putting Agnes' picture on the table at breakfast one morning.

When Mija turns down her boss at his -ahem- demand for physical attention, she later comes back to give him what he wants because though she's said no, her word won't ring.

Mija can't assert herself in the situation with the father's of the boys. I think she couldn't speak because she related so much to Agnes, she saw no use in saving the boys, she didn't want to help serve their purpose. Later she would help to repay Agnes' family and --I suspect-- turn in the boys to the police. So everybody wins, right?

In the beginning of the movie, Mija is struck by the suicide of Agnes. She questions Wook about it and he won't give her any answers. When she hears more, she's eager to learn more about what Agnes' life was like. From the beginning, one could tell that Mija wanted more than anything to get out of her life. She was seeking a beauty, a purpose in the meaninglessness of her life that she'd started to give up hope trying to find.

Her face was always sad. Even when she smiled she was sad. The only time she looked truly happy was when she was absorbed in the intensive process of writing one poem--the artwork that finally allowed her to speak volumes, the hymn of an individual who couldn't speak and couldn't be heard and found a way to speak and be heard, through simple, beautiful words on a paper.

Artists for centuries have figured out how to use a voice by means of art. Sometimes, it's the only way an artist is actually ever heard. This concept is nothing new, but watching this unfold in the way the director/writer Chang-Dong Lee creates it in Poetry is beautiful and hopeful at the same time.

Lesson: If no one's listening, go jump off a bridge.