Parky At the Pictures (1/8/2025)

(Reviews of What Does That Nature Say to You; Oslo Stories Trilogy: Dreams; and Savages)

WHAT DOES THAT NATURE SAY TO YOU.

The greatest gift that Hong Sang-soo could bestow upon the world would be an affordable boxed set of his highly distinctive films. Coming in at No.33, What Does That Nature Say to You shares many traits with its predecessors. But this study of artistry, perception, and legacy also has a visual novelty that not only reflects the ocular deficiency of one of principals, but also connects with the fact that Hong's parents owned and ran the Cinetel Soul production company.

Seoul poet Donghwa (Ha Seongguk) drives girlfriend Junhee (Kang Soyi) to stay with her parents. They have been dating for three years, but this is the first time he's seen her family home and is so overwhelmed by the size that he asks for a better look from the end of the driveway. There, they bump into Junhee's father, Oryeong (Kwon Haehyo), who knows him as the son of a famous attorney.

Oryeong is amused that Donghwa drives such an old car and asks to take it for a spin. While they wait, Junhee explains that her father will now invite him inside and she warns him to go easy with her older sister, Neunghee (Park Miso), as she's been having some mental health problems. Shuffling awkwardly, Donghwa turns to see Oryeong returning up the drive and he crows with pleasure at the fact the 1996 vehicle still has a cassette player.

While Junhee goes to find Neunghee, who is plucking a gayageum on her bed, Oryeong takes Donghwa on a smoking tour of the grounds. The diffident Donghwa shows interest in the dogs and chickens and modestly deflects praise for recently having had a poem published in a magazine and for growing such a trendy goatee. Oryeong claims not to be able to produce facial hair, but he does point out that wife, Sunhee (Cho Yunhee), is a poet of some renown and Donghwa concurs they she is very good. Up in Neunghee's room, she asks Junhee about her beau and wonders whether there might not be wedding bells now her father realises he's from good stock.

Oryeong tells Donghwa about building the house for his mother and still feeling her spirit around the place. They stop on a bench for a smoke and open a second bottle of makgeolli, as Donghwa reveals that he rarely wears his glasses because he got so used to blurry vision that sharp images felt wrong. Teasing him that it's better to look at Junhee with a clear view, Oryeong describes the beauty of the sunset over the nearby mountain (the camera pulls back to show the view before coming in for a tighter two-shot). He asks Donghwa what he likes about Junhee, but he can only come up with platitudes about her being pretty and a good person. Oryeong explains how much he loves his daughter and Donghwa says she often tells him how loving a father he was.

Wondering where they've got to, Junhee calls Oryeong and suggests they have lunch. He urges them to go out with Neunghee and drop into Sinreuk Temple, where King Sejong is buried. Junhee has to drive, as Donghwa is tipsy, while Oryeong stays behind to catch a chicken for supper. Knowing her father is cooking, Junhee tells a ravenous Donghwa to leave some room for later. Reluctantly, he stops scoffing bibimbap with pork and responds to Neunghee's request to know what he likes most about her sister. He mumbles something about her being an angel before Neunghee launches into a story about Junhee rejecting the suit of a businessman's son because she didn't like him and wasn't tempted by his wealth. She claims that's good news for Donghwa, as Junhee clearly isn't going out with him simply because his father is a famous lawyer.

When they visit Sinreuk Temple, which overlooks the river, Donghwa asks about Neunghee and how she occupies her time. Junhee explains that she is living at home while she gets back on her feet. But she pipes up with an opinion when Donghwa likes a rock sculpture by the pagoda she finds dull and jokes that he's obviously got odd taste because he drives such an old car. Alone with her sister, Neunghee pries about Donghwa's lifestyle, as she suspects he's a poor little rich boy who is playing at being a poet in the safe knowledge he can always rely on daddy's money. But Junhee defends him and insists he is pursuing beauty and gets by on the money he makes shooting wedding videos to have time to write. Neunghee is sceptical, as their mother is a poet and she works full-time and is a better writer than Donghwa could ever hope to be.

Called back from writing while looking over the river, Donghwa sits beside an ancient tree and marvels at its ability to be true to itself and accept its fate. He laments that humans know so little about lives that are over in a trice and Junhee scolds him for being so negative and drifting along rather than take control of events. When he tries to apologise, she says this isn't the time for a deep discussion, as they need to find the coffee he left at the pagoda before they go looking for Neunghee.

She has been in the temple and has bought Donghwa a book. He is bashfully grateful, but soon finds himself having to defend his views when the sisters tease him when he can't decide if it's a good or a bad thing that artefacts survive from lost civilisations without us knowing their significance. But he's saved by the bell, as Oryeong calls Junhee to ask when they'll be home, as Sunhee has been cooking up a storm.

Over dinner, Donghwa praises Sunhee's poetry, but offers only the most mundane insights. Oryeong plies him with wine and spirits, as Sunhee asks about his father and why he prefers to live away from his family. As sunset approaches, Oryeong shows Donghwa and Junhee a shortcut to the garden bench. Once again, Donghwa can only manage a platitude on seeing the sun go down behind the mountain, but is keen to see the moon later because Junhee reckons it's so beautiful.

Back at the dinner table, Sunhee asks about Donghwa's car and his moustache. She tells him he's a handsome fellow and asks what he wants out of life. When he says he only requires the bare necessities, Neunghee scoffs that he can afford to think that way because he's always got his father's money behind him. Changing the subject, Sunhee inquires about what he is writing and what inspires him. However, she rolls her eyes when he claims his work today has formed a mysterious union between her mother-in-law's tree in the garden and the old Gingko tree at the temple. But Donghwa doesn't seem to realise that he is being judged as a man, as an artist, and as a prospective son-in-law and is being found wanting in each way.

Feeling the need to justify himself, Donghwa reads the poem he was working on. It's about a flower blooming at night and the forced praise suggests no one thought it was much good. When Neunghee declares it too short, however, Donghwa gets angry and asks why she keeps mentioning his father's wealth and status when she knows nothing of their relationship. He slumps forward and Junhee tries to lead him away, as Oryeong tuts about his inability to hold his drink. No one looks at each other after Donghwa is led away.

Woken in the night by a barking dog, Donghwa goes wandering in the garden, while a guitar-strumming Oryeong and Sunhee discuss his shortcomings. He says he's too old at 35 to be so directionless, while she sighs that he lacks the talent to be a poet. They wish he could be more like his father and lament that gifts sometimes skip a generation. As Donghwa smokes under the stars and trips on his way back to the house, Junhee's parents hope she has the sense to realise that he's not the man for her.

Next morning, Donghwa tries to sneak away before anyone's up. He has gashed his forearm and Junhee urges him to get it treated. She agrees to tell her parents that he's been called away on urgent business and promises to apologise on his behalf. Yet, when he bear hugs her and tells her that he loves her, Junhee doesn't reciprocate and half-heartedly nods when he says he'll see her next week. She manages a little wave before hurrying back indoors. Not long after he leaves, Donghwa breaks down and calls for a tow-truck. Lighting a cigarette, he sighs and acknowledges that he's going to have to sell the car.

It would be easy to chalk up this stealthy, eight-chaptered satire as another auteur masterclass, as Hong writes, directs, videographs, and edits the action, while also contributing the score and the sound design. But, as with much of his canon, this is very much an ensemble piece, with the deft interactions between the characters being as crucial as the unusually experimental visual style that employs the occasional pan and crash zoom, as well as a blurry low-resolution texture that's designed to convey Donghwa's myopic perspective and his part-time job shooting wedding videos.

Conversation always flows as much as the alcohol in Hong's films, but there's much more hesitancy in this `meet the parents' saga, as Ha Seongguk's Donghwa is so insecure in everything from his poetic vocation to his relationship with his girlfriend and the good opinion of her parents. The only thing he seems to trust is his car and it lets him down in the closing scene.

Ha's rapport with Kwon Haehyo's Oryeong is wonderfully awkward, as the poet seeks to make a good impression, while his host is prepared to give him every chance to shine, as he will have been through a similar situation himself. But Cho Yunhee's assured Sunhee and Park Miso's volatile Neunghee instantly expose his lack of profundity, as the former condescendingly realises he has no poetic talent or commitment whatsoever, while the latter keeps questioning his smug asceticism when he has a wealthy father to fall back on if things don't work out (a situation that seemingly reflects Hong's own background).

Throughout her boyfriend's ordeal, Kang Soyi's Junhee begins to see that she has wasted three years on a deadbeat and it's amusing to see how her words of reassurance slowly turn to admonition as Donghwa keeps digging a deeper hole. She doesn't say anything directly, but her sad wave as he drives away is as damning as the verdicts reached by her parents after her beau's dinner table outburst.

Donghwa is far from the first Hong character to be hoisted by their inability to hold their drink. But it's hard to feel much sympathy for him, even as he reads out his excruciating verses to a hostile audience, as he is so conceited in his conviction that he's an artist and so ignorant of the social realities from which he believes he's immune.

Perhaps intended as a companion piece to In Our Day (2023), in which Ki Joobong plays an ageing poet reflecting upon his youth while mourning the loss of his cat, this treatise on creativity, authenticity, childhood legacy, and class insularity provides much food for thought. But it also demonstrates that not only does Hong still have much wit and wisdom to impart, but that he is also still capable of springing the occasional stylistic surprise.

OSLO STORIES TRILOGY: DREAMS.

There are sequential trilogies with a linear narrative and there are those like Krzysztof Kieœlowski's Three Colours (1993-94) in which it doesn't matter which order Blue, Red, and White are viewed. As Dag Johan Haugerud's Oslo Trilogy takes its inspiration from the Pole's masterpiece, it shouldn't matter how viewers watch Sex, Dreams, and Love. According to Wikipedia, Dreams is the second instalment, although the BFI claims it's the third, even though the on-screen title reads Sex Dreams Love. Distributor Modern Films, however, has chosen to release it first into UK cinemas, perhaps because Haugerud has explored its central theme before, in his 53-minute monologue, I'm the One You Want (2014), and Barn (aka Beware the Children, 2019), which featured two Dreams's leading actresses. However, it's more likely that the decision was influenced by the award of Berlin's Golden Bear and the recent debate about veracity and memoir sparked by The Salt Path furore.

While avoiding a snow walk with her mother, Kristen (Ane Dahl Torp), and grandmother, Karin (Anne Marit Jacobsen), introspective 16 year-old Johanne (Ella Øverbye) stays in the family cabin and starts reading Janine Boissard's L'Esprit de famille. She quickly becomes hooked by the story about a teenager falling for her fortysomething married uncle and dreams of experiencing that same sense of dangerous passion.

A talented dancer, Johanne has decided not to train for the stage because she has read that ballet should be banned for reinforcing outdated gender attitudes. Her friends worry that she has become very insular, but she is quite content because she has fallen for her new French and Norwegian teacher, Johanna (Selome Emnetu). Delighting being in her presence in the classroom, Johanne begins following Johanna around the school to bump into her. When not obsessing about what she eats for breakfast, she starts wearing clothes she thinks her teacher will notice and ensures she's always responsive in class.

Following an interrupted dream, Johanne reaches the conclusion that she has fallen in love and can feel Johanna's presence inside her body. She is mortified when other girls discover Johanna's love of knitting and buy her a scarf for her birthday. When her mother is too busy to teach her to knit and she fails to pluck up the courage to speak to Johanna outside the staffroom, Johanne takes a sulky week off school. Convinced she had to tell the teacher about her feelings, she finds her building and stands sobbing on the doorstep in order to receive a sympathetic welcome.

Up to this point, Johanne has narrated over action that chimes in with her description. After a long fade to black, she informs us that a year has passed and that she has written a 95-page account of the romance with Johanna. She shows it to her grandmother, who is a published poet and understands that Johanne wanted to preserve the feelings before they began to diminish. Initially, Karin wonders whether Johanne wants to publish the manuscript. But she insists on showing it to Kristen, who immediately leaps to the conclusion that this is an attempt to rationalise an underage assault by an exploitative older woman. Karin reminds her that they have no guarantee what, if anything, is true about the story and urges her daughter to show caution before bringing it to the attention of the authorities.

Johanne had made Karin promise not to let Kristen keep the printed copy of the text - and a freeze frame highlights the moment she betrayed her granddaughter, who has told her that she hasn't seen Johanna since they broke up and she left the school. As Kristen reads in bed, Johanne describes how she had chickened out of professing her love on the first night and had exaggerated a few problems with her classmates so that Johanna would feel sorry for her. She had asked if she would teach her to knit and a montage shows them trying on sweaters, as Johanne avers that such intimacies confirmed her suspicion that Johanna had feelings for her (even though we never hear her say anything of the sort). The clincher was the fact that she wound a scarf around her neck in the same way that the uncle had done with his niece in Boissard's book.

The text contains Johanne's recollections of her walk from the dance studio to the affluent part of town, where Johanna was living in an apartment belonging to a friend she didn't want to discuss. Excited by each contrasting neighbourhood, Johanne began to take in the world around her in a way she hadn't before and the puts this social maturity down to Johanna's influence (again, even though the visuals offer no evidence to support her claim).

On a woodland walk, Kristen tells Karin that she no longer feels that Johanna took advantage of her daughter. Indeed, she thinks Johanne has written a beautiful feminist text and is all in favour of it being published. When Karin notes how she has changed her tune, Kristen recalls how her mother had never allowed her to enjoy things as a girl because she was such a relict of the 1960s barricades. They argue over whether Flashdance (1983) is a hymn to empowerment or male-gazing trash, with Kristen despairing of Karin's tendency to condemn anything she values.

At home that night, Kristen tells Johanne that she's read the manuscript and asks how she's doing. The teenager apologises for lying about dance classes and describes how close she had felt to Johanna during their penultimate meeting. She had tried to linger because she felt so at home, but had been coaxed into leaving and she bombarded her teacher with texts over the next couple of days, when she was off sick. After having been under the weather herself, Johanne had messaged Johanna to see how she was doing and was put out by a photo she sent of her shopping with a friend. Fearing the worst, Johanne had paid a call and had been surprised by how different the décor looked. She was also put out by the lack of eye contact and the fact that Johanna is visited by another former pupil, Frøydis (Ingrid Giæver), who jokes that Johanne is now a member of a very big club.

Devastated by the words, Johanne had run away with a feeling of emptiness. But she had come to terms with the parting and had written her account. Karin agrees that Kristen should show it to her publisher, Anne (Andrine Sæther), who is deeply impressed by the simplicity and poignancy of the writing. When Karin and Kristen discuss the prospect of publishing with Johanne, she is surprised by her mother being in favour, while her grandmother urges caution (perhaps out of writer's envy as much as grandmaternal concern). As she sees the book as a pioneering `coming out' story, Kristen is hurt when Karin accuses her of putting Johanne's secret life on display for financial gain and all she can think of is wanting to get back together with Johanna.

She re-reads the text before deciding to send it to Johanna as a courtesy. When Karin meets her, she asks if they plan to take action against her or the school for what Johanne has written. She insists she had no idea about the girl's feelings and denies that anything sexual ever happened between them, despite the graphic depictions and intimate descriptions of her body. Karin is shocked by Johanna's suggestion that the manuscript reflects Johanne's obsession rather than a real relationship, as she makes no attempt to despitc her as a person - just as an object of devotion. They are interrupted by the arrival of Johanna's friend and they leave together, as Johanne curses her in voiceover for refusing to accept the truth and for denying that what they had had together was unique and special. She also accuses her of being deluded if she thinks everyone desires her, as she's a no one.

Johanne feels sorry for Karin because she is lonely and wants one last encounter with another body. We see her in a dream reverie pushing her way through the people on Jacob's Ladder (which is actually a steep staircase in Oslo). This is presumably told to

psychiatrist (Lars Jacob Holm), who isn't sure why Johanne has consulted him after she's had a book published to modest acclaim and has moved on emotionally with her new boyfriend. She reveals that Johanna has married. As she leaves, Johanne realises she's left the troll memory stick containing her book on her chair. But she bumps into Frøydis, who has clearly been visiting a therapist on the same floor and seems not to have read the book. They agree to go for a coffee, with Johanne having seemingly forgotten that she had arranged to meet her chap.

Typifying the sly wit that marbles this enticing queer coming-of-age saga, the ending leaves one wondering what lies in store in Sex and Love. Moreover, it will leave many keen to catch up with Haugerud's earlier works. However, it's easier to get hold of the Norwegian's novels than it is to find the aforementioned school titles or the unrelated I Belong (2012) and The Light From the Chocolate Factory (2020) on rentable disc. This sums up the plight of the cinéaste in the UK. Unless you patronise festivals or have subscriptions to half-a-dozen streaming sites, you're jiggered.

Echoes of Sacha Guitry's The Story of a Cheat (1936) reverberate around the opening segment, which is heavily narrated by a character whose unreliability remains intact to the end. Such ambiguity adds to the tease factor of the story, which keeps rattling the cages of the prudish and frustrating the prurient without actually giving much away. Haugerud and the splendid cast play the show and tell game with deft skill, so that it's near impossible to know where (if anywhere) the audiovisual components align. Much of the mystery is attributable to Ella Øverbye's poker face, as she eschews the clues that might enable to viewer to gauge her emotions and whether she is recording melancholic fact or merely pastiching Boissard. But Selome Emnetu does an equally good job in remaining non-commital (in spite of largely being seen from Johanne's perspective), while Anne Marit Jacobsen and Ane Dahl Torp amuse in wavering between being laissez and protective, while also letting slip the odd hint of vicarious envy. Only the café scene between Johanna and Kristen rings untrue, as it has too many bases to cover in a short time.

Such is the subtitled torrent that only speed readers will be able to pick up much on the visual style. However, Cecilie Semec's camera is very much at the disposal of the central conceit, as it provides inscrutable (and occasionally ironic) counterpoints to the voiceover. It also offers some evocative views of frosty forests and neon-lit neighbourboods, while the long shot of the glowing Jacob's ladder is very striking. As is Anna Berg's score, which passes from subtle murmurs to romantic swells in echoing the shifting intensity and irrationality of Johanne's infatuation.

As this is the first part we have been shown of the trilogy, it's impossible to judge it as part of a whole. With the exception of the psychiatrist and the boyfriend in the final reel, it's a man-free zone, which raises interesting questions about Haugerud's gaze. Noticeably, he avoids any depictions of the book's supposedly graphically described sex scenes, with the raciest sequence being a montage of Johanne and Johanna trying on sweaters. But, as a man looking in on a woman's world, his shrewd insights into first love, parenting, student-teacher bonds, literary convention in the age of autofiction, sexual fluidity, wokeness, and generational divides and power dynamics seem to be, compassionately acerbic, deceptively forthright, and nonjudgementally restrained. It remains to be seen what's in store in the companion pieces, however, and whether this Oslo trilogy can match Joachim Trier's Reprise (2006), Oslo, August 31st (2011), and The Worst Person in the World (2021).

SAVAGES.

Having won an Oscar for My Life As a Courgette (2016), Swiss director Claude Barras returns with another stop-motion picture that seeks to do much more than merely entertain. Co-scripted by Catherine Paillé and developed in collaboration with Morgan Navarro and Nancy Huston, Savages is an eco parable that doubles as a denunciation of the evils of colonisation and capitalism's disregard for the natural world and the dwelling spaces and traditional lifestyles of Indigenous peoples across our fragile and recklessly endangered planet. Adults and children alike should make this priority viewing for the summer holidays.

Opening with the caption, `The world does not belong to us. We borrow it from our children,' the film introduces us to 11 year-old Kéria (Babette De Coster), who lives with her father, Mutang (Benoît Poelvoorde), on the edge of the forest on the island of Borneo. Her late conservationist mother was from the Penan people and when the pair see loggers from a palm oil plantation shoot a mother orangutan in cold blood, they have no hesitation in rescuing its baby. He is named `Oshi' after he sneezes while being bottle fed.

Kéria dotes on the ape and is put out when her grandfather, Along Sela (Pierre-Isaïe Duc), billets her cousin Selaï (Martin Verset) on them because it has become too dangerous in the forest. Hurt by Kéria's cold reception and the racist teasing of her school friends, Selaï decides to run away and takes Oshi with him. Kéria rushes into the forest after them, but quickly gets lost and is frightened because she can't get a signal on her phone.

Selaï is amused by her fear, but promises to get the out of the forest. However, an angry bear blocks their first shortcut across a slippery river bridge and they have to camp out for the night. Oshi is hungry, as he is too small to eat fruit and Kéria is worried about him. She laughs when Selaï builds a wooden sleeping canopy and it collapses as soon as he lies on it. But she is glad not to have to sleep on the ground, as it is crawling with insects. As darkness falls, Selaï tells Kéria about Tepun, the shape-shifting spirit of the forest, and she reveals that her mother was killed by a panther, when they see one prowling on the opposite bank. He lights a fire to keep the animals away, but Oshi is bitten by a snake and they have to make a dash for the village to get the antidote.

They are found by Jeanne (Laetitia Dosch), a biologist who had known Kéria's mother and now lives in the Penan village. They return in time to see Selaï's mother urinate on a wad of banknotes being offered by an agent from the plantation, who tries to explain that the company will civilise them and provide them with ID, jobs, and all the mod cons. This amuses Selaï, who is proud of his mother's refusal to compromise her people's existence.

Grandmother heals Oshi, who wakes to discover he likes the leeches being eaten by another monkey. But he still suckles a nursing mother, who presses him close to her baby. Jeanne explains that she had come to Borneo from Oxford and had been taught the ways of the forest by Kéria's mother. Grandfather takes them hunting for supper and, when Kéria follows Oshi through a waterfall cave, Along Sela informs her that she had been to the village as a child and revives her name of Do Bilung (`panther woman') to ward off evil spirits. She feels the connection to her ancestors and is sad that her father has refused to enter the forest since her mother's death.

Selaï reveals that his name is Lakei Ket and he wants to stay in the forest. But Mutang comes to collect them on his moped and Kéria accuses him of being a coward for working for the plantation when it does so much damage. When the palm oil boss returns with a female politician to tell Along Sera that his government has sold him out, Kéria uses her phone to record Green Park trucks destroying the habitat and posts the footage online, where it goes viral. Mutang is angry with her because he knows how ruthless the company can be - because he went to prison for crossing them, while his wife was not eaten by a panther, but murdered for opposing a through road. He is now scared that something similar will happen to Kéria if she angers the company suits.

This only makes her more determined and, ignoring her grandfather's insistence that violence solves nothing, Kéria tells Selaï to bring his blow pipe for a nocturnal assault on the plantation. He urges her not to try and cause an explosion and Kéria is thrown into the water by the force of the blast. Oshi can't help her, but the bear lumbers out of the forest to pluck her back on to dry land, where it shapeshifts into the form of a clouded panther, who stands over her while she recovers and watches Oshi run to an orangutan mother and baby to join their family.

As the story ends, Kéria hears on her phone that so many people saw her footage that a huge protest march has been planned to lobby the authorities to think again. This is clearly the moral of the tale and the message that people power alone can confound the conglomerates who put profit above everything is always worth making. Hopefully, lots of youngsters will be inspired by Kéria's example, although one has to wonder how many are going to cope with what will probably be their first experience of subtitles.

The claymation characters are bound to appeal, however, as Barras and chief animator Antony Elworthy have resisted the temptation of anthropomorphising Oshi. Barras has also left the passages of Penan dialogue untranslated to reinforce the sense of otherness that is established without romanticising the simplicity of village life or the sagacity of the sustainable relationship with Nature. The forest backdrops is also presented as a place of both beauty and brutality, as Barras deftly explains the food chain in showing how inter-dependent the species are within their eco system.

More might have been made of the mythology surrounding Tepun and the uses to which the palm oil is put to drive home to youthful viewers that everyday items they take for granted come at a cost. But Barras and his cohorts avoid preaching. Indeed, there are some deft moments of humour, such as Along Sala's phone having `The Eye of the Tiger' as its ringtone. This is one of the choice aspects of Charles de Ville's atmospheric sound design, which contrasts the natural noises of the forest with the mechanised cacophony created by the company's vehicles and power tools. But it's essential that the voices of ordinary people can be heard above the roar of destruction, as the fate of future generations depends upon it.