Past Lives: What might have been?

Past Lives (2023) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, and too harshly, for fleeting profanity

Available via: Amazon Prime and other streaming services

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.6.23

All of us have paths not taken — mostly insignificant, a few consequential — that prompt occasional curiosity and speculation.

 

But some folks obsess over an emotionally weighty What If, to the point that it interferes with their ability to focus on the alternative happiness that has been achieved.

 

What might they be thinking? Nora (Greta Lee), flanked by Hae Sung (Teo Yoo, left)
and Arthur (John Magaro) contemplates the life choices that have led to this moment.

Writer/director Celine Song’s gentle drama opens on a provocative tableau: three people — two men, with a woman between them — sitting quietly at one end of a bar. Two are Korean, one American. Nobody says anything; the woman’s expression changes — not quite readably — as she glances from one companion to the other. Flirty? Wary? Satisfied? Indecisive?

We hear an off-camera couple try to suss out the dynamic (a game we’ve all played, while people-watching). Who is the woman with? Are the Koreans siblings? Are the guys with each other? Is somebody being dumped?

 

Therein lies a tale…

 

We jump back 24 years, to Seoul, and meet 12-year-old chums Na Young (Moon Seung-ah) and Hae Sung (Leem Seung-min), as they head home after a day at school. She’s in tears, having come in second to Hae Sung, on a class paper. He turns this back on her, pointing out that he usually has come in second behind her, and besides; shouldn’t she be happy for his success?

 

After all, they’re inseparable besties. 

 

Even so, she aspires to greatness: She wants to win a Nobel Prize.

 

Sadly, events are about to separate them. Nora’s parents are emigrating the family to New York. Na Young will be given a new “American” name — Nora — and her sister will become Michelle.

 

But before this occurs, Na Young and Hae Sung’s mothers arrange for the two to have a “date” … perhaps more “play date,” but — as cinematographer Shabier Kirchner’s playful tableaus reveal — love clearly is in the air, at a 12-year-old level that’s deeper than a simple crush.

 

Their final parting is telling, due to the way Song and Kirchner frame the moment: After a perfunctory “Bye” from Hae Sung, Na Young charges up the steep street to her home, without looking back; he watches for a moment, before sadly heading along the level side street to his home.

 

Ambition vs. devotion.