At its core, writer/director Lee Isaac Chung’s gentle drama is the classic saga of one man’s pursuit of the American dream.
It’s also a study of fitting in: finding peace as a family, and as immigrants coming to terms with their place in an unfamiliar land.
The setting is the 1980s. Jacob Yi (Steven Yeun) has just moved his family from California to a 50-acre plot of farmland in rural Arkansas, purchased with all the money that he made during 10 years as a chicken sexer. Mindful of the ever-increasing arrival of Korean immigrants to this part of the United States, Jacob envisions a soon-to-be-thriving business growing and selling fresh Korean fruits and vegetables.
Jacob (Steven Yeun, left) and his family — clockwise from left, grandmother Soonja
(Yuh-Jung Youn), wife Monica (Yeri Han) and their children Anne (Noel Kate Cho) and
Davis (Alan S. Kim) —contemplate the challenge of transforming native Arkansas
landscape into an operational fruit and vegetable farm.
His wife Monica (Yeri Han) thinks he has lost his mind.
Chung opens his film as Jacob slowly leads his family down a country road; Monica is behind him, driving the truck with all their belongings. Jacob turns into an open field, and parks in front of a large mobile home where they’re now to live. Monica makes no effort to conceal her dismay. Her reaction is magnified by the absence of steps leading to the front door that stands four feet above the ground: a droll touch that deftly amplifies the insanity of what Jacob has gotten them into.
(The place does have electricity, although this detail is glossed over. Chung is occasionally sloppy that way.)
Worse yet — as they discover a few days later, during a torrential rain — a mobile home isn’t the smartest dwelling in a region known for tornadoes.
This cuts to the heart of Jacob’s personality, and his determination to By God Make This Work, despite being wholly ignorant of the region and so many other things. He’s also heedless of the fact that the land’s previous tenant — presumably a better-informed local — went bankrupt trying.
Ergo, as but one example, Jacob refuses to spend money on a dowser, insisting that he can find a well on his own.
There’s a certain nobility to Jacob’s stubbornness, and Yeun exudes an aura of quiet dignity and unyielding persistence. Han’s performance, in turn, is richly nuanced: On the one hand, she admires and loves her husband, and clearly wants to have faith in his grand plan … but, on the other hand, she feels it’s foolish, reckless and possibly even hazardous to their children. She’s also anxious about their isolation, and where her own life and marriage go, moving forward.
Conversely, Jacob holds firm to the notion that ultimately their children will benefit from his dream.
Eventually. Once the dust settles.
Adolescent daughter Anne (Noel Kate Cho), blessed with the perception of children who’ve experienced parental discord, plays peacemaker when necessary; most often, she’s an obedient girl who does her best not to rock the boat. She also looks after her younger brother David (Alan S. Kim), while both Jacob and Monica toil (full time? part time?) as chicken sexers, to earn enough money to keep them going.
Ah, David.
To a great degree, he’s both focus and agent of change; much of this story is told from his point of view. He’s a fragile little boy, with a heart condition that makes strenuous effort dangerous. He’s also impish, mildly naughty and yet adorably naïve. Chung coaxes a marvelously subtle performance from Kim; he slides from funny to contrite to rebellious at the blink of an eye. We cherish his innocence.
Further amplifying the family’s remoteness, Anne and David don’t attend school; instead, they read encyclopedia volumes.
Jacob’s determination notwithstanding, he recognizes the need for help with all the physical labor. Enter Paul (Will Patton, impressively scruffy), a fervent Pentecostal in a perpetual state of repentance. The ferocity of his faith is both comical and yet oddly touching, although Jacob initially is wary of it. And yet there’s a strange, delicate beauty to Paul’s kindness to the entire family, and his willingness to help.
Patton throws himself, heart and soul, into this eccentric role; he’s quite endearing.
As Monica’s anxiety and unhappiness mount, Jacob realizes he must do something to meet her halfway. He therefore agrees to “import” her mother, Soonja (Yuh-Jung Youn), from South Korea. To David’s abject horror, this unwanted newcomer moves into his room, sleeping on the floor next to his bed.
David objects; this isn’t a “real” grandmother, because she doesn’t bake cookies, and seems less than doting. She smells weird, swears to an eye-widening degree, and likes to play Hwatu: a card game popular among older generations, which apparently demands a fair amount of cursing during play.
David and his grandmother become instant rivals, the little boy doing everything possible to somehow make her go away. And yet we immediately recognize that they’re very much alike: both feisty rebels, both physically vulnerable. They also function as the family’s symbolic bond: Soonja connects them to where they’ve come from, while David points to an uncertain future.
Youn’s Oscar-nominated performance also is richly nuanced: the epitome of an old-world grandmother very set in her ways, and a fount of the sometimes eyebrow-lifting beliefs that spring from tradition. Yet we see, from the soft center of Youn’s gaze, that Soonja loves her grandson dearly.
She brings him along while searching a nearby creek bed for the ideal spot to plant minari, the peppery Korean herb that gives this film its title. It, too, springs from tradition, as revealed in an epigram that opens this film’s press notes: “Minari grows, comes in the pockets of immigrants, dies in the first year, thrives in the second, purifies the water and the soil around it.”
Frankly, Chung should open his film with that quote; it would greatly help us understand what is to come.
Lachlan Milne’s luxurious cinematography perfectly captures the grandeur of the open fields and surrounding woods of this Ozarks landscape that so captivates Jacob; we understand his passion. Many of the exterior tableaus and establishing shots are captured during the clear, brilliant light of the region’s dusky “magic hour.”
Emile Mosseri’s lyrical score eschews the obviousness of ethnic Korean elements, instead going for the classical romanticism of Ravel and Erik Satie. The lovely result, always perfecting complementing on-screen events, also earned an Oscar nomination.
Although we’re primarily captivated by the challenge of Jacob’s vision, Chung also maintains a note of nervous apprehension throughout his film; we keep anticipating disaster around the next corner. Given today’s real-world racial tensions, that possibility also is uppermost (although Patton’s portrayal of Paul mitigates such anxiety).
All this said, and despite the excellent performances that bond us to this family unit, Minari is only 7/8 of a captivating film. We reach a point, at a climax that demands all manner of resolution … and then the credits roll. The story doesn’t conclude; it stops abruptly, bewilderingly. It feels like somebody lost the final 10 or 15 minutes.
Which is highly unsatisfying, to say the least.
Be advised.
No comments:
Post a Comment