Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
Exotic, beautiful fable from Korea
Kim Ki-duk, known here for the symbolic-fishhook stomach-flipper THE ISLE, grabs this ironic disconnect with both hands in SPRING, SUMMER, FALL, WINTER . . . AND SPRING, and ends up with a meta-Buddhist fable, entirely concerned with the quotidian of work and human vice, and in total thrall to the philosophy's poetic juxtapositions. All the same, this utterly lovely film hard-sells an audiovisual ideal of meditational tranquility that could produce some converts as well as tourists to Kyungsang; the hackles of the devout might also stiffen once they learn that Kim invented most of the rituals and totems himself. (He was, he says, raised as a Christian.) Like THE ISLE, the film focuses entirely on a shelter floating on a lake—in this case, a hermitage on man-made Jusan Pond, surrounded by lush woodland. The shrine is inhabited by a wizened monk (Oh Young-soo) and his grade-school-age protégé (Kim Jong-ho); with each of the five seasonal chapters, anywhere between 10 to 15 years pass. The arc belongs to the boy (embodied in the last, grown-up chapters by the director himself), for whom everything turns out to be a koan-esque metaphor for human folly and life's resulting tribulations. After the tyke impishly tortures small forest creatures by tying stones to them, his mentor ties a rock to the boy's torso, a physical trial that recurs and, as in DOGVILLE's penultimate affront, suggests both self-destructive burden and entrapment. As the years pass, the ordeals escalate, but neither the old man nor the filmmaker passes judgment. (Michael Atkinson, The Village Voice)
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
Free show!
Sponsored by The Colorado Daily and The Performing Arts and Cultural Enrichment Fee
Wed September 8, 2004, 7:00 & 9:00, Muenzinger Auditorium
Korea, 2003, in Korean with English subtitles, color, 103 min., Rated R. • official site
Tickets
10 films for $60 with punch card
$9 general admission.
$7 w/UCB student ID,
$7 for senior citizens
$1 discount to anyone with a bike helmet
Free on your birthday! CU Cinema Studies students get in free.
Parking
Pay lot 360 (now only $1/hour!), across from the buffalo statue and next to the
Duane Physics tower, is closest to Muenzinger. Free parking can be found after 5pm at the meters
along Colorado Ave east of Folsom stadium and along University Ave west of Macky.
RTD Bus
Park elsewhere and catch the HOP to campus
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First Person Cinema
(Originally called The Experimental Cinema Group)
Established 1955 by Carla Selby, Gladney Oakley, Bruce Conner and Stan Brakhage.
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(AKA The Rocky Mountain Film Center)
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Celebrating Stan
Created by Suranjan Ganguly in 2003.
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Established 2017 by Chair Ernesto Acevedo-Muñoz.