Review: Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring

Just as every action in the film has its own reaction, every image evokes the oneness of the film’s characters to their natural surroundings.

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring
Photo: Sony Pictures Classics

Kim Ki-duk’s Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring is the first of the transgressive and exceedingly prolific director’s films to get a proper U.S. release after the controversial Seom from 2000. The gorgeous setting is more or less the same, as is the tireless mode of transport, except this time there are more spiritual returns.

Somewhere in a fog-layered netherworld of sorts, a wise healer (Oh Yeong-su) teaches a young boy the ways of the Buddha. After tying rocks to a triumvirate of forest creatures, the boy is forced to carry a stone on his back and feel their burden. Every season is a new stage in the young boy’s life: “Summer” is his clumsy sexual awakening; “Fall” chronicles the residual damage of his lust; and “Winter” evokes his spiritual enlightenment.

The film unravels as a kind of Buddhist parable for children. Elementary, perhaps, but profoundly moving. By the time the second “Summer” rolls around, Kim’s overriding point—that the circle of life repeats itself—may already feel redundant to some, but the filmmaker’s reverence for silence and movement inspires as much awe as his locale.

Advertisement

Kim is a great lover of signs, and though he lays on the symbolism thick, there’s no mistaking the purity of his intent. At one point, two snakes tussle in the forest, foreshadowing the psychosexual struggle between the teenage boy and the girl who comes to be healed by his master. And in one especially ravishing shot, Kim positions the monk’s house on the lake as the world’s axis. Just as every action in Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring has its own reaction, every image evokes the oneness of the characters to their surroundings.

Score: 
 Cast: Oh Young-soo, Kim Jong-ho, Seo Jae-kyeong, Kim Young-min, Ha Yeo-jin  Director: Kim Ki-duk  Screenwriter: Kim Ki-duk  Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics  Running Time: 102 min  Rating: R  Year: 2003  Buy: Video

Ed Gonzalez

Ed Gonzalez is the co-founder of Slant Magazine. A member of the New York Film Critics Circle, his writing has appeared in The Village Voice, The Los Angeles Times, and other publications.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.