Sat. Nov 23rd, 2024

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“Director Jun!” cries a pretty young woman. We gather she worked for him once as an actress. It’s not too clear if he remembers. She tries to engage him in conversation, but he’s evasive. He goes into an old pub for a drink, and three young film students at the next table recognize him. He joins them in getting drunk, invites them to come with him to a “special place,” and then as he’s smoking and they all light up, he abruptly screams at them to stop “copying” him. To their astonishment, he runs away.

He knocks on the door of Kyung-jin (Kim Bo-kyung), a girl he loved and left a year ago. She isn’t very happy to see him. They talk, he apologizes (not for his behavior but it seems for his very existence), and he begins to weep.

Then it is the next day, and the elements of the first day rearrange themselves. He finally meets his critic friend Young-ho (Kim Sang-joong), and they go to a bar with Bo-ram (Song Sun-mi), a friendly woman who teaches film. The bar owner is Yejeon, also played by Kim Bo-kyung. “Funny,” he thinks. “She looks just like her.” He steps out into the snow for a smoke, she follows him and …

The next day, these elements rearrange themselves again, with slight adjustments in dialogue, weather and outcome. They seem unaware that they are back in the same bar. Is this a South Korean “Groundhog Day” and will the director gain insights into his life? No, it’s not that kind of film. It’s more a compressed version of how life has a way of repeating itself, how we copy our own behavior, how coincidences happen because we make them easy, and how although some days are better and others worse, wherever you go, there you are.

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By Dave Jenks

Dave Jenks is an American novelist and Veteran of the United States Marine Corps. Between those careers, he’s worked as a deckhand, commercial fisherman, divemaster, taxi driver, construction manager, and over the road truck driver, among many other things. He now lives on a sea island, in the South Carolina Lowcountry, with his wife and youngest daughter. They also have three grown children, five grand children, three dogs and a whole flock of parakeets. Stinnett grew up in Melbourne, Florida and has also lived in the Florida Keys, the Bahamas, and Cozumel, Mexico. His next dream is to one day visit and dive Cuba.