J.S.A.: Joint Security Area

Saw J.S.A.: Joint Security Area, a rather cumbersomely titled Korean mystery about a murder which happens in a border patrol station, just across the North Korean border. It seems like the perfect place to put a mystery. Two nations, one famous for its intense secrecy, but both with chips on their shoulders, telling different stories, two soldier, one per side, telling stories which differ both from each others and also from the official version of events. The severe young woman who is sent to investigate is even told explicitly in an opening scene that she is not there to solve a mystery but to tidy away inconvenient facts and drop the matter. It looks like a Rashomon retread for the first fifteen minutes or so but then, sublime revelation, we get an extended flashback which explains everything.

The main interest of the film seems to be the destructive power of even this cold war. How it destroys natural human connections and indeed even the truth. I was confused that we were let in on the secret as I think it would have been more effective if we were just left frustrated, but I think the idea is to add pathos to the underlying sad secret which is hushed up and obscured by blustering diplomats and blood-thirsty generals. It's a kind of melancholy film in the end, but in true Korean style, the tragedy is kindly presented in swooning, sorrowful tones which reassure you that, yes, this is the saddest thing you've ever seen. You may cry.

Anyway, there's many lovely symbols of hiding and obscuring. The girlfriend of one of the soldiers is interviewed just before she goes on stage to preform in a children's play, covered from head to toe in a bear costume. The investigator prefaces her climactic fact-laying-out scene with "now comes the real performance, so pay attention." We see the official version of events in flashback only to have one soldier critique how convenient it was that the Southern forces arrived "right on cue." Performance and posturing runs heavy in this film and I like that. It plays a bit redundant in a mystery, but I'm not picky. A nice little film, it's fairly heartwarming and just sad enough to make me think back on it fondly.