What kind of life does a person who has suffered a terrible wound lead? People often leap to the conclusion that those who have experienced misfortune will live out their lives trapped in the shadows of pain and sorrow. This is due to the inertia of easily judging the tragedies of others and attempting to define an individual’s present and future by a single incident. However, a wound cannot be the entirety of a person’s life.
Director Yoon Ga-eun’s third feature film, The World of Love, has drawn attention at film festivals in Korea and abroad precisely because it overturns this narrative inertia.
Following ‘The World of Us’ (2016) and ‘The House of Us’ (2019), Director Yoon, who has delicately captured the inner worlds of adolescents, completed this new work as a low-budget independent film with a net production cost of about 700,000 dollars. By gathering support from the Korean Film Council, local government film commissions, and private investments, she broke away from traditional commercial film production methods, but the weight left by the work is by no means light.
Her deep perspective was proven by a relentless streak of awards. The film swept major categories including the Director’s Award (Yoon Ga-eun) and Best New Actress Award (Seo Su-bin) at the 62nd Baeksang Arts Awards, as well as the FIPRESCI Prize at the Warsaw International Film Festival, the Golden Montgolfière at the Festival des 3 Continents in Nantes, Best Film and Best Actress at the Buil Film Awards, and key categories at the Pingyao and Hong Kong International Film Festivals.
At the opening ceremony of the 1st LA Korean Film Festival held at the Harmony Gold Preview House in LA on the 24th of last month, it was screened as the opening film, leaving a deep resonance with LA audiences.
The core reason the film received critical acclaim is that its camera focused on the daily life and choices of a high school girl carrying wounds, rather than the sexual violence incident itself. Instead of trapping the victim in a state of suffering, it portrayed her as a human being who loves, conflicts, and grows. Director Yoon underwent extensive reporting and deliberation to ensure that the story of a sexual violence survivor would not become another wound, choosing a ‘shift in perspective’ over melodrama or the re-enactment of sensational violence.
During the Q&A session following the opening film screening, Director Yoon shared the starting point of her direction, saying, “Violence and wounds were homework left unattended for a long time. Through reporting and interviews with surviving victims, I realized that ‘life after that’ is more important than the tragedy itself, and felt that we need more stories of enduring daily life amidst pain.”
The protagonist ‘Juin’ in the film is not solely immersed in sadness. Sometimes with a bold, self-centered, or impulsive attitude, she clashes with others and carves out her own way of living. As Director Yoon noted, someone who has experienced something terrible also faces their daily life while embracing their pain and moves forward.
In ‘The World of Love,’ ‘Juin’ carries the dual meaning of being both the protagonist’s name and the true subject of her own life and world. The English title, The World of Love, also captures the journey of a girl who, amidst her wounds, ultimately yearns for and seeks out love.
Following ‘Juin’s’ steps leads us to confront our society’s perspective in dealing with the pain of others. It is a moment to ponder whether we are using the excuse of comfort to reduce someone’s life to a single specific incident and obscure their possibility of building their own daily life.
Understanding a wound and defining a person by that wound are strictly different things. We must neither turn a blind eye to suffering nor explain an entire human life solely through suffering. Some cry, some laugh, and some live through the day as if nothing happened. No manner of living can be recklessly judged or interpreted by others.
The true value this film awakens is not how to erase wounds. It is the fact that even in the place swept away by tragedy, life continues, and the right to determine and lead the direction of that life belongs solely to oneself.
The only attitude we should have in the presence of someone else’s pain is to drop the arrogance of trying to define their life for them and instead show the respect of standing by their side so they can proudly stand as the subject of their own world.
When one walks through their daily life without breaking under the gaze and definitions of others, anyone finally becomes the true master of their own life and world.
