What it’s about
At a remote mountaintop retreat, an aged, ailing Zen master (Pan-Yong) shares his spiritual wisdom with a young monk (Sop) and an orphan boy (Huang) he has taken in out of kindness. The days pass slowly, but bit-by-bit, through an ascetic regimen that honors the inevitable cycle of life, death, and rebirth, the two acolytes are guided along the path of enlightenment.
Why we love it
Bae Yong-Kyun, a painter by trade from South Korea, spent years laboring over this profound film, a kind of tone poem that attempts to express what is ultimately inexpressible: the sublime nature of spirituality. In place of dialogue and narrative action, he gives us some of the richest life lessons and the most spellbinding images of nature you are likely to see in a movie. Whether you think of it as a Buddhist riddle (termed a koan), a mystical allegory, or an inner-world travelogue; if youre in the right frame of mind, you will surely be fascinated by Baes profound, visually arresting film.
Byeong-hui Yun, Hae-Jin Huang, Yi Pan-Yong, Sin-Won Sop Bae Yong-Kyun