ISLAND

I went on a research trip to Mara Island, the protagonist of my work Island, with the following question: what will happen to the boy who became the one and only student remaining at the only school on the island? While staying there I encountered a stray dog and was struck by these questions: how can there be a stray dog on this island, which is so small that one can traverse it in less than one hour? There's no way this dog could've gotten on the boat by himself. There are only around 40 residents on the island, but, curiously, most of them know the dog’s name, ‘Paldo’. Where is this dog from? On investigating the dog, I encountered some of the residents of the island: an inebriated monk who sang songs praising reeds; a lady, who lives with five little dogs, who would visit and speak to a grave every single day; and a policeman who would always wear slippers in his police office. My film, Island, aims to make the audience ask these questions: what happened to the dog, the monk, the lady and the policeman; what happened to those who seem to be the presence of the ‘island’ itself, in the sense of its place-contrasting intensity and emptiness?

The film landscape that shows both emptiness and intensity, I think, needs to be paid attention. Because that could not only emphasize to look at each character as the ‘island’ itself but also how the landscape, its environment, has affected each character’s life, being isolated in the crowd and from the societies.

I consider the writing of Emmanuel Levinas and his phenomenological account of the 'face-to-face' and the questioning of ‘Being’ within my work. In applying Levinas's insights, this film aims to look at each character as the ‘island’ itself, as the ‘Being’ that could strike and force us to question what happened to them on the island. Even though the question would not be clearly answered in the film, even though audiences would not approach some kind of truth, I think, struggling with some questions about the film characters, being curious and worried—I hope that can bring us to the place Levinas mentions as “the good” in his writing.

in a statement to PLATFORM:VB