Films byTexts by The Day He Arrives
Article EN
7.02.2018

In The Day He Arrives, a soju-fueled cross between Last Year at Marienbad and Groundhog Day, Yoo Seongjun, a lapsed director self-exiled to the provinces, roams the streets and bars of Seoul much as X wanders the hallways and gardens of Marienbad, through an endless repetition of settings, characters, and incidents, each reiteration calling previous accounts into question. “I don’t remember a thing,” the bar owner Ye-jeon insists after Seongjun apologizes for what something he has just done, her protestation recalling A’s many disavowals of the past in Marienbad. Whose version does one trust: his, hers, neither?

FILM
The Day He Arrives
Hong Sang-soo, 2011, 79’

“Near the end of Alain Resnais’ masterpiece Muriel, a man sings a music hall chanson about time and memory that mournfully repeats the word déjà to emphasize the rue of those who “fear the future, regret the past.” He could be describing Hong Sang-soo’s aimless characters – “I have nowhe