THE BIRD WHO STOOD STILL IN THE AIR

Korea, 1999, 111 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Jeon Soo- Il

The Bird Who Stood Still in the Air is a film about a Korean film director and lecturer. However, he is at a crisis in his life, boring his students, having an affair with one of them, alienated from wife and family, wandering idly around, drinking, wanting to make a film about birds. The film is his struggle?

However, the film is very static in its style. Apart from the film shown at the beginning with a chase sequence and some flight of birds, most of the film is done with fixed camera with an angle directing the eye from left to right. Most of the shots are between 20 and 40 seconds, meaning that the movement is within the frame and not in the film itself. Finally there is some movement and the film ends. The film gives audiences plenty of time to analyse how it is working.

1.Korea in the '90s? Culture? The collapse of culture? Film culture? East and West, films, lifestyle, music?

2.The Korean city and its atmosphere? The countryside? Music?

3.The title and its focus on birds? The symbolism of death? Flight and freedom? The birds as the symbol of Professor Kim?

4.The visual style, the static camera, movement within the frame, the long takes? The movement within the car and the bus, the chase at the end? The effect of this static film-making? Time to reflect?

5.Professor Kim, his lecture, the students sleeping, alienation from his wife, away for the month, the affair with his student, his disgust, the discussion about film-making? Student meetings? The art exhibition? The drinking, the promiscuity, helping his student edit his film and make it? Wandering the countryside? The time in the country, the young girl and her antagonism? The drive, the car crash? Seeking out the birds? His memory of the nests in the past? The aimless life, his not coming to grips with it, at the end with the birds?

6.The young student, her film-making, her affair, her moodiness, pregnancy? The ultimatum to Professor Kim? His absent wife? The professor and her concern for the students?

7.The university department, the discussions about students, curriculum? In a state of collapse?

8.The world of Korean film-making, experimental, money-making, academic?

9.A reflection on life, the Korean perspective?