Celine Song’s Past Lives caps off a summer filled to the brim with big-budget blockbusters, by offering one of the most intense and personal releases this year. With her directional debut spanning a decades long romantic journey between its two lead stars. Following the story of Nora (Greta Lee) – a Korean-Canadian migrant, and her childhood best friend/sweetheart Hae Sung (Teo Yoo). However, their love isn’t handed to you in the generic filmmaking fashion, as Song instead explores the routes untaken, missed opportunities, the what ifs and the hardships we carry with human emotion.
The movie opens with a scene set in a New York City bar. We hear a pair of patrons ask “Who do you think they are to each other?” as the camera slowly looms in on our two leads and a third member, Arthur (John Magaro), who occupy seats at the other end of the bar. This is the question that Song will slowly but intimately unravel throughout its 105 minute runtime.
The movie then backtracks 24 years earlier to Seoul, where we meet a young Nora – who at that age went by her Korean name Na Young – and Hae Sung, who at this period are played by Moon Seung-ah and Leem Seung-min respectively. The sweet naivety within the pair is realised when Nora is to emigrate to Canada with her family, thus leaving there friendship, and newly explored relationship, for futures unknown.
We then meet up with Nora and Hae Sung on two separate occasions. After a rekindled connection to each other some decade later, we further understand the routes that they took, the career paths they chose and the decisions that were made to lead us all the way back to that opening sequence in the bar, where the perspectives of each character now have a purpose.
Song’s Past Lives is a pragmatic and poignant piece that perfectly captures the poetic nature of human connection. It’s easy to go down the hokey Hollywood route, where no matter what adversities or inconveniences screenwriters throw at their characters, they’ll always find a way to make it work out, but Song’s writing always rises above that. Past Lives feels raw and every character conversation feels eerily familiar, or at the very least believable, and just when it seems like the film will tread familiar footing it’s quick to shut it down and follows a more realistic path.
There’s so much to unpack and admire from this attractive and artistic debut. From the confidence that Song brings to her screenplay, to the way every scene is so beautifully framed and feels integral and intentional. There are entire scenes where the camera just lingers on our lost lovers. No dialogue, but just the wistful glares and sly smiles these characters give that convey the emotion needed for that scene, with the charming score fazing in-and-out seemingly always at the right time.
Past Loves tells a tender tale, but it’s served to us as miserable melancholy. The first two acts offer hope and a touch of humour only for us to then be handed a real gut punch of a finale, with the final 20 minutes being so beautifully brutal, but contextually spot on as Song delivers on its final message.
A24’s latest project erupts through its visual style and the off-the-charts chemistry provided by Lee and Yoo – both of which alongside Song will look to be huge contenders for gold during the award season.
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