Past Lives, the first feature from writer-director Celine Song, begins with a guessing game: There are three people sitting in a bar, drinking in the early morning. We are watching the trio from a distance, unable to hear what they are saying. Off-screen people are making up possible back stories. The two Koreans are tourists, says one of them, and the white man sitting to his left is their guide. No, answers the other, the lady and the white boy are a couple, and the Korean man is her old friend.
The camera pans to the woman sitting between these men, as the voices continue to push alternate histories back and forth. The woman, her name is Nora Moon, finally looks at the camera and gives us a Mona Lisa smile. She knows the answer, but doesn't say it. Not yet.
Director: Celine Song
Writer: Celine Song
Stars: Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, John Magaro
Perhaps, in some alternate universe or ancient timeline, these three experienced all the scenarios of the unseen patterns. Past Lives is obsessed with “In-Yun,” a Korean concept that suggests that people constantly drift in and out of each other's worlds over different centuries, different lifetimes. This gently thought-provoking and heartbreaking drama gives you the feeling that much of this has happened before and will happen again. Only the names and the results change, making the film's chronicle of what happens this time that much more poignant.
Once upon a time in Seoul, two boys, Na Young (Seung-ah Moon) and Hae Sung (Seung-min Yim), were the best of friends. However, Na's family is immigrating to Canada, so any childhood crush they harbored for each other is cut short. Twelve years later, Na now goes by the westernized name of Nora (Greta Lee) and lives in New York; Hae (Decision to Leave's Teo Yoo) is finishing his mandatory military service at home. An impromptu social media message leads the two to reconnect online, which turns into a never-ending FaceTime relationship that keeps threatening to grow deeper and more intense. It's too much for Nora, with the distance and the distraction of her burgeoning career as a writer. The communication stops. Life goes on.
A playwright by trade, Song has a talent for leaving things unsaid and letting characters express themselves through unfinished sentences, casual asides, and glances; each hesitation and pause suggests short stories in itself. You can see this middle section functioning as an act on stage, even with the intimacy of a rekindled spark of puppy love playing on computer screens. There is such a perfect and often rhythm in all of this, not to mention the joy of watching two people slowly fall in love a second time, especially when the score by Grizzly Bear members Christopher Bear and Daniel Rossen establishes the string section that faint. mostly good. However, be careful with that romantic glow you feel. It's about to get complicated.
Because when Past Lives launches you into the last part of its triptych story, another twelve years have passed and the stakes have gotten much higher. Nora is now a playwright, happily married to a writer (John Magaro) she met at a Montauk retreat. They live an ideal bohemian life on the Lower East Side. Hae is finally making good on her promise to visit New York, for a "vacation." They will be in the same city for the first time in decades, and Nora offers to act as a tour guide. Every sightseeing excursion and catch-up exchange feels charged. The feelings are not gone. Neither of them knows what will happen next.
Song not only shows off her skills as a playwright here, she also draws on autobiographical elements. Yet even if she didn't draw on her own experiences, Past Lives is one of those movies that she feels achingly personal: she's tapping into the universal sentiment of "what if."
But Past Lives is really Greta Lee's movie, and she's the one who turns Nora's reconciliation with her past into something quietly monumental. Nora doesn't feel like leaving. She also doesn't know what to make of this long unrequited romance. As a supporting actor, Lee has stolen so many scenes that she's surprised SAG hasn't busted her. It's not until you see her here that you realize no one has given her a role that takes advantage of her extraordinary range beyond the sarcastic second banana or a look of human death. She can do a lot with just the hint of a smile or an eye crinkle—the “make a move he's already a guy” look she gives Magaro to kiss her is unforgettable.
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