Director: Celine Song | Writer: Celine Song
Starring: Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, John Magaro
The best film of the year came out last summer and has been quietly building its Oscar resume one award at a time since. Past Lives is lovely, it’s emotional, and it will stick with you in a place you didn’t know you needed filled. This film is almost indescribably good, which makes sense; it’s the feel, not the plot, that will move you and hurt you where it counts. There are a lot of great films to come out this winter, that’s for sure, but I’m willing to bet that Past Lives remains on our minds and in our hearts regardless.
When they were children, Na Young and Hae Sung were good friends and school competitors, and seemed destined to become even closer. When Na Young’s family chose to move from South Korea to Canada, she Westernized her name to Nora, and started a life there that left much of her roots behind. Years later, and now a writer in New York City, Nora reconnects with Hae Sung over social media and video calls. He has never forgotten her, although his life in South Korea is very traditional, predictable, and quite different from hers. Year later again, they finally reunite face to face, with all the lost time hanging between them, and the future undecided.
Although there are other partners and some themes questioning what will happen between two people who obviously love each other on some level, Past Lives‘ greatest feat is not giving into common story arcs, not becoming cliched, and instead opening our hearts to the possibility that life really could be this complicated and this emotional. This is just a tale, just a look at what it means to be alive, just an example of what love can do, and a reminder that our paths can go in so many directions, all but one of which we will never see. Celine Song crafts something so beautiful here, with the music and the mood, that it’s almost unbearable; you wish the characters would cry or shout or hit something, because the pressure and the melancholy is so thick you think you can’t take it. Lee & Yoo are phenomenal, every eye contact is perfect, and this film just drips with honest feeling. Past Lives is an instant classic, and should be on the short list for Best Picture; it’s that great.
My rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★