In Front of Your Face
당신얼굴 앞에서

  • Director

  • Cast

    Lee Hyeyoung, Cho Yunhee, Kwon Haehyo, Shin Seokho, Kim Saebyeok

  • Genre

  • Release Date

    2021

  • Runtime

    85 mins

  • Cert

    15

After impetuously running off with a lover to the United States many years ago, former actress Sangok (Lee Hyeyeong, herself recently something of an absentee from the big screen) has suddenly returned to Seoul. She is staying with her sister Jeongok (Cho Yunhee), doing mindfulness exercises, and hoping to meet up with director Jaewon (Kwon Haehyo), perhaps belatedly to revive her moribund career.

          With its title referencing not just the many scenes of one-on-one dialogue, but also something hidden in plain sight, prolific writer/director Hong Sangsoo’s latest seems, with its unspoken secrets and its film-world metacommentary, to be typical of his œuvre, even as it gently subverts many of his characteristic tropes. For here, in a bar pointedly named ‘Novel’, the characters drink Chinese liquor rather than the usual soju, and the film’s grave themes are lightened by Sangok’s life-affirming laughter.