It’s only been a few months since director Yoon Ga-eun premiered her first feature film, The World of Us, at the Berlin International Film Festival. Yet she has already established a recognizable and distinct directorial style through short works like Guest (2011) which won the Grand Prix at the 34th Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, and Sprout (2013), which won a Crystal Bear for Best Short Film in Berlin’s Generation Kplus section. All three of these works center around children, and Yoon has demonstrated an unusual talent for capturing the rhythms and emotions of childhood.
The World of Us was produced as part of a collaboration between the Korea National University of Arts (KNUA) and leading distributor CJ Entertainment. Other films produced in this program include A Girl at My Door (2014) and Collective Invention (2015).
The World of Us tells the story of a lonely 10-year-old girl named Sun who becomes friends with another girl named Jia who has just moved into her neighbourhood. They become quite close during summer vacation, but when school starts in the fall, new pressures are placed on their friendship.
You enjoyed considerable success with your short films Guest (2011) and Sprout (2013). Was it a great leap to make your first full-length feature film?
Yes, it was completely different. I had become used to making short films, but the problems you have to solve while writing a feature length screenplay are so different that it felt like I was starting from scratch. I was helped by the fact that director Lee Chang-dong is a mentor for the KNUA-CJ program under which this film was produced. So while the other directors and I were being mentored by him, I learned a lot about how a feature film works and how the characters need to be developed.
What kind of advice did Lee Chang-dong give you while you were developing the script?
I was chosen for this programme on the basis of a treatment that had a very different story, centered on school bullying. But in the end, I only kept the story’s most basic concept, and changed everything else. It was pretty much the same with the other directors, too. All throughout the process there were questions that director Lee kept asking me: “Does this make sense?” “Is it interesting?” In particular, there was one question that he asked me often, and which left a big impression on me. He said, “Do you believe in this story?”
Originally, I had included some elements that I thought would make the film more entertaining. But I realised that particularly in a story about children, the moment that it starts to feel staged or fake, the whole thing falls apart.
I’m the director of the film, but I need to believe in the story for it to work. All in all, I spent about nine months struggling with the questions he was asking me. He’s a bit frightening. It was an intense experience.
The three child actors in the leading roles were quite remarkable, especially as none of them had acted in a movie before.
How did you find them?
All three were chosen through auditions. We considered a very large number of children, either through talent agencies, acting institutes, open calls, or just through personal connections. The first stage was just for me to spend 30 minutes with each of them, one on one.
I didn’t ask them to act, but talking to them, I could get a feel for who might be appropriate for each role. In the second stage, I put them in groups of seven or eight, and asked them to do theater exercises and games while we filmed them. I also gave them a scene, and told them to act it out using their own words. They did that again for a third and fourth audition, and by then we’d made our choices. The whole process took about three months.
Their performances in the film feel very natural and convincing.
What sort of methods did you use to bring out that quality in their acting?
It was a challenge for me. First of all, we did about two months of rehearsals before shooting. Rather than make them memorise dialogue, I gave them situations. For example, “She used your pencil without asking, so you feel really angry. Tell her she should apologise.” Then, I had them act it out in their own words, like a game.
But as time went on, the situations I gave them became more closely tied to the plot of the film. Even while shooting, I never did make them read through the screenplay. Instead they would act out situations using their own words, and by then they felt familiar with it.
At times it worked well, but there were some times when I had to coach them more directly.
What other directors have influenced you as a filmmaker?
There are so many that it’s hard to choose, the Dardenne brothers, or in Korea, Lee Chang-dong, Jung Ji-woo, Kim Tae-yong. There was a time about a decade ago when I was debating whether I should continue trying to make films. Around then I saw Kore-eda Hirokazu’s Nobody Knows, and it hit me like a shock. It showed me a completely new way to make films, in terms of its approach and perspective.
I really adore his work. Every time I see a new film of his it inspires me to shoot more myself.
There’s something about his filmmaking that I really admire, and want to learn. He often depicts very painful and difficult situations, but he presents them with a kind of lightness or simplicity.
It’s something I struggle with myself. When I shoot grueling situations, my instinct is to present them in a grueling way, but I think his approach pulls you deeper into the film.
Lastly, what kind of director do you want to be in the future? The situation in Korea is not easy, is it?
It’s not an easy situation. It’s all connected with money, but it’s something I think about a lot. For this particular film, I was very happy while shooting it. We had to cope with a very low budget, but our crew and actors were all very understanding about that. I was able to tell a story that I’ve been wanting to tell for a very long time.
I don’t think it makes any sense for me to be a filmmaker, if I can’t be happy while doing it. Filmmaking is a long process, and releasing a film and getting a response from the audience is only a small part of it. So I realised that for me to be happy as a director, I need to tell the stories that I want to tell.
But I think if I enter into the mainstream commercial film industry, it’ll be a real challenge for me to do that. Whenever I meet other directors, I always ask about their experiences. I admire directors like E J-yong who are able to make both commercial features and small-scale independent films.
I think with a little encouragement, I could commit myself to shooting smaller-scale films that tell the stories I want to tell.
There ought to be ways for like-minded directors to work together and support each other. But strangely, there’s something about the situation in Korea that makes you feel small if you shoot these kind of films. When my film screened in Berlin, I met directors from other countries who also had to struggle to raise money, and would have a difficult time getting their films released in their home countries.
But they all carried a kind of pride in what they had accomplished. In Korea too, directors need to encourage each other, and feel pride in their work.