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Reviewed by Elliot V. Kotek
(June 2011, screening at the 2011 Los Angeles Film Festival)

Directed by: Kelvin Kyung Kun Park

With the grind of metal and arbitrary piano keystrokes, we’re thrust into an experimental amalgam of sound and color to accompany the recollection of a dream that could easily be interpreted as a nightmare within Cronenberg’s “Crash.” From this esoteric opening, we’re off to the streets of Korea, escorted by weird sounds, industrial noise and classical violin, and with the medley of music and moving images, we come to realize the nature of the movie, a strange collection of transitioning parts, of daily motion and ritual, an artistic exploration of the mundane exigencies of daily life within Cheonggyecheon’s metal-working classes.

A poetic narration personalizes the piece, which is billed as a letter to director Kelvin Kyung Kun Park’s dead grandfather. What unfolds is a collection of unexplained references to the industrial history of the region and the philosophical and spiritual utility of iron (used, historically, in swords and other instruments). The maze of industrial buzz is contrasted with the stark technological and technical advancements that have led to the homogenization of family metal businesses, and it is this revelation of the morphing cultural and commercial landscape that protects the film’s oddities from dissolving into a mere artistic malaise about a city’s manufacturers.

The mix of images (shot in an outdated 4:3 format) — of people walking through narrow alleys, of workers belting and melting out a range of seemingly random products, of advertisements for iron-casting companies, and of spiritual ceremonies and a metal-eating Godzilla-esque bug — imbues the piece with the suitable aura of a strange karaoke video.

A poetic time capsule capturing the fading essence of an iron-fueled town, “Cheonggyecheon Medley” offers much upon which the viewer is able to chew, most of it tubular and not all of it digestible. Unlike “Manufactured Landscapes,” in which the aesthetic beauty of the repetitive strains of industry are presented as redefined horizons, in Park’s box of images that is “Cheonggyecheon Medley: A Dream of Iron,” we’re not sure what we’re watching and yet we can’t look away.

Photo courtesy the Los Angeles Film Festival