“The Decision to Leave” Uncertain memories and vision, what is the “solution” in life?

Open wounds

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Hye-jun in "The Decision to Leave" has the image of a clean-cut, normal man. He doesn't have the tough aura of detectives in movies. He is a workaholic and lives a weekend marriage where he returns to Ipo where his wife lives. He climbs to the top of a rocky mountain with his coworker. He follows the same route as the husband of the woman who fell from the top of the rocky mountain. His work policy is to take the time and effort to follow the victim's route, rather than using a helicopter or other means to get to the crime scene. Hye-jun suffers from insomnia. He says he can't sleep because he's on the stakeout, but that he is on the stakeout because he can't sleep. Park Hae-il does a great job of playing the character of Hye-jun, who is not normal at all, while still having the image of a normal man.

“Decision to Leave” © 2022 CJ ENM Co., Ltd., MOHO FILM. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Hye-jun is obsessed with the photos and data left on the smartphone. This is probably because physical records are more reliable evidence than one's own eyes or memories. Photos and audio data do not have the complex, multi-layered images that Hye-jun and So-rae have. Hye-jun may be thinking this way. In this The Game, it seems as if So-rae is deliberately providing evidence. So that Hye-jun will not lose his reason to live. The two are special soul mates, with a complementary relationship. But no piece of evidence can catch up with the woman called So-rae. The unsolved case that is her. So-rae = Tang Wei, the thief of hearts.

"The Decision to Leave" is a film about how unreliable human memory and vision are. It makes us think about what kind of state "resolution" means in life. Perhaps we just thought we had resolved it at some point. When a wound we thought we had forgotten opens up in an unexpected way, we trace our memories back to the last sensation we remember. And we think back to when we decided to break up, with the old wound still stinging.

*1 Hollywood ReporterMaking of 'Decision to Leave']

*2 Slant Magazine [Interview: Park Chan-wook on Duality and Dissonance in Decision to Leave]

Text: Daiji Miyashiro (maplecat-eve)

Movie criticism. Contributed reviews to ``Leos Carax: Movie Wanderer'', Eureka's ``Wes Anderson Special'', Real Sound, Soen, otocoto, Toshio Matsumoto Special Pamphlet, etc.

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"Decision to Leave"

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© 2022 CJ ENM Co., Ltd., MOHO FILM. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED