Ever catch yourself sliding into hypnosis while watching a movie or show? You hook right into the rhythm, the flow of the picture and sound and suddenly you’re not just along for the ride; you’re locked into it. You’re inside it, the same way you find yourself in a dream.
This is kind of a defining feature of a lot of my favorite cinema. Twin Peaks is one of the only television shows to have ever rolled into the same territory, for me. Witness:
I’ve followed Park Chan-Wook’s career for almost fifteen years now, and I’ve come to realize that his work is always two things: terminally stylized and consistently surprising. From the dark “vengeance” trilogy to this impossibly baroque thriller, his films are unmistakably his own, yet always advancing, incorporating fresh ideas, turning into something new.
An Act of Love is a gentle midnight surprise, music as pulsing revelation birthed in the moment between waking and tumbling into dreams. It comes on ominously before dissolving into inescapable rhythm, leaving a breadcrumb trail through memory toward some warm place half-recalled.
Optimistic Underground 