Asobi Seksu in Treeless Mountains Trailer
April 23, 2009
My girlfriend has been bugging me lately to to take her to this new indie foreign film called Treeless Mountain from writer/director So Yong Kim. This Korean film follows the lives of two sisters who are sent to live with their mother goes to search for their father. Anyway, it’s just now opening in the US, and I’m sure I’ll be seeing it sometime soon. Funny thing, I have hardly seen any movies this year, but now I’m going to go to two in one week.
Despite the fact that I generally hate the tear-jerker type dramas, I have some reason for hope, and that lies in the trailer (shown below) which features the wonderful Asobi Seksu song, “Layers.” Beautiful in its understatement, “Layers” really does pile on the layers (excuse the pun) of lush keyboards and gentle vocals to create a dreamy soundscape. Singer Yuki Chikudate has one of the best voices in music today, one that will remind you of Elizabeth Fraser of Cocteau Twins or the Deheza twins from School of Seven Bells.
In the end, I know that even if the movie sucks, I can just close my eyes and hopefully zone out to what I expect to be a good soundtrack. Besides, of all the tear-jerker drama movies, the few that I like are generally foreign films, such as Life Is Beautiful. Anyway watch and listen for yourself below.
UPDATE 4/29 : Saw the movie, and it was better than expected because it was not nearly as sentimental as most of these types of movies are. I also really enjoyed the cinematography, director So Yong Kim used a lot of close ups to capture the facial expressions of the two excellent child actors, and that did more to convey the emotion of the film than the script (although I will say, I’m sure a lot of the script’s language gets lost in translation to the subtitles.) Anyway, I recommend the movie…and for you Granddaddy fans, there’s even a scene in the film where kids sing a Grandaddy tune in Korean.
