The Personal is the Political
Ah, taxis. We’ve all taken them. Sometimes Robert De Niro is even driving one. I think, haven’t actually seen that film. I know I know, I’m the worst. I apologise.
But sometimes, it’s the face of Korean cinema, the inimitable Song Kang-ho, who is in the driver’s seat. And he’s unwittingly driving a German reporter with no Korean skills into a civil war zone. Which actually is the worst. A Taxi Driver is a 2017 film telling the true story of how German journalist Jürgen Hintzpeter managed to get inside a blockaded Gwangju, in the South of Korea, in order to document the uprising and government massacre that was taking place there. He did it by literally ordering a cab there, with Song playing said cabbie, initially unbothered by politics but ultimately deeply moved by what he witnesses.
This film is an absolutely classic case of a story that sounds made up for a movie being more or less completely accurate, and it knows it. There are multiple elements of the underdog story in our main character Kim Man-seob: he is strapped for cash but kind to customers, is widowed with a young daughter (dead wife for growth strikes again), and is generally a mellow yet plucky optimist. It’s not difficult to map out a narrative in your head when watching this that will involve this character finding some deeper meaning and reward in his life. Even the music ushers us in this direction: at the start, the score is light and bouncy, the stuff of comedy or romance.
But, of course, this is not the ultimate direction of the story. The central narrative of the film is Kim stealing a customer whom he’d heard a fellow driver bragging about, and that customer turning out to be Hintzpeter, the journalist who played perhaps the biggest role in getting the news of the Gwangju uprising out of a suppressed Korea. In terms of the actual plot of the movie, this is sewn up amongst again, a fairly standard odd couple storyline. Hintzpeter and Kim initially cannot communicate, with the former being irritated by the latter’s ignorance and the latter wondering what’s making his customer be so prickly. This narrative too, is an easy one to trace. I could tell you as soon as they met that they would form a profound bound by the end of the film, because it was using all the tropes of this narrative. It was obvious, it was clear to see.
The question of this use of predictable tropes being a good or bad thing is an interesting one, especially in light of the very true story that they are surrounding. Whilst I could explain the details of the plot more fully (here’s a whistle-stop tour: they get to Gwangju, both realise how awful the situation is, bond helping local residents in their fight, eventually escape in nail-biting chase scene, and the news gets out), I think the focus should instead be on the real history it is telling. Much like the events depicted in 1987: When The Day Comes (also released in 2017), the Gwangju uprising is a key moment in the history of South Korea’s push towards democracy.
Again, it feels like a whistle-stop tour is all I can offer as explanation, though in this case that is due to lack of expertise. Essentially, the uprising was a citizen-led response to martial law in the city of Gwangju, where student protests had been fired on by the government, and participants tortured and murdered. Reacting to this, the city fought back over a period from around the 18th to the 27th of May 1980, resulting in deaths estimated to be as high as 2,300.
The government’s excuse at the time was that the citizens were actually rioters incited by communist North Korean spies, a line common during this period to excuse any amount of torturing and disappearing that thuggish security agencies saw fit. For years, discussion of this uprising was censored or prohibited, and it is in pretty recent years that it has been an accepted truth for the Korean government that it happened as the victims told it.
To say this event is an important historical moment for Koreans is therefore, just a slight understatement. It is one of the key catalysts, along with the events of 1987, for the change of South Korea from military dictatorship to democracy. Thus, its depiction in this film is necessarily something that had to be handled with extreme care, bringing back the question of what good the Hollywood-esque framing of this film brings to it. Setting up a comic underdog, and then an odd-couple storyline, brings in certain expectations that do have to be met within the confines of the drama. The underdog must get his victory, and the odd couple must come to care for each other. Is it comfortable to fit these story beats into such a sensitive true story?
The answer will depend on your own personal preferences, but for me, I feel that they did ultimately work in the film’s favour. Much as, at times, I did feel that the focus of the film was perhaps too much on Kim, an outsider to the events of Gwangju even if he is Korean, I could see the reasoning why. If you want to tell a difficult story, you need an anchor of some kind. And having Song Kang-ho, one of the most skilfully expressive actors alive, as that anchor, is no bad thing. In opposition to 1987, where the baton was passed between several key characters, here it remains squarely in Song’s hands. The strength in his performance, his ability to show his character’s slow realisation of what is going on and what that means for his own purpose in life, is masterful. In lesser hands, it might have been a weak choice to put the focus here, but with Song, there is enough talent to override that.
This film does also manage to do due diligence with regard to showing the events that took place, and their impact. We see riots, we see thugs threatening murder, we see rows of coffins in an overflowing hospital, and we see soldiers killing civilians en masse. Some critics described some of these moments as overly melodramatic in how they were played, with slow motion and swirling violins aplenty. I can see that argument, and how an approach like the documentary style of Paul Greengrass’ Bloody Sunday might have been more impactful, but I don’t feel that strays too far in this regard. Also, melodrama is used to highlight and demonstrate strong emotions, which are undoubtedly present here. For many people, the added touches will mirror their own emotional responses, not manipulate it.
A Korean political drama wrapped up in a Hollywood bow does not stop this film being honest—the murders really did happen, Hintzpeter really was a lead figure in getting out news which otherwise may not have been known—but rather, it gives it a neatness and drive. If the story itself is compelling enough for you, you might find the other elements of this film off-putting, though Song Kang-ho’s presence does enough to combat most of this.
A Taxi Driver is not the only piece of art that there has ever been about Gwangju, and many more will come. One example I’ve experienced is Han Kang’s phenomenal book Human Acts if anyone wants their soul destroyed and their eyes opened. Up to you. The film’s framing is often generic, in that it fits to certain genres, but it does also do the work to show the spirit, horror and impact of this massacre of civilians. With its western character in the German journalist, this film seems to have an eye turned to non-Koreans who might not know anything about this story. I think, ultimately, this is who A Taxi Driver may serve the best. Those who don’t know this story will be reeled in, charmed by Song Kang-ho, and left with a solid introduction to one of the darkest moments of modern South Korea’s past.
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