How Past Lives became one of the year’s movie sensations
Discovered at the Sundance festival last January, Celine Song’s first film has established itself over the months as one of the favorites of the awards season. A buzz that should lead him to the Oscars.
Every year the fairy tale begins again. Among the hundred films presented in January at the Sundance festival, one stands out from the crowd, becoming the darling of the event, THE film that festival-goers must have seen before leaving for New York or Los Angeles; In the months that follow, normally, the buzz will continue to grow and the film in question will end the year as a darling of award ceremonies and the top charts of specialist magazines. The refrain is known, from Sex, lies and video (Palme d’or 89, which launched the golden age indie from the 90s) to CODA (the remake of The Aries Familythe rights to which were bought at a record price by Apple and which ended up winning the Oscar for best film).
This year, the lucky person was called Past Lives. Passed after Sundance by the Berlin festival, released in June in the United States where it grossed more than 10 million dollars, this love drama by Celine Song has just arrived in French cinemas, the day after the announcement of its Golden Globe nominations. The film is cited in the best dramatic film categories (alongside such heavyweights of the year as Oppenheimer, Killers of the Flower Moon, The Area of Interest, Maestro And Anatomy of a fall), best dramatic actress for Greta Lee (best known until now for her roles in the series Russian doll And The Morning Show), best non-English language film (because more Korean is spoken there than English), as well as best screenplay and best direction for Celine Song. At the same time, since the beginning of December, Past Lives continues to appear in the lists of the best films of the year, that of Variety like that of the very respectable American Film Institute. Best film of 2023 according to the influential site Indiewirethe film is also placed in third position in the top Sight and Sound, which compiles the votes of more than 100 voters. At this stage, a wheelbarrow of nominations for the next Oscars (they will be announced at the end of January) seems assured.
Celine Song therefore finds herself competing with heavyweights like Martin Scorsese, Greta Gerwig or Christopher Nolan. Not bad for a first-time director without much experience in film and whose only Hollywood credit until then was a stint in the writing room of the Amazon series The Wheel of Time. The production and distribution company A24, which today dictates US cinema trends, chose to focus on the script of this author who had made a name for herself as a playwright. A very personal scenario, inspired by her own experience: the story, in three parts and over a period of 24 years, of the move to the United States of a Korean pre-teen, who must regretfully leave behind the boy who makes his heart beat. Having grown up, a New Yorker, a writer, and in a relationship with an American, she reconnects with this love that has never really left her thoughts, and will wonder in his company if they haven’t missed the point. great story of their life.
Our review of Past Lives
Sociologically, Past Lives offers a sort of echo to the recent Minari by Lee Isaac Chung, another A24 production, another semi-autobiographical story, which recounted the installation of a family of Korean immigrants in rural Arkansas in the 1980s. But where Minari conformed to ultimately quite classic patterns of initiatory story and discovery of the American promised land, Past Lives brilliantly renews certain clichés of the romantic film, reinventing the antediluvian menage a trois in the era of new masculinities, the demystification of the couple and love, and long-distance video conversations with faulty Internet connections and pixelated faces.
Many critics have highlighted the probable influence on the film of the trilogy of Before (Sunrise, Sunset, Midnight) by Richard Linklater. We can also think of In the mood for love, for this taste for whispered secrets and this questioning of missed opportunities. In the film, Celine Song quotes Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, another love film lost in temporal twists and regrets. For the next one, titled The Materialists and again produced by A24, she says she wants to be inspired by the cinema of James L. Brooks. Brooks, who, by the way, is part of the short list directors whose very first feature film (in this case, Tender Passionsin 1983) won the Oscar for best film… For Celine Song, the hope of joining this very exclusive club is now possible.
Past Lives – Our lives beforeby Celine Song, with Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, John Magaro… Currently in cinemas.
