Can an action movie reflect our most oppressive nightmare about the digital future?
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
The following is not so much a conventional film review, but rather a sharing of a few thoughts regarding the movie Carter.
How eagerly the internet community anticipated Carter after its frantically well-executed trailer is best demonstrated by the fact that upon its release on Netflix, interested viewers pounced on it almost instantly. As a result, countless reviews of the film were generated within mere hours.
The reviews, however, were almost entirely in unison regarding their negative opinions, and slowly the usual outbidding of one another began in the race to tear the film down. "Hasty work is never good," as the saying goes, and the same could be said about these abruptly formed judgments; sometimes it would not hurt to let an experience mature a little before processing it.
When dealing with certain works that go against filmmaking and/or audience routines, it is sometimes difficult to decide whether we are facing a valuable innovation / attempt at innovation, or cinematic charlatanism. Let us just recall the example of the Wachowski siblings’ film Speed Racer, which contemporary critics wrote off as unwatchable, confusing, and amateurish, and yet... today it has become a cult film. What happened there was simply that the filmmakers approached the cinematic adaptation of comic books with a radically new vision, using unique solutions to regenerate the visuals and sensations that appear in the visual imagination of printed comic book consumers.
I have no idea whether this will be the fate of
Carter as well; that
will become clear after some time. While watching the film, and especially
afterward, conflicting emotions swirled inside me too. Perhaps this was part
of the reason I began reading the insights of others, which gave me food for
thought. Most of the reviews, of course, only disguise themselves as
professional evaluations; the majority never stray from the subjective "I like
it / I don't like it" axis.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
I found only a single piece of writing that differed significantly from the rest and approached the film with sufficient intellect. This was the review by The Verge, which bore witness to a more thoughtful viewing of the film. This, of course, does not make the film any better or worse, but perhaps it allows it to receive fairer treatment.
Films are composed of two main elements: the story and its visual execution.
Naturally, both elements can be broken down into countless components that can
be evaluated individually, and professional (meaning critical,
film-theoretical) classifications are primarily based on the quality and
uniqueness of these components. The story part includes the plot, the temporal
structure and style of the storytelling, the development and refinement of the
characters within it, their system of relationships, etc. The visual execution
presents the events to the audience through the eyes of the director and the
cinematographer, in which the camera’s angle of view, its movement, the
framing, the lighting, and numerous other visual elements (sets, costumes,
reality-substituting virtual spectacles) play a decisive role—with particular
emphasis on editing, which largely contributes to the possibility of
interpreting what is seen. It may sound strange, but for now, I consider sound
(including speech and the musical background) to be part of the visual
execution, since in a film, these cannot exist without the spectacle.
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The cinematographer in action (The author’s screenshot from the making-of-film of "Carter" via Netflix) |
Every single one of these diverse elements serves as experimental terrain for filmmakers. The history of cinema's evolution can even be described as the history of these experiments. It is also a peculiarity of filmmaking that it lives and changes in close tandem with the possibilities provided by technology, in symbiosis with other visual genres.
Carter found itself in the crossfire of devastating opinions on both fronts. Some of the writings attacked its weak-legged story, while others targeted its cinematic visuals—often both at the same time. After a few ground-burying sentences, they then set about expanding on their reasoning in more detail, and that is when a few peculiar things occurred. Among other things, they became entangled in self-contradictions.
They attempted to briefly summarize the story they deemed weak—and it did not go very well. Of course, a convoluted plot is no guarantee of quality, but the assertion that Carter lacks an exciting backstory behind its unceasing action was spectacularly debunked. The more they delved into the questions raised by the story, the more interesting the picture that emerged.
Because what is
Carter about? Before we
speak about that, one must agree with the stipulation that it is not a
requirement for an action film to contain sophisticated drama. It does not
work to its detriment, but the film functions perfectly well without it.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
At the center of
Carter stands a single
character, the man called Carter, who knows only one thing for certain: that
he knows nothing for certain—given that he suffers from complete amnesia. The
film is like a labyrinth, and in its every corridor, Carter stumbles upon new
figures, and along with him, so do we as viewers. These figures drip
information out in trickles, the truth value of which he must judge, and from
which he must construct his identity. Since this is a spy story, the
information is inherently questionable, and the intent of manipulation can
never be ruled out anywhere. Carter simply has nothing to cling to; moreover,
in the first part of the film, he does not even have a choice, since his life
is threatened if he fails to follow the orders whispered into his ear. When he
rids himself of the bomb implanted in his body, he faces an even greater
compulsion, which is not a physical but a moral requirement. He cannot know
whether the fact that he has a family is true, but how can a father respond
when told he has 24 hours to save his sick daughter? He does what Carter does:
he pushes his doubts aside and, like a terminator, pushes toward his goal to
complete his mission. It is secondary whether the information is true or
false; certainty can wait. Because if he truly has a daughter and fails to
save her, then he himself is morally destroyed, regardless of whether he knows
who he is. If this is not a hellish enough motive for Carter's actions, then
what would be?
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
The film also outlines a fictional geopolitical playing field for the story. North and South Korea have finally made peace with each other, and by helping one another, they are trying to overcome the pandemic that has reared its head. All of this, of course, is still mostly a cat-and-mouse friendship; they always keep one eye on whether the other party is cheating. Behind the two of them emerges a large and common adversary, which is none other than the USA. Perhaps no one needs to be explained how many kinds of piquancy this setup holds in the light of the present and the past.
In Carter's game of self-identity, it is worth paying attention to the details, or reflecting back on earlier scenes in the light of later information. For example: an American commando unit bursts in on Carter at a blood-soaked scene, and naturally, they hurl questions at him in English. It is not quite as self-evident why Carter answers in English with the utmost naturalness. The internal voice control, however, speaks to him in Korean, which, in the absence of distinct regional markers, could be either North or South Korean. It is not what they claim that matters, but what Carter accepts of what he hears from them, and what he can regard as valid.
But a far more important question than these is: why is Carter almost naked in
his first scene? This is a fairly obvious parallel to birth—Carter's rebirth
without memories, his birth into a virtual field of force.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
Referring back to what was also raised in The Verge's piece, if anything is interesting in Carter, it is this game. Most of the reviews simply glossed over two moments found at the end of the film, which are actually of key importance. It appears that Carter reaches his destination and reclaims himself. It is as if he himself does not bother with the question posed to him: can he possibly know whether he received his real memories back? Seemingly, this does not even trouble him; the question haunts us instead as viewers. And this is a massive twist, because it derails the film from the tracks of action, spy, and other genre movies, suggesting that everything we saw was merely a pretext to bring this problem into focus. The film bids farewell with the question of a child (meaning the next generation): "Where are we going?"—and the closing frames answer it more than unsettlingly. That is, if we consider them a conclusion, and not merely a clever cliffhanger for the possibility of a sequel.
Therefore, if we accept that
Carter is a warning
about the most oppressive nightmare of our reality, then the film's visual
concept also gains a firmer foundation. Because from the reviews, it mostly
appears that we are just falling victim to a self-serving directorial craze
that mixes the action movie with computer games, and renders the action
ridiculous by showing a lofty disregard for the laws of physics. The result is
a nausea-inducing rush in which one feels as though they are riding a roller
coaster and a Ferris wheel at the same time. I am not claiming this is not the
case, but perhaps it is not so unintentionally. Because what is the most
oppressive nightmare of our reality? It is that virtuality devours reality,
including our personalities. Our internal voice, which was once our compass,
grows dull. Its place is taken by dictators, opinion leaders, and others
coming from the outside—who knows what they represent or from where they are
controlled—all forcing us to adapt and comply through virtual channels. We are
no longer who we are, but what they believe about us—based on our virtual
footprints. This is how we obtain jobs, friends, and lovers. In
Carter, we no longer
even know who we are, meaning who we used to be. And it seems as if it is
already irrelevant to Carter whether his reclaimed identity is reality.
Because who knows if the happy family is genuine, or just a virtually created
reality? There is a very beautiful sentence when Carter says that looking at
the scar on his hand, he hears a baby crying—as though instincts were still
faintly functioning; this is the extent to which he can rely on them.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
Viewed from this perspective,
Carter is a thought
experiment that writer-director Jung Byung-gil invites us to join.
Furthermore, he does so in the most self-evident way possible with the help of
contemporary technology: by borrowing the visual perspective of computer
games. We are used to seeing the events in a film through the eyes of the
protagonist, or through the eyes of a narrator as an outside observer.
However, we are not usually
inside the film, but
that is precisely what happens here. We do not identify with Carter, yet we do
not remain outsiders either. Instead, we run alongside him, ducking our heads
away from fists, blades, bullets, and the like; we plunge and spin, losing our
balance and regaining it to flee forward by hiding behind Carter or bypassing
him as he steadfastly carves up the opposition around us. There is one thing
we cannot escape: the continuity of what we see, since during the film’s
runtime, that is our reality, so we cannot lose sight of it for a single
moment—unless we close our eyes. This is why the effort to present the events
in a "one-take" manner makes sense for the director, meaning in an unbroken
temporal continuity, which in cinematic language means that the film cuts
should not be perceptible to the audience.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
Let us dare to extend this interpretive possibility even further: if we look
at the unceasing action from an action-movie perspective, then it makes sense
to debate how executable those stunts are in reality. But if we interpret
Carter's struggle as an allegory, then in light of the above, we can also say
that they are merely reflections of the unrealistic struggle that completely
permeates and is continuously fought in our lives—a struggle that today we
perhaps still wage for ourselves, or rather, are able to wage at all. Attacks
hit our human identity from all sides, just as they hit Carter, on land,
water, and in the air, during sleep or wakefulness. We defend and we attack,
though many times we just shoot blindly at an enemy that never runs out.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
But what is the situation with the infected individuals of the film's
pandemic, who mostly resemble zombies? Did the director jump onto the success
train of Korean zombie movies and shamelessly twist even this into the story?
I believe that is not the case. Or if it is, it is not entirely unjustifiable.
It is worth paying attention to what the zombies of
Carter can do. When
they catch the infection, they suddenly grow stronger and become extremely
aggressive, yet they perish within two weeks. If we interpret the film as a
struggle waged against virtuality, then let us just think about who the most
fearsome monsters of the internet are. The trolls, of course. Who, under the
guise of anonymity, think of themselves as very strong, and attack anyone and
anything immensely violently, in hordes. Yet for this, they always need a
pretext, scandals that flare up and then shortly subside. The zombies of
Carter are exactly like
this, and they pop up out of nowhere just as we unexpectedly find ourselves
face-to-face with them in our virtual lives.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
However, I would by no means want to overestimate
Carter. I consider it a
very exciting film, which is far from flawless. While watching it, my
attention also wandered from time to time, and just like in Jung's previous
hit film,
The Villainess, here
too I sometimes felt that he overdrives the action merely for the sake of the
spectacle, unfortunately to the detriment of the message capable of creating
genuine tension. It is a pity that he could not resist repeating certain
action scenarios, no matter how spectacular they might be (the struggles
taking place on the triple flatbeds of cars racing alongside a van wedged
between two vehicles and a train car are individually extremely clever, but
the repetition detracts from their impact). I find it true that he could have
made a much more powerful film if he had concentrated on a more thorough
unfolding of the main character’s dilemmas, especially considering that a
brilliant actor was working under his direction. For Joo Won,
Carter is
simultaneously a missed opportunity and a great adventure. Because while he
could not deliver a dramatic performance in a great film that would pose no
difficulty for him, he at least tested the playground of action-movie
blockbusters, which he visibly enjoyed. And what he displayed in the action
sequences is truly sumptuous.
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| (Author's screenshot from "Carter" via Netflix) |
. . .
SOUTH KOREA | JUNG BYUNG-GIL (정병길) | CARTER (카터) | 2022 | 134 MINUTES | COLOR | NETFLIX
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