A Brighter Summer Day

As in TWIN PEAKS (1990–1991), a girl who is sleeping with everyone in town functions as a lens through which to peek below the surface of the community, but, whereas David Lynch loves Laura Palmer, here the filmmaker seems much more sympathetic towards the killer. A comparison could also be made to ADOLESCENCE (2025), which is a completely different kind of thing but features an almost identical crime: Yang is focused on helping us to perceive all the sociological factors behind the event, whereas Barantini et al. draw attention to the insufficiency of such explanations. In other words, the interest in the victim, here, seems quite superficial.

Also, it is very strange that the ultimate focus is on the consequences of one homicidal act, leading (of course) to a police investigation, interviews with suspects, arrests, a trial, imprisonment, everything you would expect from a society with a functioning legal system, but, earlier in the film, the main gang, upon whom the film is focused, commits a horrendous revenge massacre leading to the very bloody deaths of quite a few people, and the whole thing is then dropped, as if it were just some schoolyard bullying not worthy of police involvement. In short, the film possesses virtues, but questions could also be asked.