"Extreme": Death of a Poet

"July in my hometown is the season when green grapes are ripe; there are a bunch of stories of villages hanging on the shelves, and the vines are covered with dreams of the blue sky; on the day when the white sails were floated, the sweetheart in a white gown , will come quietly to my side; I just want to brave the cold dew and pick sweet grapes for him."

This is a section of a poem titled "Green Grape" written in the harsh winter when a close comrade-in-arms died and he was thrown into prison again. This poem, which was never stained with blood or the tip of a knife, was as cool as running water, but it became the spiritual banner of the independence movement at that time. The hometown of July, for the colonial people, is already a memory that is almost forgotten.

The story begins in the year when Korea became a Japanese colony, and the protagonist is Lee Won-rok, who was still an innocent child at the time—later famous patriotic poet Lee Rook-sik. From the day he was deprived of his independence and dignity, Li Lushi devoted his entire life to the cause of restoring the motherland. In his short 40-year-old life, he was thrown into prison a total of 17 times. He died in the Japanese consulate prison in Beijing.

This is Li Lushi, an indomitable heroic warrior, that we have described in the legends of future generations, but in "Extreme" starring Jin Yongwan, what I saw was a more realistic and three-dimensional Li Lushi. With the heavy snow at the beginning of the article, when we touch him, what we can feel is not a pair of iron bones, but a lively and beating, more enthusiastic and sensitive than anyone else, so more than anyone else. Pain for the wounded heart; what we can feel is Li Lushi, not a soldier, but a poet.

Like other poets, this poet has his idealistic world. At the beginning of the film, young Li Lushi looked up at the sky full of stars and said this wish to his beloved grandfather: "I want to go to the theater with the children in the village, I want to go to the United States with my parents, I want to be with the beautiful His wife was on a cruise on the Han River."

This is the most ordinary prospect of a young man's future life, but because of the fall of the country, it has become an extravagant hope that he has not been able to reach in his life. However, because of this, this wish became the ideal that inspired Li Lushi to strive for national independence. He is always dreaming of something, whether in a ragged prison or a comfortable and well-off prison, he is always dreaming of the "North Korea of the future".

The North Korea he dreams of is when children run freely on the streets without being punished for not being able to recite Japanese; it is for him and his wife to dance in cafes; for North Koreans to travel on the Han River by boat... The dream of North Korea is that when he was there, his wish could fall on everyone, that is, everyone he hopes to "live well".

This is the emotion of a poet, who gives everything for a mirror that is painted in front of him but cannot be obtained. Where he is most idealistic is that he wants everyone to have a beautiful and happy life, including the Japanese who invade them. The first shock in Li Lushi's life was when he was studying in Japan. He saw with his own eyes a teenager who joined the Japanese police force shot and killed a North Korean. The cruel scene shocked him, but the first sentence he said The words were: "Did you see the beard he just grew? He's just a child."

He suffered from the suffering of his compatriots, and also from an ignorant teenager who went to blood and murder in the turmoil of history. At the moment when the gun was fired, he saw the destruction of two people: a body and a soul. This is the idealism of a poet, the surge of love and pity in his heart surging over national hatred, rushing to everyone. He once said: "As long as North Korea is independent, I will no longer hate Japan; as long as North Korea is independent, I will leave North Korea." He never forgot his ideal of a free life, nor for a moment gave up his love and pity for innocent people without borders. In the winter of the year his comrade died, he knelt on the snow with bare feet and confessed in despair: "I have no anger, what I burn is sadness, endless cruel sadness." Witness the unstoppable accumulation of human destruction.

Li Lushi is the best poet, but the most unqualified warrior.

Because there is no anger, he can't pick up the gun, even in the face of invaders and traitors, he can't pull the trigger. The initial kindness to humanity that spewed from the bottom of his heart was so weak and ridiculous in that dark and bloody era, because he couldn't hold the gun, failed the mission, sacrificed his comrades, and went to prison himself. However, at the end of their lives, those fighters who charged into battle told Li Lushi that it was his poems that made them survive the most difficult time. Li Lushi used his own way to maintain the last bit of strength for this dying country. .

The poet Li Lushi used his poems to inspire the people who devoted themselves to the independence movement, to shock the traitor who betrayed his conscience, and to comfort himself, who was suffering in prison, but he never felt that he was great and valuable. Deep in his heart, because of the inability to realize his ideal life, he always felt that his life had failed to accomplish nothing. When his life came to an end, he saw his childhood self crying in front of him and said, "What is this? Didn't he say he wanted to live a good life? Didn't he say he wanted to go to America with his parents? Didn't he say Do you want to play the Han River with the beautiful bride? What is this now?"

At that moment, the poet broke down. In the prison where the light penetrated, he cried and embraced his childhood phantom, the poet who has been beaten countless times without yielding, still maintains the character of a scholar in the most embarrassing prison, and eats in the most elegant way , in front of the ideal that he never realized but had collapsed, and in front of himself who once made a good wish. At the end of his life, for the first time, he showed his vulnerability without reservation. The poet died, died of physical pain caused by torture, and also died of despair given by the disillusionment of his life's ideals - he could not save North Korea, he could not save Japan, he could not wait for the day of his dreams, he could not face the promise he made self.

How to describe Li Lushi? Perhaps for this person with huge emotions, only he can explain for himself: "I can't pretend not to see when I see it, pretend not to know when I know it, pretend not to be sad when I'm sad, pretend not to be angry when I'm angry, Pretend not to suffer when you suffer, I can’t do it, I’m a poet.” However, for the poet himself, such a failed life was like a small fire, like a mark, burning on the land of his hometown , imprinted on the near future of North Korea that he cannot see. It was a life he had never felt before.

At the end of the film, the screen projected on the screen is Li Lushi's posthumous work "The Wilderness" - "After thousands of years, there will be a man riding a white horse again, let him shout in this wilderness!" - This engraving The poem on the prison wall is the last ray of hope thrown into the future by a man who has lost his spiritual support. When history finally fades away, what remains in our eyes is a poet dressed in white and riding a white horse. In his hometown in July, he was finally able to turn his ideals into daily life, such a shallow shadow.