Alternate Best Actor 2000: Sol Kyung-gu in Peppermint Candy

Sol Kyung-gu did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Kim Yong-ho in Peppermint Candy.

 

Peppermint Candy opens with a man committing suicide via train, and flashbacks to show the episodes that brought him to this place.

Sol Kyung-gu so far has lead three films that I've seen and two of those three I found almost intolerable in their overall approach. THANKFULLY, Peppermint Candy doesn't fall into that for me, not that I love this film or even like it exactly, but even with its subject matter I found the whole film far less unpleasant than the severely misguided Oasis and Hope. Although to be fair, as much as I disliked those films, I liked Sol in both films despite that. He was never the problem, and that is abundantly clear from the opening scene of this film, that I must contend actually is quite striking on its own. This as Sol's Kim wanders about a gathering of old schoolmates having a reunion. Sol is quite fantastic in this scene in portraying in his face this man who has so much more on his mind than anything related to meeting old friends. There is just a seething depression within him and a palatable pain that you can sense even as he isn't exactly opening up to these people. That is what makes the scene so remarkable actually is that Sol shows the attempted internalization, that given the severity of the condition of his depression it is still noticeable. Even when he tries to act happy, by singing karaoke any smiles are these forced upon puppet motions of his mouth, and nothing genuine can be seen. Sol is excellent in the moments of the random outbursts, as he presents them as basically leaks from his dam of trying to internalize the despair. These outbursts being he most genuine truth of the man. This leading to when he suddenly is upon a train track waiting for his demise, Sol quite effectively drops all pretenses giving a powerful portrayal of the insanity of the man as he screams to be taken back. Sol in this moments showing a man with nothing left but his demons that he's yelling towards the world in some final act of futility. 

That opening scene is great, and from that I thought this might be among director Chang-dong Lee's superior works like Burning and Poetry, however the film then falls into a little bit of a repetitious state for the first two flashbacks. This as the first we see him attempting suicide with a gun and failing, while leaving in a state of destitution. To Sol's credit his performance is effective in portraying in a way a variation in the depression. This as he's not quite at the end that we see in the opening, and in a way he denotes this by making it more expression. This as Sol almost showing the man's anguish as still a cry for help, albeit futile, rather than his final state where his fatal purpose has realized itself within his more internalized state. We do have a slightly different moment thrown in where Kim is brought to his hospitalized and in a severe state old crush by her husband. We get a little bit of tenderness from Sol as he offers Peppermint candy. Although the scene overall didn't quite come together for me, Sol's performance is affecting in showing the man putting aside his own despair for a moment in order to try to provide comfort to another. His eyes still reflecting his own pain, but at the same time there is that attempt at tenderness. We follow that again through a different depressing scene of an earlier past where Kim is in a failing marriage defined by adultery. Although one instantly can question Lee's choice for misery upon misery, Sol's performance does deliver once again. This however in another alternative state of depression that he vividly realizes. This more so now a man in denial of it. This as he wears a face of contentment but his internalized manner suggests otherwise. A particularly potent moment being when he randomly says that life is good essentially. His delivery being forced and labored, and most of all with this intention of emphasizing the idea in his own mind, when the opposite is the truth. 

What proceeds then is largely Lee depicting more brutalities of life as we flashback to Kim's further time as a police officer which mostly involves brutalizing suspects, mixed in with further circumstances of the failures of his romantic life. These segments though do at least allow for us to see Sol's performance that has an understanding for his character. We see the less jaded man, though still in a perpetual state of not quite being able to achieve happiness. Sol is effective though in playing with kind of the weight of his life in these scenes a bit. This showing a bit more overt anguish at some of the brutalities he deals with, and a greater passion of the moments that border on potentially a better life for himself. Still negativity seems to intercede at every point, until we flashback again to his time as a soldier, where again his life seems defined by unpleasantness. Sol again though does impressively show a troubled, but less jaded man. This in reflecting how scared he is in the situation, and his lack of conviction in the violence involved. A situation that ends in a tragic point, but at this point in the film, one can't help but almost roll their eyes by how much you feel Lee's going for the most obvious of manipulations. Which, actually even that scene might've worked if the execution of it didn't feel so melodramatic in terms of the method in which the tragedy occurs. We only find contentment in the man as he is a realized student, and Sol's performance is impressive in showing the weightless man compared to the deeply troubled soul of the first scene. I wish though I cared as we find that Lee wants to make that unbelievably original point that it "was the system man!". Which honestly I'd be fine with if this whole thing felt more honest. The film though I feel struggles to escape the artifice of the presentation, in part because of how unrelenting it is in making its fairly obvious point. That theme, even the structure, and even with the exact same opening scene, which would be an amazing short film on its own, this could've been something special as film. Lee's choices in his writing though always feel contrived to create the situation, rather make it seem a natural reflection of life and in turn the power of the scenario is lost. Having said that, Sol's performance is one element that felt genuine in the film. While he seems trapped in the scenario, Sol's performance does create something remarkably in revealing a man mentally wasting away in reverse.