The recent video release of Kim Ki Duk’s “The Bow” is a mixed bag. The story revolves around the relationship between an old man and a young girl living on a recreational fishing boat. The pattern of their lives is set to a rhythm of ritual bathings, conflicts with dirty fishermen and catnaps under the sun. The old man, who has raised the girl since she was 6, marks down the days to their impending marriage. But all is disrupted when a young man draws the girl’s attention and wants to show her a world she knows little about.

There’s no doubt that Kim is an observant and intelligent filmmaker, known for writing quiet tales about human desire and redemption, and shooting them with a sharp, clear eye.

But if you’ve seen his film “Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring” or “3-Iron,” then you’ve seen “The Bow.”

Here Kim is like a director who has read too many of his own reviews and wants to live up to his own style. A situation of Kim Ki Duk doing Kim Ki Duk. All the markers are there: spare to nonexistent dialogue, lots of ritualized actions and gestures, mood shots of floating boats, final Buddhist message — all presented with the air of a hidden message.

To his credit there is always at least one scene that makes a Kim Ki Duk movie satisfying. In “Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring,” it was a man climbing up a mountain while dragging a stone-mill behind him. At the end of “3-Iron” it’s when the two lovers embrace while on a scale, and their combined weight equals zero.

In “The Bow,” it is a screen shot of the old man choking on a noose connected to the boat drifting away and carrying the girl. It’s a seminal scene to the movie, and Kim hands out that steady and exemplary pacing so characteristic of his other films. 

But it also serves as a dividing line, after which the movie falls flat. Afterward, viewers must slog through a long and arduous ending filled with symbolism and strange cultural references. The sequences are confusing and nearly ridiculous. (As fantastic as a literal climax sounds, the execution borders on the absurd.)

The ending leaves much to be desired, as it ends a film that seemed to be heading in a straight line by veering and spinning out of control. What began as a seemingly meaningful tale of desire to add to Kim’s repertoire left, well, something to be desired.

 

Here Kim is like a director who has read too many of his own reviews and wants to live up to his own style. A situation of Kim Ki Duk doing Kim Ki Duk. All the markers are there: spare to nonexistent dialogue, lots of ritualized actions and gestures, mood shots of floating boats, final Buddhist message — all presented with the air of a hidden message.