Blessings #27

Norah Jones - Little Broken Hearts (2012)

Smoke on the water in the early morning chill as you crunch through the snow. Ears covered, clouds of hot breath washing across your face, you turn and keep walking up the trail. Away from the engine noise and civilized expectations, the quiet of higher altitude promises a different kind of reward. Soon, all you can hear is your own footsteps and when you stop, nothing. Perhaps there's a momentary twitter from a morning lark or the pat of scampering field mice searching for fresh gifts the night left behind. Like a scent of a lover hovering long after she's gone. A candle whose wick has been extinguished but the therapy of aroma that continues to climb into your nostrils. Ah, it's a good time to stop and watch because the sun is coming over the hill and the warmth on your face is one of the happiest feelings alive. Wait, hold the light upon your face until the blood slows in your cheeks and the cold is driven out of your skin. Her voice comes to you then, a pleasant blessing that has become a beautiful memory each time it falls into your ears. You realize that she's coming, riding on the wind that is waiting behind the hill. You open your eyes and look for her face in the clouds. Yesterday, tomorrow, this afternoon. All the time that holds you in sway belongs in her voice and the dream that kept you awake through the night passes like an owl with prey in its mouth.

Mother - Joon-ho Bong (2009)

A mother will do anything to protect her son. This should be the tagline for this movie. After her mentally disabled son is arrested for murder, a woman goes to great lengths to find the real killer. She's convinced that the police simply arrested her son because he was an easy target and coerced a confession out of him. The boy has trouble remembering what happened that evening but further investigations, though initially promising, only lead to dead ends. After teaming up with a young man acquainted with her son that she despised earlier in the film, things go from bad to worse, as they discover a strange seedy history about the victim. Still no closer to the truth, her son finally remembers seeing an old man at the scene the night of the murder. But when she interrogates the man, the truth comes out and our mother can't handle it. In a deranged moment of desperation she lashes out in order to protect her son. Meanwhile, following a new lead, the police arrest a different person for the crime. The son is released and returns home to realize that everything has changed and now he must do something to protect his mother. Just like all of his other movies, Joon ho-Bong weaves an trail of intrigue and dark humor to reveal some strange nuances of the human spirit. By combining the strength of this mother's devotion to her son, along with his apparent clueless innocence, we get stuck in a wicked rat maze that warps the mind. And this makes the mad dance of the mother's silhouette at the end of the movie so damn appropriate.