Introduction

The biggest change to my learning in the last 6 months has been the consumption of Korean cinema. Previously I had only watched a few Korean movies over the 3+ years I had been learning. Some of these I had watched without trying to learn from them (just with friends and family) and others I had rewatched many times (like #Alive and Parasite). However, in the past year I've been calling my best friend and watching content together (predominately in Korean since we are both learners and that is how we became friends). While it started mainly with YouTube it naturally lead towards movies we were both curious about. This post discusses not only our progress in Korean using cinema but also our experiences of Korean cinema as learners and their ability to make it obvious that you are just utterly shit.

In the past 6 months I have watched 61 Korean films including 51 different Korean films and 10 rewatches (of those films). While some of these films were recommended by friends, other films were found through YouTube, Wikis, lists of critically acclaimed Korean films or whatever Netflix Korea threw at us.

The bulk of this post talks about my takeaways (language and non-language learning related) but some of it does touch upon my Korean ability and watching films impacts on that.

My Movie Process

To track movies I've watched and check where they're legally accessible, I use Letterboxd. On a movie's Letterboxd page, below the poster there is a 'Where to Watch' section. Clicking 'All Services' allows you to check different regions.

This service is powered by 'JustWatch' (as seen in the screenshot). Personally I prefer to use JustWatch through Letterboxd because the implementation is good enough and the majority of the nice features JustWatch offers are paywalled (like searching movies via production country). I am unaware of how much it is lacking in terms of pulling information from Korean sites (that host films) but for my personal use case of western services it's fine.

Naturally, due to my comprehension not being amazing, there are times where I have felt as though I've missed something significant in a film this is especially true for films that outwardly discuss larger cultural, social and political topics). This has lead me to rewatch multiple films with English subtitles. While rewatching with the aid of English doesn't lead me to truly understanding the film, I do get a better grasp of it then I would without using my NL. I am able to shake off and eliminate most misconceptions that I created when watching the film with only Korean subtitles (especially when my comprehension is lower).

While I do care about my Korean ability, at the end of the day I am not engaging with films specifically for personal language gain, even if that is a benefit received. Films tell stories that deserve to be respected past how my Korean can improve from it (just like other forms of media, human interactions and people themselves do).

Korean Ability

Overall Comprehension

In the last 6 months there has been a noticeable difference in how consuming content - particularly films - feels.

The vast majority of movies I have watched have been full freeflow, without pausing, with Korean subtitles, although as I mentioned earlier, sometimes English subtitles were used when either my friend or both of us had poor comprehension. In particular, my listening has significantly changed. While I still would never chose to watch any film without Korean subtitles, regardless of my comprehension with them being high, the improvements to my listening comprehension has enabled me to engage better with all forms of audio-based media. It has become more consistent, as though I have raised not only my A-game but my B and C game as well. Further, certain films have felt more effortless to understand (with subtitles) than they would've felt at the start of the year. Although, it would be unfair to contribute my listening gains to purely films, even if they did help.

 

Ever since I made the transition to focusing on YouTube over TV, understanding TV shows (specifically dramas) and movies has felt noticeably harder than YouTube. (It was originally easier because that was the majority of my input.)

Originally, as the majority of my audio-based input was dramas, they were easier to consume and understand than other mediums. Since I made the transition to focusing on YouTube over dramas at the end of my first year studying, understanding TV and films became noticeably harder in comparison to YouTube, livestreams, real life, etc. The gap between these mediums has felt more pronounced in the last year as more and more content outside of TV and film became easy without making massive impacts on my comprehension (with subtitles) of those two mediums. While this gap has definitely decreased in the last 6 months in terms of effort required and listening ability, because I haven't put time into acquiring the vocabulary from these mediums that I'm missing, the decrease has not been significant.

Vocabulary

Movies are the only content I consume even semi-regularly at this point at a low comprehension. For the most part, outside of films, if something is too hard I will just not consume it in Korean. That may mean finding an English alternative or waiting. However, with films I am more likely to power through and take the comprehension knock.

I have the a deep-seeded desire to watch these films, understand their stories and characters, immerse myself in their worlds - even just for a little while, and hopefully growth through them. If I am free flowing something, the time it takes me to sit down and watch is the time it would take if it was in English.

So why let something you care for sit for what could be years if the only thing stopping you from enjoying it is yourself? If I can rewatch the film at a later date, and still enjoy it - possibly even more - then why deprive myself from that experience?

I do have a few options for increasing my comprehension for these films without just using English:

• Using Kimchi Reader to identify the most common unknown words and learning them
• (Preferably after doing the first if the movie is actually hard,) Watching the movie and mining significant vocabulary (and writing down other significant words I think are worth learning)

I haven't really done these things for any movie yet. I don't want to just make movies a source of language learning. I want them to be enjoyed as films. For their stories. For the creative work and talent behind them. For the sound design and lighting and how they're shot. I care much more about enjoying a film and learning from what it has to say then learning how it is being said.

Further, I think it's worth noting how difficult the second option actually is. If something is low comprehension for me, the ability for me to make cards up to my own standard is incredibly low. I would rather just not even try because the act of trying itself requires a level of time investment I don't want to give something I don't gain anything from (enjoyment or language skills wise)

During watch parties I have never really looked up a word unless it was just staring us down. I personally don't want to be pausing, looking up and mining words while spending time with a friend, particularly when we're watching a film. When I am alone I do occasionally look up words if I'm using Kimchi Reader but even if I was encouraged to lookup words by my friend I am not going to do it because the environment isn't a quality one for learning.

Despite the fact that I haven't learnt many words through films, my understanding of the words I already know (to some degree) has increased.

Vocabulary is one of the core things keeping me from understanding movies well. It prevents me from seeing a fuller picture of what is being conveyed and portrayed.

Naturally, vocabulary has become an issue for me on multiple occasions while watching films. Sometimes this is as bad as having an unknown in every other sentence or an entire sentence fully incomprehensible due to it being full of unknowns. At worst I stop watching because the enjoyment has been ripped away from me.

Takeaways

General and Cultural Takeaways

My lack of fundamental understanding around aspects of Korean culture and history has become increasingly obvious in the last 6 months, although I have been aware of this for years. While I feel as though films can and do inform me, to some degree, of areas I lack in, I don't necessarily feel like they should inform my understanding. They allow me to feel the 'pot holes' but they do not give me the materials necessarily to fill those pot-holes in and smooth the road. Further, I feel as though they can also make you feel like you understand more than you do or possibly lead to misinterpretation. Films, regardless of if they're based on true stories or not, are regularly based on core aspects of a society to keep them grounded and allow messages to be conveyed to their intended audiences in an easy way, however, there is no guarantee that every single thing is grounded in that reality.

For instance, lots of English films from the west will have characters acting and talking in ways that is not normal within these societies but because they are portrayed as normal in the film's world, someone from outside may not realise that this behaviour differs from the norm and may not make sense to the intended western audience, however, those outside may not realise that this behaviour differs from the norm and may not make sense to the intended western audience. Characters, of all different backgrounds and age groups will talk, act and think in ways that are not representative of the group(s) they represent because there is no guarantee that the people writing them share those backgrounds. Naturally, when 'odd' behaviour is regularly shown as common and normal, letting films inform my worldview doesn't make sense.

I cannot truly figure out what is normal and what isn't when I am not deeply embedded in that culture and background. When I haven't grown up in it, understanding expected behaviours.

I don't want to be jumping to generalisations or conclusions as this will impact how I interact with and see the language, culture, society and people because it's unfair.

If I were to allow films to inform my view on Korea with no further research or background then how would I know if certain actions, behaviours, mannerisms, phrases, etc were actually normal or socially acceptable or expected? Sure, you could say there are ways to tell (these things being repeated) but tropes also exist and tropes don't have to be based off of truth. Thus, while I think films have allowed me to better understand my deficits in my cultural, societal and political understanding of Korea, I don't necessarily believe that they should inform me alone. I don't possess the knowledge of what is seen as unrealistic or realistic (in terms of behaviour) to a Korean audience so I do not have the capability to thus make judgements about how it does or doesn't reflect reality.

While consuming any type of media, it's extremely hard to not apply your pre-existing worldviews to that piece of content. (And while this is one of the things you can't take away from L2 learners, I think it applies past learning languages.) Algorithms make that much harder when you are spoon-fed content specifically to keep you consuming (which may mean that your worldviews are being reinforced even if they don't show the full picture). Naturally, as films are meant to be interpreted by the audience, your pre-existing worldviews will inform that interpretation and can easily reinforce information that isn't necessarily correct or grounded in reality.

That doesn't mean that I think there is a 'right' way to read and interpret a film. But I do think that because our experiences, worldviews, background (nationality, culture, ethnicity, etc), social and economic positions, political beliefs, etc inform our interpretations as thus naturally how I interpret a Korean film as a foreigner will be different from how various Koreans will (even if they all have different interpretations to one another) and I believe that it is important to keep that in mind. Further, I also think that naturally my interpretations are going to be different from foreigners who don't know any Korean or don't regularly interact with Korean media. That may make these interpretations more significant, not in the sense of having more valuable but rather in the sense of having more of an impact on others if I am influenced by these films. Inevitably we are all influenced by what we consume, even on the most minute levels but we also have some level of control over how we allow ourselves to be influenced.

Naturally, understanding that my interpretation of Korean cinema is going to be different to a Korean's perspective leads me to not want to allow how I see Korea, Korean culture, people, politics, society, and history to be influenced. Obviously I cannot fully stop myself from being influenced but I believe that some of it can be mitigated by critical consumption and reflection. I don't necessarily think this just applies to films either. People naturally jump to conclusions about a culture, country and its people based on limited experiences with those people (knowing one person from a certain background or interacting with a small community of those people doesn't mean you understand them all. Even if you interacted with lots of people from a community, generalising can still be harmful, especially when normalised bigotry already exists towards that group) and choosing whether we allow that to influence us is important. Obviously there is more nuance to this than I can give but personally where I am at with it in regards to Korea right now is that I don't want my experiences and media consumption to influence how I treat Korean people and their culture, language, politics, history and country. It deserves respect. It is alive. Even if its on a minute level, I do think we can do harm, and hurt more than we realise and acknowledge.

But, personally, while I do think that we can have interpretations of any film, understanding our underlying biases and experiences that draw us to that conclusion and choosing to not allow this interpretation to thus inform how I see Korea, Korean people their culture is important to me. I don't want my worldview to be shaped by misinformed, misunderstood messages that are deformed blobs of what they were meant to be. Even if it is natural and valid for us to interpret cinema, doing so in a way that doesn't harm others is also important. There are examples of this happening (in a semi-widespread way) without even taking into account language barriers. I think some of this can be mitigated by, well, understanding and comprehending what is actually being said in the film, or through reading the thoughts of the director and team behind the film, or through other peoples analysis that discuss (from an informed perspective) cultural nuances and undertones the film uses to paint its story. But even then, I would rather be left wondering about the film and what I am missing then jump to conclusions and form a perspective on Korea that is unrepresentative of the country.

Language Takeaways

Naturally, my biggest language-related take away pertains to vocabulary. Even if I understand the majority of the words in a film, and thus can understand the majority of that film on a surface level, it still poses an issue when attempting to grasp more of the film and it's story. Further, vocabulary can instantly render a an important conversation or scene incomprehensible, leaving me without a core part of its story that may fuel other areas. Vocabulary feels like a more prevalent issue with films than other audio-visual based mediums, regardless of my comprehension.

Personally, I want to savour films and enjoy them to their fullest. Especially when they're great. Films are meant to be savoured and enjoyed to their fullest. Especially when they're great.

The level of time, effort, detail, passion, creativity, love, hard work, and yes, money (even if a film's budget isn't huge it may still be a significant sum to those working on it), poured into producing films makes me want to give them as much respect as I can. I want to be able to actually appreciate what I am consuming and the people who have dedicated months if not years of their lives to a project. So for me that means actually understanding the film so that I can enjoy it even more. The more I understand, the more I truly comprehend, the better the film becomes (unless it is bad - but not an enjoyable bad - and then I just don't want to understand).

Non-Language Learning Takeaways

In the last 6 months I feel like certain parts of my media consumption has decreased quite a lot.

While I don't think we have that much control over our media consumption in terms of the fact that applications are designed and engineered to keep us using them as long and as much as possible, with no respect to us, the consumers, I do think that for whatever reason watching a couple movies a week has decreased my usage overall (not just during the few hours a week I'm occupied by films).

It feels as though films are a three course, satiating meal that leave you full and satisfied. They stop you from going and searching for something to distract you and blast your dopamine receptors for long enough to have a clear mind and start the next day off well. For a few hours I can be undistracted while still being online (and thus being undistracted at other times online, like studying, has become easier). It has become easier to write. Easier to not check *something*. Easier to breathe and remember to drink enough water. Maybe this is just the result of other life style changes that have gone unnoticed but I do think some benefits came from, or were enhanced by, watching films. Being able to reclaim just a little bit of my mind, my thoughts, my control has made me feel a bit more at peace with my existence and those around me.

Another huge personal takeaway has been that I genuinely enjoy films. Even though I obsessively watched films as a kid (mainly the same maybe 15 films hundreds of times) as I reached my teen years I stopped watching films as much as I succumbed to the depths of my bedroom, away from the television and my anxiety was unable to handle movie theatres (although I disliked them as a kid). The few times I have watched films since 2019 I have always obsessed over things like sound design, lighting and angles (not that I know anything about those topics). Watching films has frequently ignited this enjoyment and lead to finding myself entangled with other aspects of films. I do feel like cinema can make us more empathetic human beings, not just from the stories being told and their portrayal of human experiences unique from our own, but also through the ability to make us feel. I feel good when I enjoy a movie (even if I am simultaneously feeling despair from the story) and I personally find it easier to be a decent human when I am happy (although I hope to be a decent human no matter what).