Where the Crawdads Sing, directed by Olivia Newman, released in 2022

I recently remembered "The Glory" while watching the movie "Where the Crawdads Sing, " directed by Olivia Newman, released in 2022 on Netflix. It may be because of the similarity of the setting that a girl who was abandoned by her parents and neighbors survives.

Except for that, of course, it's a completely different story, but it seems like girls are growing up very hard. I think it would be good to watch this movie with the same start but a very different development.

"Where the Gajae Sing," a movie of the bestselling novel of the same name, did not feature a star director or actor, but it is well received through word of mouth. Liz Witherspoon, who participated in the production, may be the only person who knows the name of the film.

Delia Owens, the original author of the novel, is an ecologist who became famous for her nonfiction observations of wildlife in Africa, and at the age of seventy, she published the film's original novel and made a long-term bestseller.

Khaya, who lived with her parents and siblings in the North Carolina swamp, is abandoned by her family. Kaya remains alone in a secluded house when her mother and siblings, who could not endure her father's violence, leave the house one by one and even her father finally disappears. Kaya, who couldn't learn to write or count, digs and sells mussels in the swamp and barely eats the grass.

"Where the Gajae Sing" is a kind of legal thriller, but it's not a movie that focuses on finding the culprit. The story begins in 1969 when Kaya is named as a suspect after Andrew Chase was killed in a crash.

As a suspect of first-class murder, Kaya takes the court and a court battle comes and goes. The film is a flashback that shows Khaya's childhood and her encounters and breakups with two men that have had a decisive impact on her life.

I haven't read the original yet, but I guess it's a book full of fascinating descriptions of the wetland ecosystem that fully utilizes the author's expertise. The swamp scenery and close-ups of various animals and plants on the screen are the true beauty of this film.


Barkley Cove, North Carolina, in the 1950s and 1960s was a brutal neighborhood for abandoned kaya to live in.

People in the neighborhood treat Kaya, who is not cared for by his parents, as "under-evolved, " and at the school he visited with great determination, children tease him as dirty and smelly gutter rats. Even black couples, who are almost the only general store to show compassion, are afraid of being deeply involved in white affairs.

The novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" (Harperry, 1960) and the movie "To Kill a Mockingbird" (Robert Moligan, 1962), which are considered masterpieces in both novels and movies, depict a desperate black man who is in trouble with white people.

People in the neighborhood are outraged by a black man's statement that he felt sympathy for a white woman. How dare black people feel sympathy for white people. By looking at this, you can see where the roots of the vague but grounded fear felt by the general store couple come from.

What is the power that allows us to live in a dark reality? If Moon Dong-eun of "The Glory" endured a dark time with "hate resembling longing" in her heart and the goal of "revenge" as the driving force of her life, Kaya gains strength in nature. Don't get me wrong...... I don't mean to say let's live a good life.


For us as audiences, the narrative of desperate revenge is more fascinating and stimulating. It is somewhat flat compared to the harshness of reality taught by the movie "Winter's Born" (Debra Granick, 2010), which is in line with the survival of a girl left alone.

However, if you look closely, "Where the Gajae Sing" is by no means such a naive and nice narrative. After watching the movie, you understand the inside of the last line of the movie, "The Wetland Is Mastering Death."

After learning the text, Kaya finds and learns information about the scientific names and habitats of wetland creatures. And draw pictures of what you have discovered and observed. When the time comes, we learn to write and grow up gravely without feeling much appreciation in the process of reading books.

I think about how great it is to read and write while watching Kaya's amazing changes. Kaya endured reality by writing and drawing about the trees, birds and insects in the wetlands she loved.

At this point, I repeat one of the important propositions of my life. Only immersion in the object to be pursued can lift me out of my miserable life. The goodwill of others is likely to be short and faint.

 

- I like Lee Hyun-kyung's writing so much that I am sharing it with you in excerpts. It's such a good article to look at The Glory that it's a waste to read alone, so I hope all the people around the world will see it together thanks to the popularity of The Glory and translate it into English.
In particular, the last phrase is the writing that calls for sentence collection.

 

이현경
영화평론가이자 영화감독. '씨네21' 영화평론상 수상으로 평론 활동을 시작하였으며, 영화와 인문학 강의를 해오고 있다. 평론집 '영화, 내 맘대로 봐도 괜찮을까?'와 '봉준호 코드', '한국영화감독 1', '대중서사장르의 모든 것' 등의 공저가 있다. 단편영화 '행복엄마의 오디세이'(2013), '어른들은 묵묵부답'(2017), '꿈 그리고 뉘앙스'(2021)의 각본과 연출을 맡았다. 영화에 대해 쓰는 일과 영화를 만드는 일 사이에서 갈팡질팡 하면서 살아가고 있다.