\u201cIt seems like they want to be friends with each other, but then there seems to be a line that just cannot be crossed between them,\u201d says Lee, also through an interpreter, of the actors\u2019 accomplished double act, referring to a scene in which Ye-ji bristles at Mi-ok\u2019s suggestion that her high-end clothes are out of place interviewing unemployed laborers. \u201c[Jeon and Cho] knew of that and they went into shooting that scene knowing that it was quite challenging to express. There were, of course, some things that were up to the camera in bringing that about, but I think that was a scene where the two were able to express just how nuanced and quite strange the relationship can be.\u201d<\/p>\n
The film itself is just as slippery and multi-layered, down to Lee\u2019s heady admixture of documentary and dramatic aesthetics. Inspired by real-life labor conflict in South Korea, \u201cPossible Love\u201d uses Ye-ji\u2019s nonfiction study of laid-off workers as a window into the lives of ordinary people swept up in large-scale social change, against the backdrop of which the two women\u2019s competing priorities are thrown into stark relief. Can a filmmaker who totes a $4,000 Lora Piana backpack, however well-intentioned, truly understand the plight of the working class? Is a subject eager to publicize a political struggle prepared for the risk that her personal privacy will be invaded in the process? <\/p>\n
To choreograph the film within the film \u2014 so compelling that I almost missed seeing its conclusion when \u201cPossible Love\u201d shifts the focus to interpersonal fireworks in the third hour \u2014 Lee cast a real-life documentary director and cinematographer as Ye-ji\u2019s crew, lending what Cho calls their \u201cnatural energy\u201d to the movements of the camera. Cho herself prepared by consulting the late master of the form, Frederick Wiseman<\/a>, who was unabashed about the tension between documentary filmaking\u2019s often radical politics and the privilege required to turn it into a profession.<\/p>\n \u201c[Wiseman] was posed the question by some students studying film and documentary: \u2018How can I pursue this work in reality?\u2019\u201d she recalls. \u201cAnd he replied with the immortal words, \u2018Marry a rich man.\u2019 And you know, I was preparing for the role of Ye-ji, so it was such an apt response for her situation.\u201d<\/p>\n Jeon, left, and Cho in \u201cPossible Love.\u201d<\/p>\n (Joo Jae-bum\/Netflix)<\/p>\n The potential for conflict bursts into the open at a seaside home that has been in Ye-ji\u2019s husband\u2019s family for years, where the group has decamped for a supposedly restorative holiday. Reminded of the setting by the location of our conversation \u2014 a set of green-curtained, pink-carpeted suites at the Hotel Excelsior, overlooking the northern shores of the Adriatic \u2014 I ask the actors what\u2019s going through their characters\u2019 minds when Mi-ok and Ye-ji\u2019s promising connection ultimately severs. <\/p>\n Mi-ok \u201cdoesn\u2019t really want to reveal to anyone else what\u2019s going on in the family … She only wants to show the good side that they are trying to live their best life and trying to improve and move forward with hopefulness,\u201d Jeon says, citing an early scene in which Mi-ok asks the crew not to film her son\u2019s awkward taekwondo at a school field day. When the camera\u2019s prying eye becomes more intrusive, though, she \u201cfeels a great sense of betrayal, that her family is being used and exploited.\u201d<\/p>\n For Cho, who says Ye-ji is \u201cconstantly balancing the ethical dilemma\u201d between documenting the truth and treating her subjects with care, the break was always inevitable, and no amount of Ye-ji\u2019s remorse or guilt can repair the damage.<\/p>\n Against this microcosm of the class war Lee sets the emergence of artificial intelligence, which threatens to further destabilize labor across a range of industries \u2014 including his own. Although he\u2019s uncertain if, when or how AI will \u201cintrude\u201d on the \u201centirely creative\u201d filmmaking process, the \u201cPoetry\u201d<\/a> and \u201cBurning\u201d<\/a> director is already using it for everyday tasks. <\/p>\n \u201cBefore going to see the doctor, I like to ask AI all the symptoms that I have, ask what\u2019s wrong with me. Or I would ask, you know, \u2018What\u2019s the weather like in Venice?\u2019\u201d he says. \u201cAI gives us instant answers, and it goes even beyond that to where it gives you advice these days. And in that sense, AI has indeed really gotten deeply intertwined in my daily life.\u201d<\/p>\n Similarly, Jeon is open to using AI for more \u201ctrivial\u201d matters, such as simultaneous translation from English to Korean and vice versa. But she admits to more \u201cextreme thoughts\u201d than Lee about the technology\u2019s role in the future of screen acting. <\/p>\n![\"Jeon,](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1788705922_896_.jpeg\")
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