Hotel by the River (Hong Sangsoo)

[baby doll]

IMDb

[Peng]

After being disappointed big time with Grass, this is more like it. One of the rare Hongs without some structural gambits, but being preoccupied with the toxic aftereffect of a usual Hong film's affair drama does feel like a significant next step. His stand-in here mostly serves as a fulcrum to explore a parallel pair of two characters, a woman caught in that drama with a friend coming to soothe her, and a generation still feeling left behind by it (Was shook by the sight of his young son vaping tbh). The regret hangs heavily and a sense of fatality settles down thick like snow in the midst of fixing old wounds, but even reckoning with death can't help erase past mistakes that easily. That last scene... 7/10