자전적 영화로서 정이삭의 <미나리>(2020) 연구 : 벤야민의 ‘삶을 구성하는 힘’ 개념을 중심으로

Abstract

Lee Isaac Chung is a second-generation American immigrant film director from South Korea. In 2020, he released the movie Minari, which he wrote and produced a scenario. He produced the movie Minari based on his autobiographical memories, which allowed him to be recognized by the Hollywood film industry. The skill of using Korean materials to make stories that can be universally sympathized stands out. This paper begins with the question of what is the power and how immigrants adapt to unfamiliar places and survive. Immigrants from Europe first moved to America to build a capitalist society. Since then, immigrants have had to learn, comply with the rules they set, and adapt successfully. Walter Benjamin once described the power to drive life in the first short story of One Way Path. He explains ‘power of conviction’ and ‘power of fact’ separately. Benjamin proposes to develop a new form of speaking ‘prompt language’. According to this classification, movies will also fall into the new type of category requested by Benjamin. At Benjamin’s request to develop ‘prompt language’, director Lee Isaac Chung seems to have successfully settled in Hollywood’s climate with his own quick language, autobiographical film. In the movie Minari, the composition of a family and the power that drives their lives flow between ‘confidence’ and ‘fact’, as in Benjamin’s thinking. Monica, his wife who thinks based on conviction, and Jacob, her husband, who forms an axis of practice based on sensory ability, form a central conflict. Their daily lives aim for the same goal of saving each other. However, husbands who want to build a farm and settle down and wives who want to pursue family stability in consideration of the health of their children are based on different ways of thinking. Just as Benjamin sought philosophical reflection on childhood through his collection of prose, One Way, Lee Isaac Chung tried to embody his childhood through the autobiographical film Minari. The movie Minari contains a combination of director Lee Isaac Chung’s willful orientation to settle in the Hollywood film industry by producing a successful settlement of immigrant families, exploration of will and power for life, and autobiographical films.