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JANG Na-ri is a new, up and coming animation director following in the footsteps of JOUNG Yu-mi of Love Games (2013) and JEONG Da-hee of Man on the Chair (2014). Her latest film, My Father’s Room, was selected for the student film section of the 27th Animafest Zagreb where it received a special recognition. This was JANG’s second time being invited to Animafest Zagreb with her first time being in 2014 when her film Home Sweet Home (2012) was screened in competition. With the honorable mention from an international film festival, JANG continues to be earnest and brave with her work. My Father’s Room is about a young woman who escapes from her violent childhood and environment, and her process of collecting and sealing her painful memories about her father in a box. The director restructured her own painful childhood experiences and tried hard to overcome them through the process of making this animation. We met with the director to talk about her troubles and processes as a creator.

 

When I was in school, my professor often said, “You must work on the strongest image you’ve ever seen in your life.” When I thought about it, I realized that the strongest memory I had was of my cousin’s wedding. Her father had passed early on, and I started to imagine how my wedding would be while watching hers. Although it’d be for different reasons, my father would also be absent at my wedding. That’s how I came to make this film. My father might not exist in my life in the future. However, the same goes for him. I might no longer be in his life. I hate him, but I also pity him. I wanted to express the complicated and mixed feeling of hatred and compassion.

I was lucky because the big framework came to me very suddenly. I wanted to express it in a metaphorical way, so I thought about a box where you can store your memories. That’s when I started to write, “The girl decided to put her father in the box. One by one, she placed the memories of her scary father into the box.” This short excerpt became the spine of my writing. If you watch the film, there is a scene where the girl circles around the box that’s at the center. At first, she’s facing the box, but in time, she looks to the opposite side. This represents the process of her slowly forgetting about her father, and it’s how the girl grows up to become an adult. While making the film, I told myself not to indulge in self-pity. I tried very hard not to make the protagonist someone pitiful. I also tried not to portray the father character as someone extremely evil. 

 

I made a storyboard of images that popped up in my head and I posted them on a wall. Then I connected them like a puzzle. It was also a goal of mine to direct something only animation can express. In my previous work called Home Sweet Home (2012), I drew the background and had the characters come into the scene to act. After I finished, I realized that there was no merit in making an animation like that. That’s why I wanted to direct something only animation has the capability of. I believe the narrative in animation is different from that of a film. These days, a lot of works are being produced that have animation-specific narrative. That includes JEONG Da-hee’s Man on the Chair (2014) and The Empty (2016), as well as HWANGBO Sae-byul’s Viewpoint (2011) and You Are My Sunshine (2016). In all of these films, they show visuals that are difficult to express through the lens.

There are diverse programs available to help you make animation. I use a program called TVpaint. It’s like having a lightbox inside the program. I draw cut by cut following the timeline, then once it’s rendered, the animation is complete. The process took about a year and a half. I worked on it throughout my senior year and finished it in time for our graduation screening. After I graduated, I took a break, then worked on it for about two more months. At this time, I rerecorded the sound. Most people say that the sound in the beginning (where domestic violence takes place) sounds realistic, but it’s nothing to compare to what I have in my memory. Since the actors went into the recording room and were exchanging impromptu lines, it was not possible to direct. If you look at YANG Ik-june’s Breathless (2009), there’s a scene where they fight very realistically. I really wanted to use that sound instead. 

 

Indie-AniFest gave My Father’s Room an audience award. At first, I thought people with similar experiences would be the only ones that would relate, but I was shocked at how many people could understand the story. I was shocked once again when I realized they were foreigners. At one film festival, someone brought me a tissue with a written note saying, “I hope you can get out of that box now.” Some audience came to talk to me in tears. I realized that there are many in suffering. It’s just that they’ve been keeping silent.

I began to worry since I got more praises than I had anticipated. I want to create something great, but I told myself not to think about anything. The next story is about a child that commits theft and gets caught, but it needs a lot of work.