It's Not Abuse
It's not abuse.
"It's been a while since a script leapt off the page at me like this."
"Hard to say for a play, but on film, pulling this off is no easy feat, I'll tell you."
"And Ha-jin's acting especially — I honestly don't know what to call it. I can't tell if I wrote the lines wrong, or if I botched the direction myself... It genuinely confuses me."
"What on earth are you talking about?"
Director Kim Si-woon's words had just sailed clean past the limits of Director Jeong Seong-sik's understanding.
"When we brought the rating down, I also toned down the abuse scenes so Go would take less flak for it. I only meant to convey that the character had a rough childhood, nothing more. But watching Ha-jin perform it, it's unbearable to look at. I feel guilty. It makes me think — what on earth did we make this poor kid do?"
Only then did Director Jeong Seong-sik realize just how mild the abuse scenes and dialogue actually were.
"You're right. It was hard for me to watch too... What kind of sorcery is this?"
"The kid plays with the audience's emotions like a puppeteer. Pity him, ache for him, feel sorry for him — over and over. The audience will get swept up in it, of course they will. I'm already worried about how he's going to handle his own acting when he grows up."
"Hey, your little problem's walking over right now? Looks like he's got something to say to you."
"Oh?"
The very boy who had just handed Director Kim Si-woon a fresh worry was making his way toward the two men.
"You want to film here?"
"Yes. Obviously not during actual takes. Just when I'm waiting around, or chatting with the other actors — moments like that."
"No filming is allowed outside of press articles and interviews... What's it for?"
"I want to put it in a family video album. I filmed during the Wagle Wagle Kindergarten shoots and the TTN commercial too."
"Well, if that's all it is, go ahead. Just make sure you don't interfere with production."
"Yes, sir. Thank you."
The family video album was a lie.
What I needed was a record proving I was filming this movie without a single problem.
And above all, I needed to show that actress Go Eun-hye and I were on wonderful terms.
"Senior."
"Ha-jin, come on in. Cold out there, isn't it?"
Actress Go Eun-hye was going over her script, fidgeting with a heat pack in her other hand.
I handed her the drink my mom had prepared.
"It's pear juice with honey. Drink it while it's warm."
"Oh my, thank you, dear. This is exactly what I like. I'll enjoy it."
The mood was warmed up — now for the real business.
"You love children, don't you? You volunteer at orphanages and centers for single mothers all the time."
"And how would you know that? I go when we're not filming, just to lend a hand for a bit. Once you've raised kids of your own, there's nothing left to do at home."
She made it sound like nothing, but one day she'd go on to serve as a goodwill ambassador for international organizations.
At her core, she was an actress with a warm heart who simply couldn't bear to watch a child suffer.
Right now, almost nobody knew about her quiet charity work.
Because she never talked about it herself.
"This role must have been hard on you. You play a terrible mother who says such awful things to me."
"Tell me about it. I actually turned it down at first, but Director Kim showed me your audition tape."
"My audition tape?"
"That's right. They say he just handed you the lines, bare as could be, and told you to act — no direction at all? I was stunned when I watched it. I kept thinking, how can a six-year-old channel emotions and energy like that?"
She said she'd been seized by the desire to act opposite a child like that, and that was why she'd accepted the role.
Actress Go Eun-hye was in this film because of me.
Which meant I absolutely had to protect this film — and Go Eun-hye.
Why am I suddenly talking about all this?
Because my Future Sight had warned me that a massive controversy would erupt after the release.
From the moment the trailer dropped until the film's release, the atmosphere was excellent.
The audience and critics' reactions right after release were the stuff of legend.
The film deftly modulated fear and tension to hold viewers in the palm of its hand, and with the actors' powerhouse performances piled on top, some were already calling it destined to become Director Kim Si-woon's biggest hit ever.
But that early juggernaut came screeching to a halt in the unlikeliest of places.
A child abuse controversy, born from my and actress Go Eun-hye's unsettlingly real performances.
"Are you kidding me? Where does abuse even come into this? So now acting convincingly is a crime?"
People insisted it was impossible to watch as mere acting, and the claims that the child must have been treated harshly on set snowballed into a flood of angry complaint calls.
The production company repeatedly issued press releases showing the deliberately softened props to prove the child actor had never been handled roughly, but the controversy refused to die down.
"It's an absurd situation, really. People who found the film unpleasant are digging their claws in to vent. Director Kim Si-woon has always had plenty of enemies."
He was a director whose bold subject matter and high intensity split audiences into lovers and haters with every single work.
His obsession with particular fetishes and his rough treatment of women on screen had made him a public target for women's organizations.
Feminist critics attacked him, claiming he made films purely for his own sexual gratification.
"And we just served them a perfect morsel. Slap the child abuse label on it, and how easy does the attack become?"
Despite the director's and production company's active efforts to explain, the media and advocacy groups kept whipping up public opinion.
By the midway point, the box office had taken a steep dive, and the film quietly left theaters at roughly break-even.
Mirroring that poisoned atmosphere, it earned nominations in several categories at the Red Dragon Film Awards — and won not a single trophy.
The flames spread from the director straight to Go Eun-hye.
"Acting too well can be a problem too. People went so far as to say she probably did this at home — imagine how devastating that was for her."
A kind-hearted woman who adored children, she was so battered by the outrageous accusations and attacks that she suffered from social anxiety for quite some time.
And so Confession of a Pianist left deep wounds in the director, the actress — and in me, whose debut film it was, the last work before my long hiatus.
It was a precognitive dream much like the one that had warned me about the plagiarized commercial.
My Future Sight was telling me an obstacle stood between me and a successful debut.
For now, I had no idea of the cause.
Apparently it had started in some online movie fan community — but the dream never told me which one.
With more movie forums out there than I could count, tracking it down myself was impossible.
And this wasn't the work of any one individual — it was a wave of opinion generated by audiences after watching the film, so rooting out the cause myself wasn't something I could simply do.
So what I came up with was a way to smother the controversy the moment it erupted.
And for that, I needed the image of Go Eun-hye as a woman who truly loved children.
"I've been caught up in your acting since the script reading. You played pitiful so well I kept thinking, how could anyone torment a child like this — I was on the verge of tears."
"That's just what the role called for, isn't it? An actor being faithful to their performance is only natural. I thought your acting was wonderful, Senior."
"I appreciate you saying so. Six years old, and yet you speak like such a grown-up, Ha-jin."
With a motherly smile, she patted my head.
Here and there, I steered the conversation toward her volunteer work.
All so that the world could see just how much Go Eun-hye cherished children.
Off to the side, my mother filmed our entire conversation.
It was the first footage on the camcorder I'd begged my dad to buy.
"Done recording?"
"Yep. But are you sure it's okay to just film like this?"
"I got the director's permission. He said anything's fine as long as it's not the actual film scenes."
"Then stand over by that tree. Let me get a shot of my handsome son's face."
My mom had already gotten a taste for the camera.
"Please film that later. I have a use for that tape."
"A use? What use?"
"It's absolutely essential for clearing up a misunderstanding."
Because I have to save my debut film, you see.
For the past few days, So-ra had been listless.
Her expression was sour, like someone carrying a heavy worry.
Even when she glued herself to my side, I'd turn around to find her retreated into a corner.
I finally couldn't take it anymore and asked her what was wrong.
"You've seemed so down lately, so I'm asking. If I did something wrong, just tell me."
She stared at me for a long moment, and then her eyes welled up with tears.
I'd barely said anything — why was she about to cry?
"Huaaaaang, Ha-jinaaa."
The dam finally broke.
Just like on my birthday, she threw her arms around me and buried her face in my shoulder.
Yu-jin came sprinting over at terrifying speed to peel her off me, but the moment she saw So-ra's face, she froze in place.
"Sniff... Mom's... really sick."
We sat down in a corner of the studio, and I asked her what had happened.
Yu-jin was being unusually docile today — So-ra's expression must have scared even her.
"Your mom's still in America?"
"Yeah."
So-ra's mother, estranged from Director Han Jae-ryong, had been staying in the States.
Perhaps embarrassed that her mom and dad didn't live together, So-ra rarely talked about her mother.
But seeing her say all this through tears, it was clear her mom was very ill.
"Is she very sick?"
"I think so. She said it was... cancer."
In my past life, Director Han Jae-ryong had lived alone for a very long time.
I hadn't known it back then — he must have lost his wife to cancer.
"Dad says he has to go to America to see Mom."
His wife had cancer, so of course he needed to be by her side.
And So-ra, being six, would naturally have to go with him.
"So that's why you've been so glum. Your mom's sick, so of course you have to go. You'll come back, so why are you crying so hard?"
Summoning a husband she'd been separated from — that could only mean one thing. It meant preparing for the end.
If she passed away from the cancer, the two of them would return to Korea.
"But... that's not... sniff."
So-ra burst into tears again.
"Huaaaang... he said we might move there for good."
Oh no. Damn it.