In this blog post, I will analyze how spatiality, texture, and audiovisual devices create interpretive possibilities in Director Park Kyung-keun’s documentary ‘A Dream of Iron’.

Film Information

‘A Dream of Iron’ (2013) / Director: Park Kyung-keun / Cast: Park Kyung-keun (Narration) / Release Date: November 13, 2014 / Genre: Documentary / Runtime: 105 minutes / Country: South Korea / Rating: General Audience

Reason for Selection

I wanted to analyze a documentary that deals with space, particularly one that emphasizes buildings and regional characteristics. I believed that analyzing an experimental work composed solely of visual and auditory elements—rather than narrative or characters—would be of great help when conceptualizing a 5-minute documentary script for my final project. My first encounter with Director Park Kyung-keun was through the documentary ‘Cheonggyecheon Medley.’ The portrayal of people living along Cheonggyecheon, using iron as a motif, left a strong impression on me, and I heard that the director was planning a documentary series centered on iron. “A Dream of Iron” is the second documentary in that series. The visual elements and music I was looking for played a central role in this documentary, and since it incorporates mythical elements, I wanted to take on the challenge of analyzing it.

Synopsis

The film is structured around two main narrative threads. One centers on Korea’s oldest rock carvings in Ulsan, depicting our prehistoric ancestors—who lived as hunter-gatherers—hunting whales. Revered as a divine being that provided food and clothing and symbolized abundance, the whale was a source of positive dreams about the future for our ancestors. In the modern era, people shift from dreaming of whales to dreaming of iron, aspiring to success and wealth. During the 1970s Five-Year Economic Development Plan, Hyundai Heavy Industries and POSCO became capable of building oil tankers weighing thousands of tons, and as the dream of whales transformed into the dream of iron, society underwent a profound change. The film interweaves footage of ships being built in massive shipyards, whales swimming in the ocean, and archival footage from the 1970s to show how we have changed.

Form

This documentary is primarily driven by Director Park Kyung-geun’s calm narration. Addressed as if to a specific person—“To Seung-hee”—this narration reveals the speaker’s complex inner world; it sounds like a lament to a former lover, yet also like a speech directed at Korea’s past. When asking what constitutes a documentary, the use of narration is a key factor. Since I understand that Ulsan MBC provided production support, I was initially concerned that this might be a conventional use typical of broadcast documentaries; however, the calm, confessional-like narration in this work creates room for diverse interpretations within the static visuals.
Along with the narration, another formal peculiarity is the absence of typical interview scenes, and the subtitles are used sparingly, limited to spatial descriptions. While people clearly appear, the film shows only them working without offering any further explanation. The workers at the shipyard are not talkative; at most, they exchange light-hearted jokes with colleagues while changing into their work clothes. For most of their working hours, they work quietly alongside the machines.
The most distinctive aspect of its form is its attempt to capture images in a spectacular manner while, above all, emphasizing texture. The reason the film persistently shows the shipbuilding process—such as pouring and remelting iron in intense heat—is reportedly because the director himself was captivated by the texture of that process, which led him to decide to make this documentary. Recently, the global film industry has seen a surge in activity where artists originally working in fine art or installation art are engaging with the narrative medium of film. I believe that, in addition to Apichatpong Weerasethakul, works such as the experimental projects by the Park Chan-wook brothers and Park Chan-kyong’s ‘Manshin’ are providing a fresh stimulus to the film industry. In summary, “A Dream of Iron” is a film that minimizes storytelling and focuses on the various facets of iron found in iron and steel production sites.

Scene Analysis

In fact, this film lacks distinct scene divisions. Unlike films such as ‘Don’t Cross the River, My Love’ or ‘The Sound of a Bell’, there is no clear emotional anchor for the audience to rely on. Since there are no characters to emotionally connect with, the film focuses more on archival footage, music, and the visuals of the iron and steel production sites. Therefore, unlike conventional scene analysis, I will attempt to analyze the film by dividing it based on its imagery.
The film opens with a scene of a monk ringing a bell. Regardless of the narrative progression, it continuously shows a temple and the events taking place there; at this location, the director persistently reveals his emotions through narration, saying, “To Seung-hee.” After brief archival footage depicting the industrialization process of the 1970s, a helicopter camera captures the majestic process of shipbuilding at a shipyard. In this documentary-style film, scenes showing the manufacturing process from a bird’s-eye view are repeated several times, allowing the viewer to feel both the grueling nature and the grandeur of the process itself.
The oldest rock carvings in Korea, located in Ulsan, serve as the film’s most mythical setting. The film begins by exploring how prehistoric divine beings have transformed into ships in the modern era. Although the filmmakers claim the idea was inspired simply by the visual similarity, the wave of industrialization driven by Hyundai Heavy Industries through POSCO under the Yushin regime of the 1970s was akin to the whales of the past. This is because it provided people with food and clothing, enabling a life beyond mere survival. However, the film does not stop there; it goes on to depict scenes of labor struggles.
We see a scene where hundreds of POSCO workers stage a rooftop sit-in. The struggle for labor rights in Korea, which began at this time, remains an ongoing process even decades later, with little significant change. In the latter part of the film, there is a scene where several workers are polishing the majestic propellers that propel the ship. Watching that scene, I am reminded of an anecdote about René Duchamp. It is said that at an aeronautical engineering exhibition, Duchamp told a fellow sculptor, “Painting is dead now; who could create something more magnificent than that propeller?” This leads me to believe that in modern society, where the sculptural perfection once considered the exclusive domain of a select few professional artists has expanded into mass production systems, the value of art itself is also transforming.
At first glance, this documentary might seem like a simple sequence of images or even feel tedious, but the director’s creative interpretation of the chosen subject matter and the way he handles it make me realize that it can produce a work of art entirely unlike anything else.