In this blog post, we’ll explore how the combination of romance and fantasy in the movie ‘A Boy Goes to Heaven’ creates a beautiful story.
Synopsis
Nemo is a 13-year-old boy who lives alone with his single mother. Cheerful and eccentric, Nemo sings and dances to cheer his mother up, but one day, she dies in an accident at the watch shop where she worked. The new owner of the comic book store that replaces the watch shop is a single father who has moved from Seoul with his young son. The moment Nemo sees the father and his son, Ki-cheol, he feels a strong sense of destiny. Despite his young age, he asks the father to marry him and confesses his love.
The father laughs off the young Nemo’s confession, but Nemo gets along well with Ki-cheol and makes no secret of his feelings for the father. One day, while the three of them are at the theater together, a fire breaks out, and Nemo goes missing while trying to save Ki-cheol. When Nemo regains consciousness, he wakes up in a flower-filled field near a train station and realizes he is already on the border between the living world and the afterlife.
Nemo strikes a deal with the Grim Reaper to gain 60 more days to live in the living world, but there’s a strange rule—one day there equals one year in the living world. When Nemo wakes up 20 days later, he has grown into a 33-year-old man with a beard, and he has 60 days left until Christmas. Nemo, pretending to be “Nemo’s Dad” and mimicking an adult, approaches the wealthy man, and the two fall deeply in love.
They spend happy times together on early dates and trips, but Nemo continues to age rapidly. Eventually, Nemo becomes a 93-year-old man, and the father and son realize that he is, in fact, the boy who truly loved them. Due to the constraints of time, the two must part ways, and Nemo goes to heaven to meet his mother. In the final scene, a shot of the father and son reuniting against the backdrop of heaven’s serene landscape is inserted, hinting at a sense of fantastical hope.
Genre Analysis: Melodrama and Fantasy
Melodrama Elements
The typical structure of a melodrama has the following characteristics:
1) There are two lovers.
2) There are social pressures or characters that stand in their way.
3) The ending shows either conformity to social norms or a fleeting or incomplete happy ending achieved after overcoming those norms—it is not a state of complete, self-contained happiness.
4) Minor supporting characters provide moments of humor throughout the film, helping to regulate the overall tone of the story.
This general structure of a melodrama is clearly evident in ‘A Boy Goes to Heaven’. The love between Nemo and the Rich Man is central, and that love is threatened by insurmountable obstacles—spatial and temporal constraints. Supporting characters provide humor in keeping with the fairy-tale-like atmosphere, setting the rhythm of the story.
Nemo and the Rich Man’s relationship begins as a one-sided crush, but it develops into mutual love once Nemo grows up and actually meets the Rich Man. However, it is not a specific villain that prevents their love from lasting, but rather supernatural laws—namely, the boundary between this world and the afterlife, and the constraints of time.
Ultimately, the two part ways, but this separation is reimagined in a way that, while intensifying the melodramatic sadness, also hints at eternity or a future reunion through fantastical devices. The final scene in heaven functions as a kind of emotional happy ending that complements the separation in the real world.
Fantasy Elements and Their Role
In this film, fantasy devices realize an inherently impossible situation—the dream of a boy and an adult sharing love—thereby amplifying the melodramatic mood. However, the film as a whole introduces fantasy while remaining within the framework of melodrama to create a fairy-tale-like atmosphere.
Borrowing film theorist Todorov’s classification, fantasy is divided into three categories: the macabre, fantasy, and wonder. To summarize briefly:
• The Macabre: Phenomena that are unlikely to occur but can be interpreted rationally
• Fantasy: A state where one hesitates to determine whether something is real or not
• Wonder: Something that makes it clear from the outset that it is not real
If we subdivide these further, we can distinguish between macabre fantasy, pure fantasy, and fantastical wonder. The fantasy elements inserted into most romantic dramas take on the nature of “fantastical wonder”; while settings where characters traverse time and space for love or where the dead appear have a fantastical beginning, they ultimately conclude with a return to the natural order or reality.
In ‘A Boy Goes to Heaven’, Nemo returns from the boundary between the living and the afterlife, and the rule that one day equals one year dramatically illustrates the constraints of time. Consequently, while the lovers are reunited, the premise that they must eventually return to their original places further heightens the poignancy of their love.
A common thread shared with Tim Burton’s ‘Edward Scissorhands’, ‘If Only’, and ‘October Love’ is that while they allow for temporary miracles through supernatural devices, they ultimately choose an ending that conforms to the order of reality. This approach makes unfulfilled love appear even more beautiful and poignant.
There are two reasons why fantasy elements are frequently incorporated. One is an aesthetic attempt to subvert the conventions of traditional melodrama, and the other is that love itself is closer to belief or concept than to reality, making it easier for audiences to accept settings that transcend time and space.
Effective Devices
Color Palette and Cinematography
In the melodrama genre, an excess of color, costumes, and sets tends to visually express emotional fluctuations. ‘A Boy Goes to Heaven’ actively utilizes pastel tones—pink, sky blue, and light purple—to create a fairy-tale-like atmosphere and visually support the fusion of fantasy and melodrama.
Film scholars view this visual “excess” as a projection of the emotional twists and turns of melodrama onto the screen. Furthermore, from the perspective of “costume narrative,” when characters violate or transcend the norms of the story, their dazzling costumes and appearances subtly present an alternative narrative. The film’s fairy-tale-like mise-en-scène makes the acceptance of fantasy feel natural.
Props and Symbols: Clocks and Snowmen
The premise that Nemo’s mother ran a clock shop, along with the clocks hanging throughout the house, visually encapsulates the theme of “time.” The mise-en-scène featuring a broken clock and numerous clocks symbolizes a fate powerless before time—a destiny defined by time.
The snowman embodies Nemo’s pure wish—a happy family with his father—but the fact that snow melts hints at the laws of nature and the finiteness of time. These props intuitively reinforce the story’s central themes.
The Function of Music
In melodramas, music is a crucial device for shaping the emotional tone of a scene and drawing the audience into the story. Songs frequently sung by Nemo, as well as tracks like “Just Like Anyone Else” sung by the Rich Man, evoke nostalgia for the 1970s and 1980s while symbolically revealing the characters’ emotions and pasts.
These songs connect Nemo’s inner world, the Rich Man’s memories, and the longing of those left behind; blending with the film’s fairy-tale atmosphere, they reinforce its melodramatic sensibility.
Conclusion
Analyzing this film from a genre perspective has made it clearer how the combination of romance and fantasy shapes the work’s mood and aesthetics. The harmony of fairy-tale-like mise-en-scène, color palette, props, and music allows for the incorporation of fantasy elements, and that fantasy simultaneously evokes both the poignancy and the sense of eternity inherent in the romance.
Personally, I found the film’s mise-en-scène and color palette most impressive, and it was fascinating to observe how fantasy amplifies the romantic sentiment. I look forward to studying further by analyzing films of other genres in a similar manner.
