Dear My Life

  Header illustration for the review essay of My Mister (2018) . Illustration created for editorial review purposes. 💭 Short Personal Reflection My Mister (2018) found me in the middle of a thought I hadn't known I was having. Until we truly understand someone, our perception of them is a mixture of illusion and prejudice. We assume that people living in nice houses and driving expensive cars must be happy, while those in modest homes must be struggling. But if we look a little closer, we begin to see that everyone is carrying the weight of their own life — like a duck that appears calm on the surface but is constantly paddling beneath the water. This Korean drama series quietly reveals what lies beneath. Even in lives that seem broken, there are people who recognize each other's pain and choose to endure together. Perhaps no life is entirely right or wrong. Maybe life is simply about seeing, understanding, and comforting one another in between. As one of the most criticall...

  Header illustration for the review essay of The Bucket List (2007) . Illustration created for editorial review purposes. 💭 Short Personal Reflection The Bucket List (2007) found me at a moment I didn't quite expect — the quiet edge between what I have lived, and what I have left. Rob Reiner's American buddy comedy-drama starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman arrived at exactly the right hour. In the film, two men stand before the vast shadow of death and yet continue to cross items off their list — one by one — until they finally rediscover the quiet joy of being alive. Watching them, I found myself reflecting on my own life. I have always believed that I lived diligently, doing what needed to be done. Now, standing at the threshold of retirement, I have begun to reach for the things I once set aside — vintage pieces for the home, unfamiliar countries, soft watercolor drawings on an iPad. But as I try to begin, I am met with something I hadn't expected: a body tha...

  Header illustration for the review essay of Only Yesterday (1991) . Illustration created for editorial review purposes. 💭 Short Personal Reflection Only Yesterday (1991) arrived quietly, the way certain memories do — not summoned, but simply there. There are moments in life you wish you could erase and write again. Words you shouldn't have said, actions that fell short. When they come back to mind, your past self can feel painfully inadequate. And yet, strangely, those same memories begin to take on a different shape over time. What once felt like regret slowly becomes something you long for. Perhaps the coexistence of regret and longing is simply part of what it means to live. This Studio Ghibli film seems to know that — and to find, in that coexistence, something worth sitting with quietly. 🎥 Film Overview Director Isao Takahata Release July 20, 1991 (Japan) Runtime 118 minutes Cast Miki Imai (Taeko Okajima), Toshirō Yanagiba (Toshio), Yōko Honna (...

  Header illustration for the review essay of From Up on Poppy Hill (2011) . Illustration created for editorial review purposes. 💭 Short Personal Reflection From Up on Poppy Hill (2011) came to me in the way that old things often do — quietly, without announcing itself. In one corner of my room, an old turntable still remains. A box of cassette tapes. A worn wooden desk. There have been many suggestions to replace them, to move on to something better. But that never quite happens. Because those things carry more than function. They hold traces — of time, of presence, of something that once stayed. Among them, one object lingers more than the rest: an old kitchen spatula once used by my mother. Worn at the edges, slightly discolored. And yet, looking at it brings a quiet heaviness to the chest — not sadness exactly, but something close to it. Because it is no longer just a tool. It has become a small place where a certain time continues to remain. Watching this film feels simi...

Header illustration for the review essay of Whisper of the Heart (1995) . Illustration created for editorial review purposes. 💭 Short Personal Reflection Whisper of the Heart (1995), Yoshifumi Kondō's only Studio Ghibli feature and one of the quietest masterpieces in the studio's history, found me at a moment I recognized deeply. There was a time when life felt so overwhelming that I couldn't see what lay ahead — like being stuck in a deep swamp, ready to let go of everything. In the film, Shizuku rewrites a song that once praised a hometown landscape into something closer to her reality — "Concrete Road." No forests, no hills, just a hard path that stretches forward, demanding that you keep moving. There are moments when our own paths feel just like that: dry, rigid, and endless. We don't know where we're going, or what waits at the end. And yet, Shizuku doesn't stop walking. Watching her, I felt something deeper than admiration — it felt like wit...