Caravaggio, Michelangelo, Cher … many of our finest artists are known by mononyms. South Korean-born American film-maker Kogonada may not be quite as much of a household name (yet), but he’s a name worth getting to know.
His latest film, After Yang, is about a father (Colin Farrell) desperately seeking answers when his daughter’s robot older brother (Justin H Min) shuts down unexpectedly. This daughter (Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja) has been adopted by American parents (Farrell and Jodie Turner-Smith), but comes from a Chinese background. This is where a robot big brother comes in: in this version of the future, you can purchase siblings who come fully equipped with a lifetime’s worth of cultural heritage of your choosing. Despite these science fiction trappings, After Yang is a delicate and gentle piece of work, born, says its maker, of a desire to reconnect with a sensitivity that he worried he had lost.
