Seeing in Circles: Narrative Circularity, the Cosmetic Gaze, and the Fusion of Self and Other in Kim Ki-duk's Sigan

abstract:This article examines the connections between narrative circularity, cosmetic surgery, and the circular nature of the cosmetic gaze in South Korean auteur Kim Ki-duk's film Sigan (Time, 2006). I argue that the cosmetic gaze, which allows the human body to act as both subject and object to the self, also mirrors the looping circularity of Kim's film. By formally and narratively (con)fusing the film's male and female protagonists, Sigan enacts the interconnectedness of male and female, subject and object, and, consequently, self and other while offering a critique of how Korean subjects have literally embodied the burdens of the male-identified, Eurocentric gaze.