After Yang Will Make You Grieve For a Robot

Someone at a robot company once told me a story about one of its bomb disposal machines. The soldiers who had been using the robot in Afghanistan were dismayed after it returned from repairs. They said that the robot's shiny new parts and casing--lacking the bullet holes and blast scars they knew--made it seem as if the machine itself had, in a sense, died. It might seem odd, grieving a robot. But for anyone who's seen After Yang, the beautiful and strange new movie by the South Korean filmmaker Kogonada, it won't.