Treeless Mountain, Both Versions

Do foreign movies ever have a real ending, or get to the point? We watch so many, and they never seem to have the big finish, happy/sad/shocking ending, or moral to the story that American movies have.

Case in point: Treeless Mountain. Now keep in mind that this could be any of a number of foreign movies we have watched over the past two years. I'm picking on this one because it was the latest viewing.

I freely admit that I chose to watch this one, based on the following description: "Sisters Jin and Bin must fend for themselves when their mother abruptly packs her things, leaving the girls in the care of their alcoholic aunt without a word as to when she'll return. In a tale of innocence lost, the sisters try to make sense of their mother's absence. But in the meantime, 6-year-old Jin will be forced to mature far beyond her tender years."

Sounds dramatic. Poignant even, eh? Nope. Mother dumps them off. Monotone. Aunt keeps them for a while. Monotone. Aunt gets tired of them and dumps them at the Grandparents house. Monotone. The End. 

While watching, I Americanized the script in my head...

The Mother is a raging crackhead hooker that decides she can no longer care for her daughters. She dumps them off at her sister's doorstep in the middle of the night in the pouring down rain while her sister is out at the local bar getting wasted with old perverts. 

The sister returns, sees the girls, and is majorly pissed. She tries to call the the girl's crackhead Mother to come get the little brats out of there, but her pre-paid phone is out of minutes. She tells the girls they can stay, but only if they do everything they are told. Otherwise, they will be sold to the Carnies that come through a few times a year. The ones that eat children.

For months the Aunt makes the girls massage her feet, brush her hair, drive her to the bar, clean up her vomit. [insert many drunken, dramatic scenes where there is screaming and things get broken] Finally, when the Aunt has use for them no more, she decides to push them off on the Grandparents.

This is the best thing to ever happen to them. Their grandmother is Carol Brady, and their grandfather, Mr. Miyagi. 

They are shown love, kindness, and how to catch flies with chopsticks. They flourish, and their hard knock lives become just a distant memory. 

Of course the grandparents die [insert emotional crying scene] but this just gives the girls enough screen time to reflect on all they have learned. By now they are fine adults, and when they walk away from the grandparents grave, hand in hand, into the sunset, you can't help but be moved knowing that if they can overcome such adversity in their life, then you can too! 

Yay for movies! Yay for life! Yay for lessons learned! Yay for...oh, enough already.