The Story Behind The Shot: The infinite possibility of ‘Past Lives’ final scene
When Past Lives was released in 2023, it became a siren call for those burnt by lost love, a devastating story of ‘what if’ and the haunting of an old flame. The film has a bittersweet longing and delicate intimacy as Nora and Hae Sung faintly explore the unexplored love between them, slightly tepid and unsure as they spend time in this grey area of connection. Are they friends or soul mates? Do they feel regret or peace over how their lives panned out?
Over the course of one week, the pair walk around Manhattan simply walking and talking, sharing stories about their childhood and the years spent apart, reintroducing their adult selves to each other. But a singular question lingers over each moment spent together, something that threatens to disturb the innocence of their relationship – will something happen between them? And there’s one shot in particular that captures the enormity of this tension.
The film ends with Nora and Hae Sung saying goodbye to each other on the street, waiting for Hae Sung’s taxi to arrive as they stand in the orange glow of the street lamp, staring into each other’s eyes. It’s a long and static shot, with the director, Celine Song, forcing us to linger in the infinite possibility of the interaction, unsure whether they’re about to act on the unresolved feelings and romantic tension or whether they’ll simply hug and walk away from each other, leave the past in the past and provide an ending to their story. A subtle wind rustles Nora’s skirt; the air feels charged and electric, with Nora slightly swaying towards Hae Sung at one point. It’s a tiny moment, but in the stillness of the scene, it feels like a lurch, a sudden magnet that pulls her towards him as if she’s about to kiss him.
The entire film builds this moment, a catharsis that isn’t a catharsis because nothing happens. When Song spoke about this moment, she explained that the shot was “the hill that we’re all going to die on,” saying that the film’s success depended on this final encounter, and if it didn’t work, then the movie wouldn’t work. Song succeeded in this task, creating a moment that is both devastating and freeing, a weight lifted from your shoulder whilst also laying heavy in your mind for days after.
The length of take adds to the intimacy of the interaction, reminding me of Ethan Hawke’s analogy in Before Sunrise when he talks about Quaker weddings and how people become married by staring into each other’s eyes for a prolonged period of time, that the eyes are the window to the soul and this allows you to see someone truly. As Nora and Hae Sung look at each other in the final scene, you get the feeling that this is what they are doing, looking into the person they once knew and reckoning with the person they will never know, or at least, not in the way they once imagined.
The movie was inspired by Song’s own lived experiences of meeting her childhood sweetheart after becoming married to her current partner, saying, “It was such an extraordinary feeling to feel like you’re two things at once but also a different thing to a different person. But both of those people are me. I felt like I was watching my past, present and future sort of collide in that room.”
Song put a finger on an experience we both long to forget and be reminded of, capturing the fleeting nature of relationships and the way we disappear in and out of each other’s lives, regardless of how formative and life-changing they are.
