Night Flight (Ya-gan-bi-haeng – 야간비행) is a South Korean-made (2014) LGBT-themed film. The film tells the loneliness, rejection, and identity struggle of a youth trying to discover his homosexual identity. I know this theme is very “cliché,” but the identity-society and individual conflict in this film is truly very harsh. For this reason, it is not a romance. This was a good experience for me too. The film left a good impression. How LGBT individuals undergo a transformation due to social pressures is also told in a quite dramatic way in the film. A successful queer film.
A harsh reality and an unidealized story truly feel more realistic while watching. A colorful, rosy reality lived in a dream world where everything is on track, like in classic South Korean BL cinema or general BL dramas, is not in question here. The film offers not just a love and “coming of age” theme; it also has a deeper social call. And this call, as I said, felt very familiar to me, but the reality in the film is delivered through a good narrative.
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Night Flight, 2014 Movie and Plot Flow
The plot and summary of the film: Close friends in middle school, Yong-ju, Gi-woong, and Gi-taek continue to study at the same school in high school. Yong-ju is aware of his sexual orientation and has harbored feelings for Gi-woong for a long time. However, Gi-woong has now turned into a violent, ruthless person known for his bullying attitudes. He oppresses and bullies everyone at school, including his old friend Gi-taek. There is a constant conflict between him and Yong-ju.
Through a mobile app, Yong-ju meets Joon-woo, a secretly gay youth from the same school, and a friendship develops between them. They are curious about others like themselves, but social pressure causes everyone to hide their identity.
Over time, Yong-ju’s sexual identity is revealed. Gi-woong learns of Yong-ju’s feelings for him and also confronts his own suppressed sides. But instead of confronting this reality, he directs his anger at Yong-ju; he beats him and humiliates him. Yong-ju is ostracized by everyone at school and practically declared “the other.”
Gi-woong, on the other hand, is experiencing his own internal war. While living with the masks imposed by society, he both distances himself from his true self and becomes lonely. The film shows that choosing to live by hiding one’s identity or facing pressure by revealing it are equally exhausting.
The betrayal of closest friends, the structure of the education system that crushes the individual rather than protecting them, and society’s blind intolerance are told in a very impressive language in the film. The film is worth watching even just to see this theme.
Social Hate and Destroying Peace: Review and Commentary
Night Flight directs somewhat familiar criticisms at the rigidity of the education system in South Korea, the pressure on youths, and social homophobia. These criticisms are actually universal and are always repeated in films. The reason for this is definitely that people still lack a universal “tolerance.” The film presented a good viewing in this respect as well. I didn’t get bored or fast-forward while watching the film.
It lays bare how people can turn into monsters when they sever their emotional and mental bonds with each other. This theme is “striking” and “dramatic” in itself. For this reason, the film makes you watch the hatred and discrimination of people who cannot empathize with each other and constantly see another as the other, which we encounter not in an idealized universe but in real life. I saw these in this film. You don’t necessarily have to be a homosexual or LGBT individual to watch the film.
LGBT Individuals and Politics
To continue: LGBT individuals have always been victims of politics. Politicians who want to get votes from fanatics always throw homosexual individuals in there. What should exist is a peaceful society where everyone can express themselves. But the exact opposite is done; social peace and tolerance are sacrificed to politics.
While equal citizenship should mean everyone has the right to live together in their state, it merely turns into a maneuvering space for the politics of those who hold political power. Nobody actually cares about homosexuality; the important thing is political power… I extracted these meanings deeper down while watching the film. I don’t know, maybe it was a bit forced.
Night Flight and the Deep Loneliness of LGBT Individuals
The deep loneliness and dead ends of the characters give the film a psychological weight. I think this layer might be the reason I watched the film. Actually, the South Korean-made film voices how the LGBT community is offended and excluded, alongside universal injustice. Character development is quite deep. The duo, unable to live their own characters between emotions and social demands, have now fallen out with each other. Two homosexual individuals both play the “hetero” role and inflict violence on each other purely to throw off heteronormative pressures. This actually shows how ruthlessly we make humans enemies to one another today. A universal Kantian peace immediately came to my mind. We absolutely need universal inner peace and harmony. I made quite deep inferences while watching the film.
Returning to the duo again; their hatred stems entirely from social provocation. They act harshly towards each other to prove they are not homosexual. This actually stems from the duo’s desire to please others, not themselves, because heteronormative pressures point in this direction. Again, the desire of politicians and power holders is also for LGBT individuals to be “hated.” Whereas feeding evil institutionally and socially only brings chaos.
Loneliness is not just a physical state; an individual can also be all alone amidst crowds. The film makes you feel its psychological depth with this theme too. The film also explains that wars, discrimination, dogmatic beliefs, and social pressures feed from the same root—selfishness and lack of empathy. Because every evil starts with seeing another as the other.
Heteronormative Norms and the Night Flight Movie
In a society that distances itself from interiority and lives on the surface with technological addiction, emotional and mental communication breaks, and this drags the individual into deep loneliness. People are especially afraid of getting “lynched.” This is not just a social media lynch; they also do not want to be someone pointed at and declared guilty in the social sphere.
This is an incredible psychological pressure too. Actually, the reason LGBT individuals sometimes raise their voices so much and adopt harsh attitudes must simply be due to their exclusion and being kept under pressure. The situation of the lovers in the film is exactly like this. The hatred directed at LGBT individuals turns into counter-hatred. Then one can turn to LGBT individuals and say, “look, homosexuals are very aggressive.” A complete state of chaos. But the ones creating the chaos are not LGBT individuals. In the film too, the homophobia outside shapes the internal chaos of the two lovers.
The homosexuality theme and harsh divisions in the film, and the duo’s relationship with each other, also develop in this context. No matter how “gay” the duo is, they have to fit the “heteronormative” role society has cut out for them. I had said this is the reason for both an internal conflict and the two lovers’ conflict with each other. Maybe I fell into repetition, but sometimes I like repeating.
The “Key Point” of Sexual Orientations from Film to Reality
Countries that have found the “key point” of social peace are now focusing on artificial intelligence technologies and elevating humans, instead of dealing with gender roles. Dark countries, on the other hand, continue to remain in the darkness of human history with pressures on LGBT individuals and women. There is no place for them in the civilizations of the future. Fighting and conflict, interfering with another’s lifestyle, as I said, is entirely a “show of power and politics.” The first quarter of the 21st century is long over. We still haven’t been able to end the debates from hundreds of years ago.
The LGBT issue is now a topic humanity must leave behind. Beliefs, lifestyles, sexual orientations, races, and languages neither humiliate nor elevate a human. Grandeur is nothing other than realizing existence and making life valuable.
