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We begin by watching a woman (played by Han Hyo-joo) waiting for someone. That someone is neither of the two men we soon begin watching watch her. They think she is a woman from their distant past who left their town for Seoul years ago and about whom they have heard nothing but rumors since. When they approach her, her hesitation leads them to believe that she is in fact who they claim she is. But she insists that she is not. Eventually they concede to her protests, but in a bit of a bind to find the daughter of a family friend so that his last dying wish is granted, one of them (played by Kim Yeong-min) pleads, implores, and startlingly close to demands, that she come with them anyway and lie that she is the man's daughter since she resembles the daughter enough that they believe she can fool the dying man.

Why would this woman go along with these strangers, particularly since one of them has serious anger management issues? Is she the woman they claim she is? Is she trying to get away from the person who later texts her a disturbing message? Or is it because, as much as they need a momentary surrogate for the dying man's daughter, she needs a surrogate for her own family? Although the premise may seem unbelievable at first, if you suspend that disbelief, your efforts will be rewarded at the end.

Based on a Japanese short story by Azuko Taira entitled "A Wonderful Day", Ad Lib Night is partly an ethical exploration. If the female protagonist is indeed lying, is it ethical to ask someone to lie for a dying wish? Is it ethical to lie for such a request? Through the positioning of the main lie we see the other lies of this family. The funeral wailing becomes just as much a performance as that asked of our main female protagonist. Yet, when her performance reaches its sublime moment in the film, we discover such can be more real at times than the truth.

The Ad Lib Night family we watch directly as they wait for the funeral to be given a reason to begin, and the family we listen in on indirectly through our main character's mobile phone, are not closely-knit families. The Ad Lib Night families are troubled and in some ways dysfunctional. As part of the famous quote from Anna Karenina goes, ". . . Every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." And director Lee Yoon-ki does a lovely job of fleshing out how this particular family is unhappy through the complaints announced as the disquieting night drags on towards the mo(u)rning.

As Darcy has noted, Ad Lib Night is one of those rare moments where the English title improves on the Korean title, "A Very Special Guest". For when one ad-libs, one is not lying in that one's interest is in presenting the opposite of truth as truth, nor is one bullshitting in that one is disinterested in the truth. Ad-libbing seeks to represent the proper feel of the moment without scripted lines. Yet it's important to underscore that while ad-libbing is 'unscripted', it is not un-studied. Quality ad-libbing, like improvisation, requires one to have familiarity with the topic at hand. And the comparison to acting in Ad-Lib Night is possibly what director Lee intends because our main character prepares for her performance by literally stepping into her character. Regardless of who our female protagonist is, she has experience in the failures of family. She has knowledge of the familiar family ache that resonates for some of us. And it is that echoing ache that floats prominently in Ad Lib Night, Lee's third film, showing us he has returned to the powerfully patient form that gripped many of us with his debut This Charming Girl.      (Adam Hartzell)

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