The movie official poster. note
Je t’aime plus qu’hier mais moins que demain.note
— Quote from L' éternelle chanson by Rosemonde Gérard, used in the movie and the trailer.
— Quote from L' éternelle chanson by Rosemonde Gérard, used in the movie and the trailer.
A year after Burn the Stage (which chronicled the WINGS Tour in 2017), Korean group BTS brings us another Rockumentary film, now chronicling the LOVE YOURSELF Tour from 2018. Like the Burn the Stage movie, Bring the Soul was an event release, opening in cinemas worldwide in August 7th, 2019.
This documentary film differs from Burn the Stage by taking on a Lighter and Softer tone and a wildly different approach. While Burn the Stage had more traits of a film essay and reflected on the fleetingness of fame and happiness, Bring the Soul is far more straightforward, starting with the BTS members settling to dine in a hotel in Paris the day after the last concert of the tour, and jumping back and forth from there to the chronological events of the LOVE YOURSELF Tour as the members reminisce about them in their dinner conversation.
Some weeks later, a documentary miniseries of the same name was released on the Weverse app, where the film is also available.
The Bring The Soul movie contains examples of:
- Bait-and-Switch: There's a sequence that goes back and forth between SUGA brainstorming for songs in his hotel room while Jungkook agonizes over something he's working on (that appears to be a song) in his own room, with the sequence having themes of the difficulties of the creative process. Finally, Jungkook shows what he was making... which is a cute digital drawing of his dog.
- Big "WHAT?!": V is told by SUGA that many people say V and Jungkook look similar. His reaction is an indignant version of this trope.
- Conversation Cut: A rather inspired variation occurs during the dinner - some members start imitating how other members speak in their concert speeches, and Jungkook starts mocking SUGA's overuse of Dramatic Pauses:Jungkook: (imitating SUGA) It's so hot, ARMY! Because...
(cut to SUGA onstage in a concert)
SUGA: ... of you. - Dramatic Pause:
- How SUGA does his concert speeches, which Jungkook mocks during the dinner.
- j-hope also does this with his "I'm your hope, you're my hope, I'm j-hope!" Catchphrase, which Jungkook also mocks in the same scene.
Jungkook: I'm your hooope...
(pause, holds up hand in an exaggerated manner to shush the "fans")
You're my hooope...
(does it again)
I'm JAY-!
(points mic towards the "audience") - Food Porn: The members have some really, really nice food in the hotel.
- Fun with Acronyms: In the same vein as Burn The Stage, Bring The Soul. Some subtitles in other languages added their own
versions of the title while also fitting the acronym pattern, such as "Brinda Tu Ser" ("offer your being") in Spanish. - Gilligan Cut: While the members are about to leave the venue after a concert, Jungkook is told to hurry up, to which he answers he'll just eat one more snack. Cute to a minute or so later, where he's still eating - until Jimin yells at him.
- Groupie Brigade: Averted! We get a scene of j-hope walking around the streets in Berlin when a fan approaches. She asks if he's on "important business" and, when he says yes, she easily leaves him be.
- How We Got Here: The documentary starts with the members settling for dinner in a Paris hotel the night after the last concert of the LOVE YOURSELF Tour of 2018. From then it cuts back and forth from the dinner to the chronological events of the tour while the members reminisce about them.
- A smaller one happens for the London section of the tour, which opens with the concert starting and the members entering the stage... except that Jungkook is sitting on a chair, not doing the choreography with the rest. Cut to a few hours earlier, explaining what happened. He got a nasty cut on his ankle, and was offered to be sent to a doctor (which would have made him miss the concert). He refused, and sang in the concert anyway while being on a chair onstage the entire time.
- Lighter and Softer: Than the Burn The Stage movie. While its predecessor was far more poetic and melancholic, with even some comedic moments being underscored by poetic narrations about the fleetingness of moments of happiness, Bring The Soul is far more straightforward in its presentation of events, with Burn The Stage's narrator being left out entirely in favor of the informal dinner banter of the members.
- Line-of-Sight Name: At one point, SUGA shows some of his songs that are still works in progress, mentioning that the working title of one of them - which he made in Chile while on tour in 2017 - is "Chile, I'm hungry". This song would turn out to be "Honsool" from his mixtape D-2, released in 2020.
- Mundane Made Awesome: During the opening montage, the montage (set to rock music) of the members traveling and arriving to Paris also treats us to several gritty shots of the members eating.
- Shout-Out: The film uses the quote "Je t’aime plus qu’hier mais moins que demain" ("I love you more than yesterday, but less than tomorrow", which is taken from a quote from the poem The Eternal Song by Rosemonde Gérard. Prior to the release of the film, V had used the quote in the concert in Paris (which took place the day before the dinner we see in the movie) and his tweet right afterwards thanking French ARMYs
. The original quote is:For you see, each day I love you more
Today more than yesterday and less than tomorrow.
