Didn’t you know beforehand how the world of men is? Sometimes we have to let go of the things we like.

An orphaned boy is raised by an old hermit on a small barge in the middle of a scenic, mountain lake where he learns about the cycle of life and death.

For an overview of critical interpretations of the film’s symbolism, see Green and Mun’s 2019 article, “Representing Buddhism through Mise-en-scène, Diegesis, and Mimesis” (IJBTC 29.1).