Release date: October 2008
Sang-gu lives in a peaceful village deep in Kangwon Province surrounded by murals painted by his now-dead father. When the village decides to tear down the decorated buildings so a company can construct a training institute, Sang-gu first protests then heads to Seoul, with his canine sidekick, to find out how to capture the murals on film before they are destroyed and to look for the mother of his good friend, Min-hee, a Russian mail-order bride who deserted her husband and daughter. Sang-gu begins to discover pieces of his father’s past—it’s an unusual one as his father had studied to make documentary films himself.
The director clearly had aspirations of making an art film, along the lines of Why did Bodhidharma go to the East? <달마가 동쪽으로 간 까닭은?> or Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... And Spring <봄여름가을겨울 그리고 봄>: with the vague storyline of the first and the grittiness of the second. The first highlight of the film was the dog … what an actor! Spoiler: the dog ends up as boshintong. The second was the repartee between the director of the film school and his assistant, played by veteran actors Yoon Je-moon and Choi Yeo-jin … what a hoot! My take: C
The dog (uncredited), Sang-gu (Kim
Young-chan), and Min-hee
(Rhonda Lee Zakutney) watch Sang-gu’s father’s
documentary footage on an ancient projector.
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