World Language Resources

In the spring of 1992, Kim Dong-won, the film's director, met two long-term political prisoners who were charged with being communist spies from North Korea. During their 30 years in jail, the prisoners never gave up their allegiance to communism and North Korea. When they were finally released from prison, they began living in the Kim's neighborhood, and he became quite close with one of the prisoners, Cho Chang-son. Kim's film documents the former prisoners' return to mainstream Korean society and their campaign for repatriation

A sensitive, blue collar sad sack hopped up on conspiracy theories and sci-fi is convinced that aliens have infiltrated human society and are planning to destroy the planet at the next lunar eclipse. He sets out to kidnap his boss to torture him until he confesses to his alien identity and stops the invasion. Of course, it’s hard to confess to something that’s just a delusion in a sick man’s mind.

Yu-bong, a vagabond singer of Pansori lives with the boy Dong-ho and daughter, Song-hwa. He teaches Song-hwa Pansori music and Dong-ho the drum. They wander about singing Pansori for a living, but their lives get harder after the Korean War. With the influence of Western culture, Pansori gradually becomes less appreciated, and even despised. Dissatisfied with his miserable life, Dong-ho leaves home after having a dispute with Yu-bong, and brokenhearted Song-hwa refuses to sing Pansori.

Unable to afford proper care for his sister dying from kidney failure, Ryu turns to the black market to sell his own organs only to end up cheated of his life savings. His girlfriend urges Ryu to kidnap the daughter of wealthy industrialist Dong-jin, who recently laid him off. Ryu agrees, but unforeseen tragedies turn an innocent con into a merciless quest for revenge. Bound by their personal losses and deep-seated anger, the two men are thrust into a spiral of destruction.

Tae-jung and Seung-young are old junior high classmates. They are reunited when they are assigned to the same army base for their military duty. While Tae-jung is a sergeant near the end of his military service, Seung-young enters later as a private and has a hard time adjusting to military life, which is all about orders and obedience. Tae-jung, is a position of authority, is able to make Seung-young’s life easier, but even as time passes, Seung-young is still unable to adjust to the army routine and he becomes more isolated from his fellow soldiers. Even Tae-jung is constantly put in awkward situation because of him. Then, after Tae-jung has been discharged, Seung-young slowly starts to change…

A documentary film maker, Joung Ho-hyun documents her conflict with her mother after her father's death over how to dispose of some property he left them.

When Sang-woo's mother is forced to send him to live with his grandmother, Sang-woo is shocked at what he finds--a place without electricity, indoor plumbing or access to fast-food restaurants. Angry and confused, Sang-woo rejects his grandmother's attempts to please him. But, as time passes, the old woman's kindness begins to touch the young boy's heart--awakening curiosity, understanding, and finally, love.

The film offers a utopian place in which soldiers from the two Koreas and the United States are intertwined in a happy-go-lucky fashion during the Korean War. In November 1950, when the war was at its peak, the U.S. pilot named Smith crashes in Dongmakgol, a small village in the eastern part of the country. And Lee Su-hwa (Jung Jae-young) and other North Korean soldiers end up staying at the village, while Pyo Hyun-chul (Shin Ha-kyun) and another South Korean soldier broke away from the troops led by a villager and come to Dongmakgol. Since Dongmakgol is located in such a remote area, the villagers do not have any idea about the war that is ravaging the entire peninsula. What's more, they "welcome" any stranger regardless of their nationality, which confuses both South and North Korean soldiers. And the story revolves around the changes that eventually engulf the soldiers of different identities.

A young man living alone in his attic, wishes to publish a book of his dreams. He records his dreams on a small tape recorder, while he falls in and out of sleep. Then when he awakens, he writes of these dreams on paper. His dreams consist mainly of memories and recollections of his youth.