Bakha Satang
South Korea,
2000, 129 min
Shown in 2001
CREDITS
- dir
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Lee Chang-dong
- prod
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Myung Kaynam, Makoto Ueda
- scr
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Lee Chang-dong
- cam
-
Kim Hyung-koo
- editor
-
Kim Hyun
- mus
-
Lee Jae-jin
- cast
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Sol Kyung-gu, Moon So-ri, Kim Yeo-jin
- source
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Cine Click Asia, 135-28C, 3rd Floor Inkline Bldg. 891-37, Seoul, South Korea. Fax: 82-2-538-0479
-
COMMENTS
Lee Chang-dong in person.
OTHER
Peppermint Candy begins at a reunion picnic of old friends, under a railroad bridge on the banks of a river. A strange, disturbed man stumbles into the party and is recognized as Yongho, a long-lost member of the group. As his old pals look on in horror, Yongho screams, “I’m going back!” and steps in front of an oncoming train. And then we rewind, as Yongho’s life unfolds backward in time, reversing through 20 years of a life both harrowing and ordinary—backward through a failed business and marriage, his years as a vicious cop and scared soldier, backward to sweet, dreamy youth and a world of promise. Writer/director Lee Chang-dong, who dazzled us with his debut film Green Fish, again proves to be one of Korea’s great new talents with this ingenious and audacious reverse time trip. Everyman Yongho’s troubled journey parallels two decades of Korea’s turbulent history, the beginning of his disillusionment arising during the massacre of student demonstrators in Kwangju in 1980. Anchored by the extraordinary performance of newcomer Sol Kyung-gu as Yongho, Peppermint Candy is a tough but tenderhearted portrait of a lost soul embittered by his society’s worst mistakes and his own bad choices.
—Tod Booth
FACTOID #384
Henry Fonda attended the SFIFF in 1967 to receive a tribute for his work in classics like The Grapes of Wrath and 12 Angry Men. Daughter Jane showed up in 1975 for a tribute of her own. And her brother Peter made two Festival appearances, one as a guest in 1963 and another to accompany the film Nadja (in which he gleefully portrayed Dr. Van Helsing) in 1995.
