London Korean Links

Covering things Korean in London and beyond since 2006

A look back at LEAFF and LKFF 2023

We didn’t get around to writing any detailed reviews of the films that screened at the two big festivals in the autumn of 2023, so it’s time to try to pull some thoughts together before the memories fade entirely, jostled sideways by new ones. There were some sparkly new films which were fun to watch … [Read More]

Love without Boundaries: Oasis

One of LKL’s films of the noughties screens as the final movie in the Love without Boundaries season. Oasis (오아시스) Director: Lee Chang-dong (2002, 132 mins) Cast: Moon So-ri, Sul Kyung-gu, Ahn Nae-sang Thursday 8 August 2019, 7pm @KCCUK | Book here Jong-du (Sul Kyung-gu, Memoir of a Murderer), introduced to the viewer as he … [Read More]

Review: 1987 – When the Day Comes

1987: When the Day Comes is one of those movies which could not have been made a couple of years ago. It would have got the director and its all-star cast included on the infamous blacklist of suspected lefties who would not get government support in future. And to have the director of this film … [Read More]

LKFF 2018 Teaser Screening #2: Memoir of a Murderer

The second LKFF2018 Teaser screening is Won Shin-yeon’s adaptation of Kim Young-ha’s Memoir of a Murderer: Memoir of a Murderer (살인자의 기억법) Dir Won Shin-yeon (2017, 118min) With Sol Kyung-gu, Kim Nam-gil, Kim Seol-hyun Monday 21 May 2018, 7pm | Regent Street Cinema | Book tickets Serial killers are popular figures in South Korean cinema, … [Read More]

Film review: Memoir of a Murderer

Memoir of a Murderer asks us to step inside the mind of someone who is losing his memory, a sufferer of Alzheimer’s disease. The movie opens with a scene focusing on the face of a gaunt and aged-looking Sol Kyung-gu as single dad Kim Byung-soo. As we watch, his face begins to twitch. At first … [Read More]

Festival Film reviews: we also went to…

We’ve almost finished clearing the London Korean Film Festival backlog, the only major review outstanding now being Park Chan-kyong’s fascinating documentary Manshin. While I’m polishing that, here are a few brief reviews of the films I didn’t feel moved to write dedicated articles about. Han Gong-ju A heavy and depressing story redeemed by the sensitive … [Read More]

Brief film review: Hope / Wish (Lee Jun-ik, 2013)

One of the more anticipated films of the 2013 London Korean Film Festival was Lee Jun-ik’s Hope, a harrowing family drama examining the long-term effects caused by the traumatic sexual assault on a young girl by a construction worker near her school. It’s a powerful film which one won’t watch for pleasure, or indeed watch … [Read More]

Lee Chang-dong’s Oasis screens at the KCC

Lee Chang-dong’s Oasis figures in most people’s list of top ten Korean films of all time, or at least of the first decade of this century: a compelling storyline which is both moving and shocking, with stand-out performances from Sol Kyung-gu and Moon So-ri. It will be screening this Thursday at the KCC as part … [Read More]