Discoveries from South Korea World Cinema

A phone has fallen in love with his owner. But she does not live as he wishes. He is confused, but continues to love her.

Jin-sik, Kang-young, and Eung-il were living like losers in a semi-basement room. Then one day, an unknown delivery box falls at the door of this room. When Eung-il opens the box, Point Man, a four-dimensional monster, pops out with a Penrose triangle. The Point Man unilaterally informs them that a contract has been signed with the Galactic Federal Lone Star Lifespan Bank, but when they refuse to sign the contract, the Point Man kidnaps Jin-sik, Kang-young, and Eung-il into space with their house. They fight desperately with the point man to return to Earth...

Informally known as Baseco Compound, Port Area in Manila is the biggest urban poor community in the Philippines. Children living in the Baseco compound are left behind in abject poverty without proper care and education. WMC, the missionary community led by Shin Seung-cheol, goes to Baseco Compound and provide warm food and medical care while teaching children skills like baking. This documentary features their journey of hope and compassion.

Nana and her co-workers realize that their repeated weekends at work and overtime is wrong. They decide to do something fun instead of working overtime and they start to knit. They break down a worn out shirt to use as thread and color the city. They make a plan to 'terrorize the city' at night when everyone's asleep but it's not that easy. Nana thinks of a way to bring change to their lives and thinks of making a social company labor board.

Yeon-joo despises herself. She can't help picking a fight. She pushes people away even when she doesn't want to. Also, being a lesbian doesn't help the fact that she hates herself either. After a little talk with Mom gone terribly wrong, Yeon-joo attempts to kill herself. Unfortunately, sudden appearance of teacher and Ji-oh (who seem to be in a suspicious relationship), and interruption of Illuminati kid’s mysterious rituals, Yeon-joo's suicide attempt doesn't go as planned.

Young Yu-jin likes The X-Files and keeps a diary written in a secret code.

A kid full of fear. A gun aimed to the head of the kid. The gun held by his mother. The tension between him and her. She is about to trigger the gun.

22nd of August, 1945. Japan lost the war and they loaded an 8,000 person Joseon laborer force onto a ship called the Ukisima to take them to the Busan Port. However, the ship sunk into the water due to an unknown blast. This is the story of thousands of Joseon people who dreamed of returning to their families and how they died.

Although an initial match-making attempt between Pyongho and Saebyol through their grandparents is unsuccessful, the two are brought together by fate to participate in the Pyongyang spring fashion show. Modelling both the fashion and the virtues of a wedding couple, their families convene to judge the potential unity. However, tradition versus the foreign influence seeping into society becomes the theme as misunderstandings come to create drama between the two families and the young couple

Nazaré, Portugal—home to the world’s most colossal waves. Once driven by a relentless pursuit of success, former Korean national surfer Cho Jun-hee turned toward these legendary swells while standing at the edge of his life. Starting with nothing, he braved the towering waves without jet skis or rescue teams, facing the terror of a near-death experience. Now, with a dedicated team and equipment by his side, he prepares for his third and most daring attempt yet. This is his journey to conquer Nazaré's waves.

Seventeen-year-old Mi-jin dreams of a life different from her selfish, immature mother who had caused her childhood trauma. Her mother returns home after seven months, pregnant with no plan whatsoever. Mi-jin's pathetic friend Tae-gu who had dropped out of school and works as a karaoke part-timer keeps bothering her. To refresh her mind, she plans to go on a trip with her other friend Sujeong with the money earned from a part-time job, but they get scammed.

Raised by her divorced father, Hye-suk is a little on the wild side. She steals money in order to buy instruments to form a band after dropping out of school. However, she soon needs more money to get her band booked in clubs, so she begins to pawn her father's antiques until a suspicious pawnbroker reports her to the police.

A night owl sculptor and an early riser delivery man are neighbors divided by a thin wall. Their conflict over noise levels escalates into a war, in which each ends up trashing his own apartment, leading to an unexpected end.

Sang-eun comes to Seoul with land papers to raise money for a business. Two malefactors, trying to steal these documents, fight among themselves.

“Music needs no words. It communicates for itself.” The film is a story of a viola player, Richard Yongjae O’Neill, who overcame the discrimination he had experienced due to his multicultural background. Along with children from other multicultural families, they all learn to communicate through music.

Reframing the farmers’ movement in Jeon-Nam Province with a reconstruction of interviews and events.

When Seung-woo was young, he was left in his mother's friend Yeon-soon's house due to his father's sudden bankruptcy and met Yeon-soo's daughters Dong-hee and Ga-hee. With everything gone overnight, Seung-woo spends every day meaninglessly in a small attic room but is comforted by Ga-hee who is like a mother, a sister and a lover. He starts developing feelings for her while writing poems and reading books with sounds of piano played by Ga-hee in the background. It's been a year since Seung-woo stayed in that house, then one cold winter night, he leaves behind a note thanking the lady for everything. Thirteen years later, Seung-woo, Dong-hee and Ga-hee reunite but he's become a corrupted 32-year old addicted to smoking, drinking and women. The two girls can't help but be shocked at the way he turned out.

Dong-min, an art major who is completely colorblind, must submit an assignment on his favorite color. As he works on the project with his crush, Kyung-jun, he struggles to grasp the sky blue that Kyung-jun loves. In the process, Dong-min begins to listen to his own heart.

The story of Jae-seung, who lost his father, a photographer, during the May 18 incident, follows in his father's footsteps and becomes a photographer. The story of the art of photography, conflicts with people, and love.

Lim Jaechun, who worked as a factory worker for 30 years and was suddenly laid off, spent 10 years in a tent as a sit-in. Director Lee Soojung calls her ‘sister J’. 10 years into the fight for reinstatement, Jaechun now writes, plays guitar, and sings while living in a tent. She says her personality has changed after 7 years of being laid-off from “originally timid” to being very lively. Sister J deals with a struggle for reinstatement, but it is actually a film about a single person, as stated in the title. This documentary brings artistic vitality to the ‘4,464 days’ Sister J spends on the site, with lines and music driven from the forms of the play into the cinema.

There is no such thing as a pervert. Everyone has different tastes and meeting someone who accepts that can develop into the most beautiful couple. This film takes Mayleen, a woman, with a hand fetish, and Min-guk who has a foot fetish, to portray a story of normal people with not so normal sexual tastes.

Nuzabar from Kazakhstan, burdened with guilt over his young son's death, flees to Korea in an attempt to escape his past. However, he eventually contemplates ending his life. In a twist of fate, he saves a young boy in danger, prompting him to confront his past emotions and seek forgiveness.

High school girl Ryeo Won is not happy about having Baek Young who has short hair, wears uniform pants, and acts all tough as her seatmate. She is unsure if Baek Young is a lesbian or a transgender, but she doesn’t understand why “she acts like a boy.” Whether Baek Young knows how Ryeo Won feels or not, she starts opening up to her.

Two lonely souls spark the flame of love in this unlikely romance. Leaving his lavish corporate job to become a street painter, Siun starts managing a run-down house. where he meets Mijung, a financially struggling woman forced into prostitution. Together, Siun and Mijung come closer in a difficult time.

Documentary about a worker who spent his entry life constructing building.

Dong-hyuk's grandfather leaves him a mansion in his will. Dong-hyuk returns to Korea to take care of the place. However, he almost loses his life in the mansion. Every time he is in danger, Dong-hyuk escapes danger by the power of the Buddhist relic his mother gave him. Dong-hyuk goes to see the head Buddhist priest at Dae-rim Temple. Buddhist priest Dae-wu tells Dong-hyuk that his grandfather had some servants killed in the basement for not revealing that his mistress and his aide were having an affair. The enraged souls of the servants are causing this danger. Buddhist priest Dae-wu urges Dong-hyuk to leave but Dong-hyuk stays. The spirits are unable to approach Dong-hyuk because of his Buddhist relic. So they transform themselves into Dong-hyuk's fiancee and steal the relic. When the spirits threaten Dong-hyuk, Buddhist priest Dae-wu prepares to fight them.

Living Euljiro traces the neglected losses of those living within a centuries-old district of maze-like alleys at the heart of Seoul. Through intimate encounters and textured observation, it creates a mosaic of perspectives exploring memory, identity, and resistance—revealing the human cost of a relentless urban Masterplan beyond a binary narrative of gentrification.

Tomato plant is growing at a school. Nobody knows where it's from, but they all give water and wish every different thing to the plant. Will they be able to meet the tomato?

On a rainy day, an old man is sweating his guts out putting a mysterious device up the ceiling.

Model, Seong-min, falls in love with Eun-ju who is a hallucinating kleptomaniac suffering from memory blackouts. Seong-min learns that Eun-ju's husband had murdered her fiance long ago and forced Eun-ju to marry him with threats of death. Seong-min becomes determined to rescue her but he may not survive her husband's fury or Eun-ju's own mental state.

Choreographer Nam Jeongho's Pallae: Womanhood Story premiered in 1993. Five female dancers spend the night washing clothes and bathing together at the wash place, which is the backdrop stage, for the performance of Pallae in 2021.

This literary adaptation tells the story of Oh Mong-nyeo, a young woman living with her stepfather in a seaside village. When men in the village attempt to rape her, she escapes by boat with her boyfriend to seek a better life elsewhere.

Nam-Soo (Son Hyeon-Ju) is a powerful high ranking gangster. One day, Nam-Soo is diagnosed with cancer and learns he is dying. Nam-Soo is shocked, but then starts to look for a nursing home where he can die peacefully. Meanwhile, Nam-Soo looks for Young-Chae (Jo Mi-Ryung), the girlfriend of his friend Jong-Kil. In the past, Young-Chae and Jong-Kil were about to get married, but Nam-Soo killed Jong-Ki. Nam-Soo finds Young-Chae living with her daughter. She runs a small lodge in Kangwan province. Young-Chae and her daughter don't have much money and Nam-Soo feels a heavy sense of guilt ...

Jimin is a three-time test taker who hopes to go to an acting school. She asks her acting teacher, Bokyum, to do a farewell skit to break up with her boyfriend.

The kid suffers from _____________.

A performance held in Chuncheon celebrates the 50th anniversary of the debut of the mime artist Yu Jin-gyu. The film breathlessly follows what happens before and after the performance – from rehearsals to the after party, interviews and filming. some point out that jin-gyu’s art has changed, while others try and surmise where his desires are directed. jin-gyu reflects on ‘the poetic expression of desire’ through mime and prepares to move forward.

A residence event is held to support visual artists. Both local and foreign artists gather at this faraway location. They begin to lodge at the accommodation that used to be a cattle shed in a pear orchard. As the day of the exhibition draws near, fans gather at this residence, among them a young woman named 'Yul-li.' Artists disappear one by one, making the residence spookier than ever.

Kim Youngju, a corporate contractor, does not receive the usual holiday gift from work so dearly prized by her parents.

On a summer night in a residential Seoul neighborhood, a delivery person moves slowly in the dark between rows of closed doors, waiting for a ping to inform them of their next destination.

Ki-cheol, who spends all his tuition while trying to look good to Sook-i, a girl who loves her unrequited love , starts his first part-time job (?). Ki-cheol, who unexpectedly leaves Seoul, gets caught up in all sorts of twists and turns… Will Ki-cheol be able to return home safely?

On a crossroad between forgiveness and revenge, the audience are asked to make a decision. Through LEE Su-A's life, we wanted to portray the harshness of reality. What choice will the love-lost LEE Su-A make, stuck between despair and hope? Condemned with unfortunate events.. her saving grace is love. People and love.

Professor Song, staying in Germany, was suspected of espionage and banned from Korea. Now he's expecting to visit Korean after 33 years. The Border City', by whech Berlin was called during the period of partition, could also be a name for Seoul naw that the city is haunted by the 'red complex' and refuses Prof. Song to come back to his homeland.