Korean Autumn… Kokdu: A Story of Guardian Angels & London Korean Film Festival 2019 1st-24th November

Kokdu is the latest film from director Kim Tae-yong, probably best known for Memento Mori (1999) and Late Autumn (2010) and who also curated the restoration of Korea’s oldest surviving feature, Crossroads of Youth (1934) – as seen in London earlier this year.

It’s a charming mix of traditional Korean theatre based on the myth of the Kokdu, four supernatural spirits who guide the dead to their destination in the afterlife. The action is split between live action in “reality” and a spectacular theatrical production with the two gradually becoming one as the film progresses.

Two children, Su-min (Kim Su-an) and Dong-min (Choi Go) trade their grandmother’s flowery shoes for a puppy they discover at the market but when the latter (Park Jeong-suk), is taken seriously ill, they try to retrieve her shoes and take them to hospital. The children follow a trail to the junk dealers’ site and, spotting the shoes deeply buried, fall down after them only to emerge backstage at a theatre where their mother (Park Mi-hyen) is directing a Kokdu show.

In the grand tradition of Oz, the play’s the thing but Tae-yong keeps his fantasies balanced throughout maintaining a firm grip on his poignant narrative to the elegiac end.

‘I am an entertainer Kokdu. I’ll cry and laugh with you, comfort you through the journey.’

On stage the children are greeted by four Kokdu; the Caregiver (Cho Hee-bong), the Guide (Shim Jae-hyun), the Guard (Park Sang-ju) and Entertainer (Lee Ha-kyoung) all are new to their roles and so nervous about apparently having to escort children to their after-life they decide that the best policy is to fib a bit and play along with the pretence of finding grandma’s shoes which, no doubt, when clicked together under the incantation “there’s no place like home” may well return you to reality.

Traditional gugak music is used throughout and as per its stage origins, the story was originally performed live at the National Gugak Center in Seoul, generating record ticket sales, the film has spectacular theatrical routines as the children head towards Heaven or Hell and Grandma, waking in hospital, heads out towards them…

The children with Caregiver, Guide, Entertainer and Guard 

The two children give wonderful performances beyond their years and the Kokdu are excellent value too, especially Lee Ha-kyoung who dances superbly and Cho Hee-bong who's dynamically funny in any language. Entertaining for all ages, I found the film very moving – we never stop preparing ourselves for grief and processing it once it has arrived: and fairy tales have always served that purpose.

The film was screened as part of the programme launch of the London Korean Film Festival which runs from 1^st to 14^th November in London before touring across a further six cities from 18^th to 24^th. Now in its 14^th year the festival will highlight 100-years of Korean cinema with UK and International premieres, guests and events across a diverse set of strands.

The Seashore Village

The festival’s Opening Gala on 1st November with a UK premier of a restored The Seashore Village (1965) a story of a young woman, Hae-soon, living in a village heavily populated by women who have lost their husbands at sea. The film’s director Kim Soo-yong is now in his 90s will be present to discuss the film, his career and the rich history of Korean film.

Special Focus: A Century of Korean Cinema picks up from the LKFF’s superb collaboration with BFI earlier this year featuring pivotal titles exploring the nation’s rich cinematic history and incorporating UK and European premiere film screenings of culturally-important retrospective titles, many newly restored, and introduced by leading filmmakers and critics from Korea and the UK, along with Q&As, forums, workshops and unique events. 

The oldest film to feature in the Special Focus programme is Yun Yong-gyu’s melodrama A Hometown in Heart (1949) and there will be a focus on films from the 60s including Aimless Bullet (1961)from Yu Hyun-mok, a key figure of the period, which I’m told is a powerful, downbeat view of postwar struggle told with style and substance. A Woman Judge (1962), the second ever film from a woman director, Hong Eun-won also looks another highlight featuring the struggles of a young woman to break the mould and become a judge.

Aimless Bullet

The strand continues with key films from the 80’s and 90’s an era when Korean cinema finally started to gain more international recognition with directors like Hong Sangsoo, whose The Day a Pig Fell into a Well (1996) sounds too good to miss, Lim Soon-rye, her debut, the satire Three Friends (1996) is on show, and Lee Chang-dong whose second work Peppermint Candy (1999), portrays a tragic personal story which reflects on Korean society as a whole. 

The Cinema Now strand showcases the best of contemporary Korean cinema with a diverse line-up including some of Korea’s finest recent titles, including festival sensations and domestic box office hits from the past year most of which are UK and European premiers.

Presented by the LKFF in conjunction with the Barbican’s Hidden Figures film programme, there is a celebration of renowned director Ha Gil-jong, one of Korean cinema’s most iconoclastic auteurs from the early 70s – when censorship was strict - to date. The March of Fools (1975), Ha’s best-known film, is among those screened and shows how he was able to use a college comedy to reflect on the prevailing dictatorship of the time.

The Day a Pig Fell in a Well

Women’s Voices celebrates the work of first-time women directors with four films: Cha Sung-duk’s Youngju (2018, UK Premiere), Ahn Ju-young’s A Boy and Sungreen (2018, International Premiere), Shim Hyejung’s A Bedsore (2019, International Premiere) and Young Sun Noh’s intimate documentary Yukiko (2018, UK Premiere).

The Documentary strand highlights the work of two of the country’s political film collectives which developed in the 1980s, the Seoul Film Collective, who from 1982 to 1987 produced a number of films that contributed to the collective social and political reform movement and the collective Jangsangotmae whose film The Night Before the Strike (1990) was banned and had to be shown illicitly.

The Animation strand will showcase a classic Korean animated film from Shin Dong-Hun, a pioneer in Korean animation, A Story of Hong Gil-dong (1967) one film Disney will not be re-creating as live action.

Full details of these and the other strands, Artist Video and Mise-en-scène Shorts, are set out on the festival’s website: it’s going to be a richly rewarding November!