My Beautiful Days (Korea, 2002)

Directed by: Im Jong-Jae

Starring: Kim Hyung-Sung, Pang Eun-Jin, Boyun Eun-Jung, Kim Min-Sun


Overlooked on its release, but already being rapidly re-evaluated, MY BEAUTIFUL DAYS is all about those years between leaving college and starting life when nothing seems to be happening but time keeps slipping away. Old age is ahead of you, an ill-remembered youth is behind, and what are you going to do with the rest of your life? 

Just finishing up his government service as a parking lot attendant, Jun-I (Kim Hyung-Sung, Resurrection of the Little Match Girl), is unable to get a grip on anything he¹s doing. He spends his days directing traffic and having a desultory affair with a married woman; at night he works at a dry cleaners owned by an older man, hiding from problems of his own, who¹s also named Jun-I. He runs into an ex-girlfriend and her little sister; incidents accumulate, emotions build, and it all comes off like real life: there¹re no dramatic climaxes, nothing you can put your finger on and say "There! That¹s where it all changed." But there¹s no mistaking this movie for anything other than an urgent call to stop worrying about the water temperature and get in the pool.

Sink or swim, it¹s your life and you better start living it.  Impeccable acting, and the firm, sure hand of an auteur at the helm, MY BEAUTIFUL DAYS is a quick sip of bitter medicine to cure the ironic distance that ails you.