Romances end in blood and the frail hopes of individuals are torn apart in a vile karmic continuity of colonialism, civil war and occupation. After surviving Japanese colonization, Korea became the first war zone of the Cold War. The legacy of war remains today in this divided country. In a small town on the outskirts of an American military base in South Korea, three teenagers, Chank-guk, Jihum and Eunok struggle to find their way in the violent wake of the Korean War. Chang-guk, the son of a Korean barmaid, longs to travel to America to find the soldier father who abandoned him. Timid Ji-hum can’t deal with his boastful, disabled veteran father. And withdrawn Eunok, blinded in one eye by a sibling’s prank, falls for James, a U.S. soldier, who promises to pay for restorative surgery. These three teenagers are the figures in the landscape of this story, which highlights the global implications of a very Korean reality. None of them is able to escape the withering pull of tragedy. All lives collide as each one’s hope and longing for a better future returns upon them like a letter returned stamped in red with “Address Unknown”.Read More »
