The Martyrs

In a hospital waiting room, a group of men arrive and meet one another. Choe, is the upbeat fellow who always thinks of the nation and its people. Cheon was wounded in the war and has fallen into despair. Then there's the dentist, run ragged by his hectic life. They commiserate over each man's lot in life and exchange stories about their love affairs.

A grandfather, his son, and grandson are all henpecked husbands. A comedy picturing these three henpecked men's lives at one family.

During the later years of Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910), Lim Kkeok-jeong, a butcher's son, stands up against the aristocrats' tyranny and helps displaced people live in peace at a village he has established. He also forms a chivalrous robbers' band to get rid of corrupt officials. He dedicates himself to saving people from misery and teaching a lesson to the aristocrats and corrupted officials.

A school teacher on a remote island has to convince skeptical parents to allow him to take his class of young children to Seoul to experience modern, urban civilization for the first time.

A detective searching for the cause of a young man's death uncovers a melodramatic story involving prostitutes and religion.

A man meets a woman on his hiking trip to Mountain Seorak, but she suffers from incurable diseases. He becomes infatuated with her hair. When he tells her about his feeling she promises him that she would leave her hair after she dies as part his heritage for the man. But when he looks for her later she is already dead, and her hair was already sold to another person. He meets another woman he becomes intimate with, but finds that she is his biological mother.

This film is a compilation of three short horror stories. They include a story of a wife ghost who was separated by death with her husband. She met him after praying for meeting a husband for 100 days. The wife ghost finally leads him to death. In the second story, a ghost of a dead wife who is jealousy of her husband's love of a barmaid sets them on fire. In the third, a male ghost tests a chaste woman's will not to be tempted by men.

This film concentrates on a group of people who have trouble adjusting to mainstream society. From a woman running away from her previous life, to a man with a terminal disease, to a pop artist misunderstood by his contemporaries, the film looks on with sympathy and compassionate humor on a set of people who, for whatever reason, just don’t fit in.

Two brothers—Cheol-ho, an accountant with a toothache and a pregnant wife, and Yong-ho, an unemployed ex-soldier wounded in battle—navigate life in post-war Korea.

Natasha, an officer at the Soviet Embassy in North Korea, is in love with Seok-bong. But Seok-bong has already planned his wedding with Bok-hui. Natasha grows jealous and threatens Bok-hui to leave somewhere else. Meanwhile Bok-hui's brother, Tae-yeong, is executed after participating in an anti-communist march. Seok-bong is accused of taking a part in the march. Seok-bong starts to feel pessimistic about his communist belief. He tries an escape to the South, but he is captured by the authority and executed.

A man wanders around the mountains with a bleeding leg, holding a rifle in his hand. Seemingly a fugitive, he runs from as-yet unknown pursuers, but he also seems to be following somebody who has already walked the same path. As he hides in a secluded cave, past memories sweep through his exhausted mind, memories of lifelong cowardice and evasion. And this recollection leads to a reconstruction of early 20th century Korean history. Winner of Best Picture (Nam-a Pictures Co., Ltd.), Best Actor (Ha Myung-joong), Best Art Direction (Kim Yoo-joon), Best Lighting (Son Young-cheol) at the 14th Grand Bell Awards. (source: Jiro Hong, koreanfilm.org)

The professors' wife lives as abused mentally by her husband. One day the couple goes climbing with a young man, who works for a pharmaceutical company and often visits them on business. While they scales a cliff holding a rope, her husband under them loses his footing and falls down. When they all are about to fall, she cut the rope, so the husband died in a fall. She stands at the bar, but the court decides the case is an emergency evacuation. So she obtains an acquittal, but murderous intent in her mind must work on her.

During the Korean War in early 1950s, mother’s family comes and stays at Dong-man’s house. His uncle on father’s side is a North Korean partisan and the uncle on mother’s side dies while fighting as South Korean soldier. For this reason, his grandmothers don’t get alone. Dong-man tells a stranger that his partisan uncle is home and his father gets arrested.

Leaving prison in hopes of reuniting with his lover, a man finds instead that she has married his childhood rival, a now-crooked businessman.

Bun-rye, the eldest daughter in a poor family, is violated by Yong-pal, who is a married man, and out of desperation she becomes a concubine of Young-cheol, a gambler who is impotent. Kong Jo-shi is in love with Bun-rye, though she still has feelings for Yong-pal. After losing his money, Young-cheol takes out his anger on Bun-rye and throws her out of his house. In retaliation, Jo-shi kills Young-cheol, and Bun-rye is driven to madness.