The Isle / Saari
Seom
The Korean film The Isle has already won awards at several film festivals, and after seeing it, it is no wonder. The film is a hypnotic dive into the labyrinths of the human mind, where horror and beauty mix…
The Korean film The Isle has already won awards at several film festivals, and after seeing it, it is no wonder. The film is a hypnotic dive into the labyrinths of the human mind, where horror and beauty mix beautifully. It vaguely reminds us of the picturesqueness of Kwaidan. However, the reality of The Isle is much more brutal and cruel than its distant predecessor.
Hee-Jin is a beautiful but mute landlady of a fishing village, who sells fish bait and food by day, and herself by night to tired fishermen. The cottage village is actually a scattered collection of rafts floating on a pond, accessible only by Hee-Jin's boat. Many guests come there to spawn and others just to escape. Fishing is a substitute activity.
One day, one of the cottages is rented by a former police officer, Hyon-Shik, who has killed his wife in a fit of jealousy and is now running away from his colleagues. His lust for life has left him somewhere far away and soon the man attempts suicide. However, Hee-Jin intervenes and saves the man. This is the beginning of a sad and moving love story between them, which even the viewer does not believe will succeed.
The encounters of unstable people on the pond lead to conflicts, jealousy and violence. Hyon-Shik and Hee-Jin both grope in the reeds of hope and despair, and the film is teeming with truly gripping metaphors between humans and fish. The Isle does to fish what Amores Perros did to dogs. When the police arrive looking for Hyon-Shiki, he loses even the faintest shred of hope and attempts suicide by swallowing a bunch of fishing hooks and tearing them out of his gills.
Elsewhere, a self-absorbed businessman charms his girlfriend by filleting the sides of a live fish into sushi and releasing the fish's torso back into the pond. People don't seem to treat each other any better than fish do, and other people are mostly needed to be exploited. The message is very dark, but in the end, amidst the pain, you can also see positive messages if you look closely.
The Isle is a film that should be watched in silence and on the big screen. Its power comes from a multi-layered script, the kind you'd wish for more of these days; as well as from the wonderful cinematography and the beautifully chilling performance of the female lead (Seo Jeong). The Isle is a state of mind where it is possible to spend a moment, but after the film ends, there is a sense of relief that there is a way out of it.
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Format: DVD
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Age rating: 16
Genre / Product categories:
Draama Trilleri
Year: 2000
Audio track:
Korea
Subtitles:
Suomi Ruotsi Tanska Norja
Director:
Kim Ki-duk
Starring:
Kim Yu-seokSuh JungSeo WonSon Min-seokCho Jae-hyunJang Hang-seonHan Ji-SunYoon Hee-wonNo Jin-wonYang Young-JoChoe MinWoo Seung-yeupJeon Seon-hwaChoi Hye-kyeong
Added to the collection: 11.05.21 • Information edited: 08.11.25