Vintage Korean Cinema on every third Thursday of each month! The Korea Society will be screening films from the golden age of Korean cinema in the 1950s and ‘60s.

Movies will be screened at The Korea Society in midtown Manhattan (950 Third Avenue, 8^th Floor.)

January 18, 6:30 PM
운명의 손 (The Hand of Destiny) 1954
B&W, 85 min.
Director: Han Hyeong-Mo
Casting: Lee Hyang, Yoon In-Ja, Joo Seon-Tae

One of the first Korean films to be made after the end of the war, director Han Hyeong-Mo explored the painful and gritty realities of a freshly divided Korea with his 1954 romantic drama The Hand of Destiny. Jung-Ae (played by Yoon In-Ja) is a North Korean spy who keeps her cover by working as a barmaid. Almost by accident she saves the life of Young-Chul, a simple South Korean laborer. Love blossoms, but the deeper it grows, the more complicated and painful Jung-Ae's espionage becomes.

February 15, Madame Freedom (1956)

자유부인 (Madame Freedom)
B&W, 125 min. 1956
Directed by Han Hyeong-Mo
Starring Park Am, Kim Jeong-Rim, Yang Mi-Hee and Lee Min

One of the Korean film industry's biggest hits of the 1950s, Madame Freedom was a commerical landmark that proved quiet, socially-relevant dramas could fill theaters. Madame Freedom was also one of the most controversial films of the period, raising hot-button issues about women's role in society and the changing nature of Korean culture.

When Oh Sun-Young (played by Kim Jung-Rim) asks her husband Jae Tae-yoon (Park Am) for permission to work outside their home, in a store that sells Western products, a host of questions come up that can't be ignored.

March 15, Flower in Hell (1958)

지옥화 (Flower in Hell)
B&W, 100 min. 1958
Directed by Shin Sang-Ok
Starring Kim Hak, Choi Eun-Hee and Cho Hae-Won

The first Korean movie to show an on-screen kiss, Shin Sang-Ok's classic drama Flower in Hell might ruffle contemporary audiences for a different reason. Seoul in 1958-it's setting-is a world away from the gleaming, high-tech metropolis it is today. Opening documentary footage shows a desperately poor post-war Korea, one where the only way to survive to is to forge shady relationships with the U.S. soldiers.

Young-Sik is trying to get ahead in this grim environment. Living in a red light district, he makes a living robbing American military warehouses. Things are looking up when he meets Sonya, a young woman who makes him think of marriage. But she might prove the undoing of the gang's biggest heist.

April 19, Sam-Ryong the Mute (1964)

벙어리 삼룡이 (Sam-Ryong the Mute)
B&W, 86 min, 1964
Directed by Shin Sang-Ok
Starring Kim Jin-Gyu, Choi Eun-Hee and Park No-Shik

Under a traditional feudal system, Sam-Ryong, a mute farm-hand, lives obediently for his master. When he falls in love with the master's daughter-in-law, he finds courage to fight against society's conventions and to win her love. Critics praised the final scene of the film, in which the house burns, as a work of pioneering and experimental film making. It won the Grand Bell (Daejong) Award in 1965 for Best Picture.


May 17, A Seashore Village (1965)











A Seashore Village may start out like the 2000 George Clooney blockbuster The Perfect Storm — a band of rural fisherman set out to sea on a fated trip—but it quickly becomes something much thicker.

Journeying into a dark moral thicket, A Seashore Village follows Sang-soo, the lucky fisherman who managed to avoid his comrades’ fate. Sang-soo wants to do more than provide solace to Hae-soon, the widow of one of his crewmates. The only thing more transgressive than his feelings for her are hers for him.

June 27, A Road to Return (1967)

귀로 (A Road to Return)

B&W, 90 min. 1967
Director: Lee Man-Hee
Casting: Kim Jin-Gyu, Mun Jeong-Suk, Jeon Gye-Hyeon

Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window, with all its raw tension, pluck out the violence and replace it with a complex web of emotional betrayal and voila, you have A Road to Return. With it, Lee tells the story of a disabled writer and his nursemaid wife whose wandering affections tear him between gratitude, jealousy and resignation.