Friend (film)

Infobox Korean Film | name = Friend

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caption =
director = Kwak Kyung-taek
producer =
writer = Kwak Kyung-taek
starring = Jang Dong-gun
Yu Oh-sung
Seo Tae-wha
Jung Wo-hyun
Kim Bo-kyeong
music =
cinematography =
editing =
distributor =
released = March 31, 2001 (South Korea)
runtime = 118 min.
language = Korean
budget =
imdb_id = 0281718
hangul = 친구
rr = Chin'gu
mr = Ch'in'gu

"Friend" (친구 "Chin-gu") is a 2001 South Korean film directed by Kwak Kyung-taek. At one time, it was the highest-grossing Korean movie of all time, but has since been surpassed by "Silmido", "Taegukgi" , "The King and the Clown" and "The Host".

This film is the director's experience about his friends, a semi-autobiography set in his hometown, Busan, and the actors speak with a strongly accented Busan dialect. The film changed the public images of Jang Dong-gun and Yu Oh-sung; previously, Jang had been famous for romantic comedies and Yu had appeared in movies with mostly cult interest.

Plot

The film follows the lives of four childhood friends: Joon-seok, the leader of the group and whose father is a powerful gangster; Dong-su, whose father is an undertaker; class clown Jung-ho; and Sang-taek, who was an exemplary student. As children they play together, sell sexually explicit pictures cut from a magazine, and wonder if a Korean Olympic swimmer could outrace a sea turtle. Jung-ho also showed the rest of them a VCR that his mother had, and this film he found on it. It turns out to be a pornographic movie, and the boys are entranced while arguing over what a "menstruation" was, with them believing that it was the word that adults used to describe the "vagina".

Fast forward to high school, where they are reunited after separating during middle school. They become smitten with the lead singer of a band of girls their age. Joon-seok invites the band to a party at his house, where each boy pairs off with one girl (though not after some tension over how to do so). Sang-taek receives his first kiss from the lead singer, Jin-sook.

Back in school, Joon-seok and Dong-su get in trouble after a confrontation with a teacher; After their friends convince them to go apologize, they are only off with a light suspension. During an outing to the movies, where Sang-taek catches the eye of another school gangster whom he had picked a fight with earlier, Joon-seok and Dong-su fend off a whole rival school while Jung-ho protects Sang-taek. Dong-su, after the fight, returns with a baseball bat and smashes the school's glass cases with its awards and trophies, dropping out of school and warning anyone who bumps into the street will "pay". Joon-seok is suspended from the affair. After graduation, Sang-taek and Jung-ho go to college but the others do not.

A few years later Sang-taek and Jung-ho return to find Joon-seok married to Jin-sook, the singer from the band. He is seriously ill and abusive towards his wife as a result of being addicted to philopon; he also appears depressed that his father is dying. Later he recovers from his illness, divorces his wife, and mourns his father. He assumes his father's role as a crime lord. Dong-su also becomes a gangster with a rival organization, and becomes similarly powerful.

The men stay friends, drinking, singing karaoke, and eating galbi together. An assassination attempt on Dong-su, however, sours relations and leads to a gang war between Joon-seok and Dong-su. After a night of karaoke and celebration with Sang-taek and Jung-ho, Joon-seok goes to visit Dong-su at his base. Joon-seok talks to Dong-su as if nothing has happened, and asks if he would like to accompany him to see Sang-taek off, since he was heading to the United States. Dong-su, however, does not want to, and Joon-seok becomes serious. Joon-seok asks Dong-su as a friend to leave for Hawaii for a few years until things cooled down, Dong-su, however, refuses and asks Joon-seok to leave. Joon-seok, realizing that he and Dong-su weren't friends anymore, as friends would do what other friends asked, agrees with him and leaves to say farewell to Sang-taek and to head off to Hawaii.

What Dong-su did not realize was that Joon-seok asked him to leave as a friend. After realizing the advice in Joon-seok's message, he decides to head off to Hawaii as well. However, since both his pride and his ignorance prevented him from listening to his "friend", Joon-seok leaving first from the bar. Dong-su is then murdered in the streets by his driver, as are many other agents of Joon-seok.

A few years later, Sung-taek returns to Korea upon hearing news on Dong-su's murder and Joon-seok being on trial for it. Jung-ho explains how Joon-seok had left for Hawaii after Sung-taek left, and how after a few years he became weaker and weaker and finally went nuts. He was caught in a bar after fighting with the waiters, and breaking bottles as well as gashing his own arm. Joon-seok goes to trial for Dong-su's murder, and even after Jung-ho gets the jurors bribed, Joon-seok pleads guilty.

After the trial, Sang-taek visits Joon-seok in prison, and the two talk like old friends who haven't seen each other. When the time comes for Joon-seok to leave to go back to his jail cell, Sung-taek asks why he pleaded guilty in court. Joon-seok simply replies, "Humiliation. Me and Dong-su are gangsters. Gangsters shouldn't be humiliated." Sang-taek and Joon-seok then part ways, with Sang-taek promising to visit every month. The film ends with Joon-seok walking back to his cell, in a hallway with a white bright light in the end, with Joon-seok reflecting on the past when they were all children, wondering who would win in a race, the Korean Olympic swimmer or a sea turtle, when they were all still friends.

Awards

*46th The Asia-Pacific Film Festival : Best actor and best supporting actor award

External links

*imdb title|id=0281718|title=Friend