KoreanMovie - Seopyeonje (1993)

The specific Korean tradition that is reclaimed in Seopyonje is the type of folk-song known as pansori, described as a musical sublimation of South-West Korea’s collective grief and suffering - in other words, a kind of blues. The film’s three central characters are itinerant pansori singers in the 1950s, a time when many aspects of Korean culture came under siege from Japanese and western influences. Dong-ho and Song-hwa, orphans, they were both apprenticed to the pansori master Yu-bong who pressured them to sacrifice everything for the art. Dong-ho rebelled and ran away, to become the man he is now. Song-hwa stayed, lost her sight, and outlived Yu-bong. Rumor has it that she is still travelling and still singing pansori…