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Two childhood friends, who grew up in a farming village outside of Seoul, meet as adults, at random. They haven't seen one another in years. They go out for drinks and reminisce. The young woman has been studying pantomime, and she shows off some of what she has learned. She pantomimes eating a tangerine and her gestures are so specific you could swear the tangerine was really there. He is amazed at the illusion. She tells him that if he ever is hungry for anything, he can create it on his own like this.

Everyone is hungry for something in "Burning," the new film from South Korean master Lee Chang-dong . How that hunger manifests, and what hunger even signifies, is up for debate. The debate itself is too dangerous to even be spoken out loud, since it threatens the class status quo. Based loosely on Haruki Murakami's short story Barn Burning , "Burning" is Lee's first film in eight years , and it is a bleak and almost Darwinian vision of the world, survival of the fittest laid bare in sometimes shocking brutality. The three main characters circle warily, looking at each other with desire, mistrust, need, never certain of the accuracy of their perceptions. Lee's explorations require depth and space. It's a great film, engrossing, suspenseful, and strange.

Jongsu (Ah-in Yoo), the young man enraptured by the pantomime, dreams of being a writer. His favorite author is Faulkner, because—he says—every time he reads a Faulkner story, it feels like his own. This makes sense since it takes a while for us to understand the layout of Jongsu's life, so hazy is it with strange relationships, missing figures, blank spaces. His father is in trouble with the law for assaulting another farmer, although the details remain vague. His mother took off when he was little. When he runs into Haemi, (Jong-seo Jun), a girl he grew up with, dancing outside a store giving off raffle tickets, he almost doesn't recognize her. "Plastic surgery," she grins. Almost before he knows what has happened, he and Haemi have sex, and he agrees to feed her cat while she takes a trip to Africa. Rattling back and forth between Seoul and the family farm in his battered pickup truck, he is caught in an in-between state, dreaming of Haemi, waiting for her return, shoveling food for the cows, or putting out food for her cat—a cat who is never seen or heard. It's impossible to avoid the speculation that there is no cat, that Haemi made it up. But for what reason?

When Jongsu picks up Haemi at the airport on her return from Africa, he is chagrined to discover Haemi has a man in tow, a man named Ben ( Steven Yeun ), whom she met on her travels. The two are clearly now an item. Jongsu has a weird feeling that Ben is no good, that something is really "off" about the guy. Ben drives a Porsche, his apartment is huge and filled with beautiful artwork, he doesn't seem to have a profession. Jongsu says to Haemi, "There are so many Gatsby's in Korea." If Ben is Gatsby, then that would make Jongsu Nick Carraway and Haemi Daisy. The closer Jongsu gets to the heart of Ben, the more he sees that there's no "there there." Ben is dangerously void, maybe even a sociopath. (Yeun gives a truly chilling performance.) The class critique in "Burning" is as unsubtle as F. Scott Fitzgerald's was, and it creates unbearable tension, rage crackling off the screen. When Haemi demonstrates the Kalahari Bushmen's "hunger dance" for Ben and his friends, Jongsu notices how uncomfortable everyone is, hiding their mocking smiles. He catches Ben yawning during Haemi's dance. Haemi, so alluring to the appreciative Jongsu, is a creature of fun for these empty city slickers. Jongsu starts to feel like Haemi may be in some kind of danger.

"Burning" takes place in a world of fluctuating and amorphous borders, invisible yet pressing in on the characters. Jongsu's village is on the border of North Korea, where the air is pierced with shrieking propaganda from a loudspeaker across the hills, creating a sense of emergency among the gentle pastoral landscape, like some attack is imminent, like something dreadful lurks beyond the horizon. Haemi's cat is literally Schrodinger's cat, caught in a borderland between being and non-being. The food vanishes, the litter box is full, but the cat never manifests. The phone rings repeatedly at Jongsu's farm, but no one's on the other end. Just empty space and dead air. Images and motifs repeat, creating a fractal effect. Closets are important: each character has a closet containing secrets, mysteries (a shaft of reflected light, a gleaming knife, a pink plastic watch). Fire is important: For Haemi, it's the fire that the Kalahari Bushmen dance around. For Jongsu, it is the bonfire of his mother's clothes in the backyard, one of his only clear memories from childhood. And for Ben, as he casually admits to Jongsu, almost daring Jongsu to be shocked, it's the greenhouses he burns down in his spare time. "You burn down other people's greenhouses?" Jongsu asks. Ben, smiling smoothly, his face telling no tales, nods.

In one extraordinary sequence, Haemi and Ben drive out to visit Jongsu on his farm. The three sit out on the patio, get stoned and watch the sun set, the tree leaves rustling overhead, the light growing dimmer and dimmer. Haemi takes off her shirt and dances on the patio, staring off at the hills of North Korea, her silhouette undulating against the pink and purple glowing sky. Both Jongsu and Ben are frozen in their seats, as they watch her fluid gestures, her primal openness to the beauty of her own experiences. Jongsu had seen this in her when she pantomimed the tangerine. He fell in love with this part of her. Ben yawns again. By the end of the dance, she is in tears. Jongsu now knows that Ben is, apparently, an enthusiastic amoral arsonist. There's a serious and alarming sense of danger, only you can't really point to its source. The whole of "Burning" feels like this.

There's so much disorienting background noise in “Burning," the traffic, the ringing of the phone, the street music, the loudspeaker blaring North Korean propaganda, Trump on the television in the corner of the room. It's hard for anyone to keep their thoughts straight; it's hard to believe what might be staring you right in the face. The tension between "what is" and "what isn't," started with Haemi's beautiful tangerine pantomime, is in urgent operation throughout. Things are never what they seem. Or, perhaps, they are, and that's even worse to contemplate. The tangerine is delicious but it's invisible. It won't provide sustenance for long. The cat was never there. Haemi made it all up. Greenhouses don't provide space for things to grow, they just stand there in the fields waiting for the arsonist's match.

Sheila O'Malley

Sheila O'Malley received a BFA in Theatre from the University of Rhode Island and a Master's in Acting from the Actors Studio MFA Program. Read her answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire here .

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Burning (2018)

148 minutes

Yoo Ah-in as Lee Jong-su

Steven Yeun as Ben

Jun Jong-seo as Shin Hae-mi

Kim Soo-kyung as Yeon-ju

Choi Seung-ho as Lee Yong-seok

Lee Chang-dong

Original Story

Haruki Murakami

Director of Photography

Hong Kyung-pyo

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Burning patiently lures audiences into a slow-burning character study that ultimately rewards the viewer's patience -- and subverts many of their expectations.

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Lee Chang-dong

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Jeon Jong-seo

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Review: In ‘Burning,’ Love Ignites a Divided World

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By Manohla Dargis

Oct. 25, 2018

One of the most beautiful scenes in a movie this year — in many years — comes midway through “Burning.” Two men and a woman are lazing around outside a home. They’re in the South Korean countryside, near the border with North Korea, where the squawk of propaganda drifts in and out from loudspeakers. Now, though, in the velvety dusk light, the sound of Miles Davis’s ethereal trumpet fills the air, and the woman begins swaying, taking off her shirt. She is dancing for the men, but mostly she’s dancing in what feels like ecstatic communion between her and the world.

Desire, ravenous and ineffable, shudders through “Burning,” the latest from the great South Korean director Lee Chang-dong. Set in the present, the movie involves the complicated, increasingly fraught relationships among three characters whose lives are tragically engulfed as desire gives way to rage. The story has the quality of a mystery thriller — somebody goes missing, somebody else tries to figure out why — one accompanied by the drumbeat of politics. The larger, more agonizing question here, though, involves what it means to live in a divided, profoundly isolating world that relentlessly drives a wedge between the self and others.

The story opens the day that a young delivery man, Jongsu (Ah-in Yoo), meets a young woman, Haemi (Jong-seo Jun), in a chaotic, anonymous city. She works as store barker, dancing in scanty clothing while tempting shoppers with raffle prizes. Haemi hails Jongsu and reveals that they know each other from their hometown — he has no memory of her — then blurts out that she’s had plastic surgery. Later, she reminds him that when they were young he once crossed a street to tell her she was ugly, news she casually delivers while searching for a reaction that never comes.

Jun gives a physically open, natural performance that works as a lovely counterpoint to Haemi’s cryptic actions — she has an unseen cat, peels an invisible tangerine — while Yoo invests Jongsu with a reserve that suggests social awkwardness that can seem self-interested. (Slack-jawed, Jongsu hunches like a man in retreat or a teenager who hasn’t settled into his adult body.) Despite his seeming indifference to Haemi, he responds to her friendliness, and before long they’re in bed. This nascent intimacy abruptly ends when she leaves on a trip. When she returns with a wealthy enigma, Ben (Steven Yeun), the three form an awkward triangle, a configuration that derails Jongsu.

The movie is based on “Barn Burning,” a 1992 short story by Haruki Murakami that throbs with unspoken menace and shares its title with a far more blatantly violent 1939 story by William Faulkner . Lee nods at Faulkner (a favorite author of Jongsu whom Ben begins reading), but takes most of his cues from Murakami’s story. Lee retains its central triangle and some details, while making it his own by, for instance, changing the Miles Davis music . Mostly, Lee slowly foregrounds the uneasy violence that flickers through the Murakami to stunning, devastating effect.

Written by Lee and Oh Jung-mi, “Burning” unfolds in realistic scenes that don’t necessarily seem to be advancing a strong theme. Things happen, casually. For the most part, the story follows Jongsu, who’s as closed-down as the door in the movie’s opening image. Seemingly friendless, he says he wants to write. But his father’s legal troubles have forced Jongsu to take over the family’s run-down farm alone. “What kind of ‘writing’ are you going to ‘create,’” his father’s lawyer mockingly asks Jongsu, as if to remind him of his place in life. The lawyer also compares Jongsu’s father to a protagonist in a story, a remark that suggests our stories are written for us.

For the lawyer, fiction writing is clearly useless, and it certainly has no instrumental value for Jongsu’s father. That the movie is based on a story by a celebrated writer invests this seemingly uneventful scene with dark comedy, even if the larger point is the question of free will. (Is Jongsu writing his own story, or has it been determined by his father, whose rage landed him in jail?) The movie engages this question more directly once Ben — with his silky smiles and laid-back imperiousness — begins disrupting the equilibrium. “There is no right or wrong,” Ben tells Jongsu, after confessing that he torches derelict greenhouses. “Just the morals of nature.”

An understated visual stylist, Lee shoots and edits this scene simply but elegantly, initially cutting between the two men, who are each isolated in the frame. They’re sitting fairly close yet seem worlds apart. It’s the same night as Haemi’s ravishing dance. But now she’s asleep inside, the sun has set, and the men are alone in an exchange that grows darker, figuratively and literally, as Jongsu talks about his unhappy childhood and Ben shares his worldview. As the scene progresses, Lee joins the men visually in two-shots that leave one or the other blurred, only to punctuate this back and forth with an image of them seated side by side like mirrored images.

Here and throughout, Lee allows the actors to fill in their characters, letting them add pointillist detail to their portraits rather than smothering them in close-ups or self-regarding directorial virtuosity. All three leads are sensational (Yeun turns yawns and soft laughter into nightmares), giving performances that retain a sense of mystery that dovetails with the movie’s ambiguity. Again, things happen, often casually. Yet while each event expands the narrative — filling in the larger picture with nods at sexual relations, class divisions and a riven people — they don’t necessarily explain what happens or answer the fundamental question that burns through this brilliant movie.

Burning Not rated. In Korean, with English subtitles. Running time: 2 hours 28 minutes.

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Burning Is the New Thriller About Toxic Masculinity That You Didn’t Know You Needed

By John Powers

Image may contain Steven Yeun Human Person Sitting Clothing Apparel Yoo Ahin and Pants

If you had to choose the most interesting filmmaker in the world right now, you wouldn’t be wrong if you named Lee Chang-dong. Back at the Vancouver International Film Festival in 1997, I was on a jury that gave this South Korean auteur top prize for his first film, Green Fish , a funny, unsettling crime picture that was like an X-ray of Korean culture. “This guy,” I remember thinking, “has some talent.”

In fact, Lee had far more of it than I realized. Over the last 20 years, nobody has made more good movies than he has. Bursting with a novelistic richness spiked with political awareness, Lee specializes in empathetic stories about ordinary people caught up in emotional extremes, be it the doomed hero of the wrenching Peppermint Candy , which begins with his suicide and traces his life backwards, to the aging heroine of his exquisite last film, Poetry , who finds refuge from the onset of Alzheimer’s and a family crime by enrolling in a poetry class. Lee never does the same thing twice, and in his latest movie, Burning (the best thing at Cannes this year ), he has created a hauntingly ambiguous metaphysical thriller about isolation, soul-warping social divisions, and the darker corners of the male psyche.

Based on an elliptical short story, “Barn Burning,” by Haruki Murakami (itself a riff on a Faulkner story of the same name), Burning centers on Jong-su (Yoo Ah-in), an alienated wannabe-writer who works as a part-time Seoul deliveryman. One day, he bumps into Hae-mi (Jeon Jong-seo), a delightfully vague young woman who claims to have known him when they were kids. Before he quite knows what’s happening, he finds himself in bed with her. Reading more into this erotic encounter than she does (you know men), he agrees to look after her cat while she takes a trip to Africa.

So far, so good. But when Hae-mi returns, Jong-su is shocked to discover that, along the way, she acquired a boyfriend, Ben, played by the terrific Korean-American actor Steven Yeun (best known for The Walking Dead ). Rich, handsome, and internationalized, the Gatsby-esque Ben quickly gets under his skin. It’s not simply that this newcomer has stolen what Jong-su thinks of as “his” girl, but that he fairly gleams with entitlement. Where Jong-su drives a truck, Ben tools around in a Porsche; where Jong-su lives on his family’s farm blasted by propaganda from North Korean loudspeakers, Ben has a sleek apartment in the posh Gangnam neighborhood immortalized by Psy . Although amiable, Ben exudes a yawning air of superiority that is at best annoying— you want to smack him—and at worst feels a bit, um, sociopathic. The conflict between these young men leaves us wondering what will happen to Hae-mi, an elusively alluring figure caught between the smug Ben, who may be using her, and the bottled-up Ben, who may care about her more than she wants. We sense something bad could happen. But exactly what ? That’s the mystery.

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Now, Burning is something of a (forgive me) slow burn—it takes two and a half hours to reach its devastating climax. This is a movie in which every detail—from Hae-mi’s cat to Jong-su’s imprisoned father—shapes our sense of what’s going on. Not one for flashy style, Lee likes to let scenes play out so that his actors have time to slowly suggest the essence of their characters. Here, he wins three performances that, in a fairer world, would all be up for big awards. As the unreadably cool Ben, Yeun could hardly be better or more charismatic—he’s a movie star, folks. He’s matched by Yoo, who is famous in Korea for both his acting and his online political pronouncements, including terming the #MeToo movement a “witch hunt.” While this makes him someone you might not want to date, it doesn’t keep him from shining as Jong-su, a seemingly nice guy whose loneliness, desire, and fury keeps peering around the edges of his often silent passivity.

At first, Jeon may appear to be stuck in a classic women’s role as Hae-mi—the wishbone being pulled on by two men. Yet she’s far more than that. Indeed, in a marvelous screen debut, she gives a radiant turn, blooming so brightly—especially in a stoned twilight dance to Miles Davis—that she often outshines her male costars. Whenever she’s not on-screen, the film instantly grows darker, unhappier. This, I think, is deliberate. Lee wants us to grasp that Hae-mi is a woman threatened by the desires and demands of two men who don’t see her for who she actually is. Filled with free-floating spirit, she becomes the occasion for Jong-su and Ben to reveal a masculinity that is as toxic as she is life-affirming.

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‘burning’: film review | cannes 2018.

South Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong's 'Burning' is a quiet romantic thriller in which an aspiring writer and a rich hotshot become rivals for the affections of a charismatic young woman.

By Todd McCarthy

Todd McCarthy

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Daringly heating his mysterious tale involving just three people on a low boil across two and a half hours, South Korean director Lee Chang-dong establishes and then sustains an almost trancelike state while still keeping a simple yet elusive story afloat in Burning . This is a beautifully crafted film loaded with glancing insights and observations into an understated triangular relationship, one rife with subtle perceptions about class privilege, reverberating family legacies, creative confidence, self-invention, sexual jealousy, justice and revenge. The pic looks likely to get a good ride on the festival circuit and in specialized theatrical release in select markets.

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‘Burning’ Is One of the Best Films of the Year

Lee Chang-dong’s metaphysical mystery, starring Steven Yeun and based on a short-story by Haruki Murakami, is about a love triangle, a disappearance, and the cold war between haves and have-nots

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It’s no surprise that the most anticipated American political films of 2018 feature cameos by Donald Trump. There he is, being used for satirical target practice by Michael Moore in Fahrenheit 11/9 —a film that takes its title from the day after 45’s election—or lurking on the margins of Errol Morris’s American Dharma , which profiles the president’s alt-right-hand man Steve Bannon in hopes of answering Moore’s not-so-rhetorical question at the outset of Fahrenheit : “How the fuck did this happen?”

If Ronald Reagan was the first movie-star president, Trump is the first cartoon commander in chief. Still, it’s a bit jarring to see him show up in a thriller set and produced in South Korea. Trump’s appearance in Lee Chang-dong’s Burning is more fleeting than even his cameo in Home Alone 2: Lost in New York . But it feels like the secret heart of a movie that’s set in the trenches of a global class war whose combatants have rallied behind (or against) despotic figures of privilege.

What Trump is actually blathering about in his appearance in Burning doesn’t matter so much as the fact of his (disembodied) presence on a television set in a farmhouse in Paju, an isolated town close enough to the North Korean border that that country’s version of fake news can be heard drifting on the wind into its neighbor’s airspace. In this incongruous geographical context, Trump is unmistakably a symbol of something larger.

One of the highest compliments that I can pay to Burning —besides calling it one of the year’s flat-out best films, which it is—is that the nature of this symbolism is somewhat indeterminate. There is a difference between movies that refuse to fix their meanings for fear of exposing their essential vacuousness—that leave so much space for interpretation that they end up feeling legitimately empty, like a shell game without a marble—and movies that bristle with an ambiguity derived from the complex, irreconcilable nature of reality itself. Lee’s film, which has been freely adapted from a short story by the Japanese author Haruki Murakami, belongs in the second category, and near the top of the roll call as well. It’s a flawless exercise in suggestiveness, in which images, characters, and lines of dialogue are relentlessly, unmistakably doubled. The implication of this tactic is that every exchange and interaction is inherently a contest of sorts between its participants—that there are not only two sides to every story, but two possible solutions to every mystery. Which is to say: no solution at all.

Burning is a movie comprised of many mysteries, but its central enigma is the disappearance of a young woman, whose unexplained absence reconfigures an awkward young-adult love triangle into a game of cat and mouse. The cat in this setup is Jong-su (Yoo Ah-in), an aspiring writer with a not-quite-unrequited crush on his former schoolmate Hae-mi (Jeon Jong-seo). Hae-mi is in turn in thrall to Seoul-based trust-fund kid Ben (Steven Yeun), whose almost preternatural air of wealth and privilege makes him nobody’s mouse, even as he acts like a rat toward both of the other parties. His affluence and handsomeness have the impulsive, gullible Hae-mi hypnotized, while Jong-su is warily resentful, especially once Hae-mi goes Gone Girl, at which point Ben—who has dangled the girl like a bauble in front of his poorer rival’s desirous eyes every time they hang out—seems to completely disavow her existence altogether. Jong-su already believes (with good cause) that Ben is a callous rich kid who uses people as status symbols. He seems to be dead inside. But is he a killer?

Burning runs 148 minutes, and every second of it is pressurized by suspense and dread. Its first half is methodically devoted to establishing three characters who bounce off of each other in loaded and unsettling ways. During one dinner, Hae-mi and Ben regale Jong-su with a story of their meet-cute in Kenya (the sort of trip that a farm hand couldn’t afford) and of a tribal dance that the bushmen use to express the philosophical concept of “hunger.” The “little hunger,” they explain, pertains to actual, earthbound necessities, while the “bigger hunger” represents more ephemeral, metaphysical appetites.

Besides his evident desire for Hae-mi (whose replication of the bushmen’s dance, performed twice, the second time shirtless, is very much an IRL thirst trap), Jong-su experiences the “little hunger” every day of his cash-strapped life. He’s struggling to maintain his family’s property while trying to kick-start a writing career and dealing with the fallout from his father’s physical attack against a government official—an ominous bit of backstory that strengthens the script’s subtext of haves-versus-have-nots while introducing the possibility of inherited anger issues. Hae-mi, whose manic-pixie act seems blissfully uncalculated (which might just mean that she’s a good actress) is, by her own admission, driven by her own version of the “bigger hunger”: She’s looking for excitement and fulfillment while she’s still young and idealistic. But Ben, who never misses a gourmet meal and doesn’t want for anything, is impossible to gauge in terms of appetites, and thus potentially capable of anything.

Both Jong-su and Ben are fighting for a place at the table, but to reduce Burning to a story of voracious, eat-the-rich revenge is reductive. Still, Lee does plenty to manipulate our sympathies in that direction, even as he’s simultaneously laying the groundwork for something more complex. It wasn’t until the two-hour mark that I realized that the film was being told fully from Jong-su’s point of view, meaning that Hae-mi and Ben are being seen through his eyes. Given the strength of Jong-su’s feelings toward both parties—and how inseparable his contempt and loathing for Ben is from his protective, desirous crush on Hae-mi—it’s fair to ask whether Lee is cultivating true audience solidarity or urging us to understand the story exclusively through the lens of his hero’s prejudices: to see Hae-mi and Ben as idealized and demonized figures, respectively. Throw in the fact Jong-su is a writer, and the idea that we’re watching a highly subjective, slanted version of events is in play.

The paradox of Lee’s structure is that while Jong-su becomes a sort of audience surrogate and Hae-mi serves as an obscure object of desire, the film’s most memorable presence is Ben, whom Yeun plays with a slippery brilliance that would, in a just world, earn him year-end award recognition. So, For Your Consideration: Ben is the best movie villain in a long time. (I saw Yeun in a hotel bar at TIFF this year and I couldn’t separate him from his glad-handing asshole character; it was all I could do not to walk over and throw my drink at him.) Early on, Jong-su pegs his rival as “The Great Gatsby,” a compliment that is also a dig, and Yeun ably reps both sides of that equation: He makes the character’s gentrified, Gangnam-style largesse signify as charming and narcissistic at the same time. He also plausibly sells the possibility that Ben is an actual sociopath, especially in a monologue during which he describes his hobby of setting fire to rural greenhouses. Farm boy Jong-su can’t help but take this as more than a metaphor: it’s either an open acknowledgment of hostility or a veiled confession of other, even more sinister serial crimes. If it’s a bit too literary that Ben’s fetish also triggers Jong-su’s own childhood memory of a burning greenhouse, the resulting imagery is so incendiary that it scarcely matters (and, in a weird coincidence, it rhymes with Morris’s signature image in American Dharma ).

If all of this makes Burning sound a bit abstract, I should add that it’s an absolutely first-rate work of filmmaking. Lee is an acknowledged master of dramaturgy and character work (check out 2007’s Secret Sunshine , starring The Host and Snowpiercer ’s Song Kang-ho as a man with an insatiable fixation on a damaged woman), but his visual aplomb here is something else. The film’s style is sophisticated and beautiful, making smart use of the setting’s endless horizon lines and using interior spaces that mirror the characters who inhabit them (Hae-mi’s cramped, adolescently-decorated apartment; Ben’s Patrick Bateman–esque penthouse) and that the script is filled with a wealth of tricky gimmicks—a misplaced watch; a lost cat; a terrifyingly abrupt cellphone call—that outshine any recent American genre effort. In fact, you’d have to go back to Michael Haneke’s Cache to find a movie that leverages suspense against substance as deftly as Lee does, except that Burning is essentially Cache turned inside-out, leaving its bad-and-bougie character’s true motivations a question mark (whereas Haneke plumbed the subconscious of his Parisian antihero).

Lee may lack Haneke’s knack for shock tactics, but he’s equally adept at conveying the threat of violence underneath everyday behavior. Without ever disrupting his rigorous use of point of view, he gradually builds in enough distance between us and Jong-su that we begin to question not only his understanding of events but his actions, which are perhaps not as righteous as we’ve been trained to accept in stories about underdog vigilantism.

That’s where the Trump footage comes in—a throwaway detail that actually matters a great deal. On the one hand, Trump is the face of the kind of detached, front-running status that has left Jong-su (and his father before him) seething at the unfairness of a socioeconomic spectrum that has placed them at the wrong end, and whose arbiters seek to keep them there. And, as a would-be F. Scott Fitzgerald (or William Faulkner, whom he idolizes) you’d think that Jong-su would despise Trump’s anti-intellectual agenda. But Trump is also a rallying point for a group of Americans (and worldwide fans) whose resentment at being labelled “deplorables” has fomented a form of loyalty-as-rage that is as much about lashing out at perceived “elites” as (hypocritically? Obliviously?) supporting a president who is of (and for) that same 1 percent.

The contradictions of Jong-su’s character—of his anger, his tenderness, his yearning, his self-hatred, and his hungers, big and little—are not “solved” by the shots of Trump but contextualized by them in a way that reaches out to an international audience even as the majority of Burning’s references are distinctly Korean. The old saying that the more specific an artwork is, the more universal it becomes, surely applies here, and there’s a contradiction in that, too, since the thing Burning is most specific about is that when it comes to human behavior—our own and that of others—the only real truism is that it’s impossible to know.

The script’s litany of specificities—what the characters read, what they eat, what they do, and where—ultimately yields an incomplete understanding, which extends all the way to the aftermath of Jong-su’s final actions, which are either viciously definitive or futilely inconclusive: take your pick.

Or, maybe, they’re both at once. It was, after all, F. Scott Fitzgerald who said that the sign of a fine mind was the ability to hold two competing ideas at the same time. Burning , which follows this advice in every single choice of writing, acting, and directing, is as smart as cinema gets.

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Steven Yeun Makes His Leading-Man Korean Film Debut in Burning

This review was originally published during the Cannes Film Festival.

Easy-listening jazz wafts through Lee Chang-dong’s Burning, but it’s not the smoky American variety one associates with Haruki Murakami, whose short story “Barn Burning” the film is based on. It’s a kind of anemic, amniotic variety, primarily there to soften the edges of tastefully modern cafés and condos inhabited by the wealthy. It’s bloodless, perhaps enough to be vampiric. It is a very suitable soundtrack for class warfare.

Lee’s film, which relocates the action to present-day South Korea, is very much a generational story. In an interview, the director has mused that the young people of today must look at the world and “wonder if it’s a mystery that can’t be understood,” and that sentiment is echoed by protagonist Jong-soo (Yoo Ah-in), a post-collegiate bumpkin with vague ambitions of being a novelist. He has no idea how to start his novel, because nothing much about his life makes sense to him — not his unshakable unemployment, not the reappearance of his old classmate Hae-mi, not the DMZ visible from his backyard.

Jong-soo and Hae-mi (Jeon Jong-seo) are young and poor and living decidedly outside the ascendant Korean Dream. They bump into each other while Hae-mi is working as a promotional dancer for a discount store, announcing new markdowns while half-heartedly executing some pop-star choreography. He doesn’t recognize her at first, because she’s gotten plastic surgery — she claims when they were kids he crossed the street to tell her she was ugly. “Pretty now, right?” she asks with cynical laugh. They get dinner, they sleep together in her tiny one-room apartment, and she asks him a favor — she’s going to Africa on some kind of quest of self-discovery, could he come by to feed her cat while she’s away?

This being a Murakami story, the introduction of a cat is a good sign things are about to get weird. A noirish haze blankets Burning and its baby-faced protagonist, whose amnesia about half of his own childhood seems to be as much a function of his spacey personality as the lack of history in his life — in the land, in the city, between him and his family. The cat never shows up, however, even though Jong-soo shows up dutifully to feed it every day. When Hae-mi returns, it’s with Ben (Steven Yeun) , a rich, somewhat older man she met in Kenya, and with whom she’s clearly now having an affair. More confused than heartbroken, Jong-soo starts hanging out with them, waiting for Hae-mi to choose him, or for her and Ben’s relationship to make some kind of sense, neither of which — I hope it’s not spoiling to say — ever happen.

Steven Yeun, in his first leading Korean film role, is the perfect antecedent to Yoo and Jeon, the latter a first-timer with a youthful onscreen unguardedness. Yeun, on the other hand, is suave and unknowable, regarding everything, especially and including his two new young friends, with a kind of removed bemusement. His job is unclear, he says he likes to “play” for a living, and that, along with his Porsche and his sleek Gangnam apartment, carries a kind of malevolence, even before he tells Jong-soo about his secret penchant for burning the neglected greenhouses of the Korean countryside. It seems like he gets some kind of light amusement just out of watching Hae-mi’s uninhibited emotionality — during a dinner with some of his rich friends, she shows the group a dance she learned in Kenya, which communicates both “little hunger” and a bigger, more philosophical hunger, and is suddenly overcome while demonstrating the latter. Yeun absorbs the moment with the impassive eyes of someone who’s never experienced either.

There is so much fascinating, underplayed tension running through Burning — oddly, I found myself put in mind of Elon Musk stepping out with art-pop singer-songwriter Grimes at the Met Ball last week. I don’t claim to know anything about the inner life of that relationship, but the perception of the rich vampirizing youth — not directly biologically or physically or financially, but emotionally — is incredibly compelling. I was a little let down, then, when Burning lost its steam in its second half. Jong-soo becomes obsessed with finding the next greenhouse Ben is going to burn; meanwhile, Hae-mi goes missing, and the kid seems woefully unable to see the strings being pulled all around him for what feels like forever. Ben remains a cipher — an increasingly by-the-book sociopathic cipher — and the film’s final moment of release is as underplayed as the rest of the film, at the moment you’re craving something bigger. Perhaps the mystery of the world has yet to be solved.

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‘Burning’ Review: Lee Chang-dong’s Adaptation of Haruki Murakami Story Is a Mesmerizing Tale of Working Class Frustrations – Cannes 2018

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Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong and Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami share distinct fixations — loneliness and desire — so the combination of their talents feels like a natural fit. No surprise then that “ Burning ,” Lee’s first feature in eight years, expands Murakami’s short story “Barn Burning” into an enthralling look at working-class frustrations in which a sad figure chases elusive possibilities.

As with “Secret Sunshine” and “Poetry,” Lee takes his time combing through a scenario rich with the ineffable sadness of people at the mercy of a cruel world. The result is a haunting, beautiful tone poem. Lee takes his forlorn character to unpredictable places, leading to an outcome that dangles tantalizing questions and potent themes.

Murakami’s abstract narrative provides an ideal template for Lee’s standard fixations, resulting in a dark and often gripping look at the soul-searing plight of an alienated young man. That’s Lee Jongsu (Ah-in Yoo), an introvert who lives in his own quiet world and seeks escape at every turn. His life is defined by possibilities that hover beyond his reach — romance and affluence — and they’re epitomized by two fascinating characters drifting into his orbit just enough to clarify why.

The first possibility emerges in the opening minutes, as the jobless wannabe writer wanders through a working-class neighborhood and comes across Haemi (newcomer Jeon Jong Seo), an energetic young woman working at a lottery stand who remembers Jongsu from their youth. The opposite to his soft-spoken demeanor, she latches onto him and lures him to her cramped apartment to show her how to feed her cat while she’s away. It’s an easy tactic to get the pushover into bed, and their abrupt tryst plays out for minutes on end, going from erotic to creepy as the camera gets closer to Jongsu’s face. He doesn’t smile, maybe because he’s never had a reason for it, and his face reflects the sudden shock of a man unfamiliar with what it even feels like for things to go in his favor.

Needless to say, it’s not what he thinks. Haemi vanishes to Africa, and when Jongsu drops by her apartment to feed the cat, it never materializes. Did he imagine the whole thing? “Burning” hovers in such uncertainties while fleshing out the mundane details that define the rest of Jongsu’s world. Nothing in his daily routine works in his favor: As he contends with his incarcerated father’s mounting legal troubles while tending to the older man’s farm, he fails to conjure any support from his neighbors, and his professional aspirations remain unfulfilled. He fields strange calls at odd hours, as if to underscore his hopelessness that someone will throw him a line. Not since “A Serious Man” has a movie hinged on one character’s baffled reactions to a Job-like pileup of bad luck.

Then things get weird. One day, Haemi returns from Africa with a new partner in tow, an ultra-charismatic hunk with an American name: This is Ben (Steven Yeun, “The Walking Dead”), a wealthy and assertive stranger who grins at Jongsu when Haemi brings him along to Ben’s elegant mansion. Jongsu can’t tell if Haemi’s toying with him or merely considers him one of several fuck buddies, and his quiet shock at the new circumstances hover on the brink of a grim joke. He can’t stop staring at the pair in wonder, and grasps for the words to explain Ben’s allure. “He’s the Great Gatsby,” he tells Haimi when they finally get a private moment together, pegging him as one of those “mysterious rich people, you don’t really know what they do.”

Ben himself embraces his privileged status — the fetching Yeun, a rising star in the U.S., is a perfect fit for the role — and when the trio hang out and smoke pot together, he shares a carefree philosophy about the world that further complicates Jongsu’s resentment. Director Lee (who co-wrote the screenplay with Jungmi Oh) deepens this beguiling drama with dialogue that hovers on the edge of lyricism. “I can’t remember ever shedding a tear,” Ben says, “so there’s no proof of sadness.”

Lee Chang-dong movies tend to begin in one place and catapult into new directions as his characters’ obsessions deepen. “Burning” eventually becomes a fascinating psychological thriller once Ben confesses his kink: a secret hobby of burning greenhouses (updated from the barns in the source material). Again, Jongsu has no idea what to believe: Is Ben truly a deranged arsonist or just messing with him? He has to know, and launches on a quest to map out the greenhouses in the surrounding area to figure out if Ben plans to set any of them aflame, and whether he harbors the destructive impulse himself. These unnerving periods of dialogue-free exposition approach “Vertigo” in their poetic eeriness, and it’s some of Lee’s best filmmaking to date — as the narrative arrives at the culmination of Murakami’s story, it launches into unknown terrain.

“Burning” continues to develop from there, with Ben and Haemi flitting in and out Jongsu’s world as he develops a fixation with their behavior. The movie veers from a patient, naturalistic style to profound expressionistic moments that flow into the narrative before crumbling away just as fast. One striking moment finds Haemi shedding her top, silhouetted against the fading evening light as she engages in a slow outdoor dance set to smooth jazz — then devolves into tears. Whether this event unfolds as we see it or represents Lee’s own understanding of the character remains unclear.

Meanwhile, “Burning” crystallizes its fixation on class. At times, the filmmaker overplays his hand — he drops in news reports of Donald Trump appealing to blue-collar Americans in the background of one scene — but the movie stages a striking contrast between the restrictions of Jongsu’s world and Ben’s casual sense of comfort. Jongsu wants it so badly that he begins to echo Ben’s world through his own confused filter. When he argues to Jongsu that there’s “no right or wrong, just the morals of nature,” he sets the stage for Jongsu’s attempt to embody that sentiment in a shocking final showdown.

That climax reflects much of Lee’s work, which often takes its time to seep in before veering in a grim direction. It’s not the most satisfying payoff, but it gels with everything leading up to it by leaving open any number of possibilities. Haemi could be a manic pixie dream girl epitomizing Jongsu’s deepest fantasies, and Ben might reflect the self-confidence eluding Jongsu at every turn, but he’s such an unreliable narrator (“Aren’t all protagonists crazy?” his shrink asks) that “Burning” forces you to take the events at face value alongside him.

“It’s no fun being serious,” Ben prods Jongsu, and “Burning” sometimes could use that advice as well. Lee Chang-dong’s cinema turns on somber, contemplative moments, so it’s a welcome shift to see him work with a character willing to call the movie on its own stern tone. But “Burning” keeps twisting back on itself, charting the path of a man waking up to the world, only to find that it won’t stop messing with him.

“Burning” premiered at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival in Official Competition. It is currently seeking distribution.

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Burning (2018)

User Reviews
She has left her childhood place, her whole family, she's in debt, has no friends. She's clearly escaping something, a part of herself like her past.
Another important thing about Haemi is the stories she tell about her childhood that are not clear whether they are real or lie since Jong Su doesn't remember them.
She has a cat which very much has the same quality that she has, stray.
The little light she gets on her wall means a lot to her.
Her room is really messy which signifies her messed up life.
"He's my one and only friend." and "He's the only person I trust.", referring to Jong Su.
Little Hunger (her past) - Big Hunger (Salvation)
Everyone seems to be leaving him: mother, father, sister, Haemi, and even his calf.
Just like Haemi, he has problems that root in his past.
He's also looking for salvation (waiting in Haemi's room for light to get on the wall).
His care for greenhouses is perhaps because they represent his identity, the place and culture he grew up in.
Helping Boeling (not sure if I got the cat's name correctly) means helping Haemi to him since they basically represent the same idea.
Her concerns for Haemi are probably because she is the last thing remaining from his past and he's actually fighting his past trying to prove himself that he's not forsaken: he's not destined to be left by everyone.
His hanging jaw signifies his uncertainty and lack of confidence.
Confident, apparently satisfied, and most importantly a player (as he admits that).
The cosmetics box and the accessory drawer strengthen his claim of being a player.
Seeing a new girl right after Haemi goes missing, putting makeup on her face, keeping Boeling and the accessories (from his previous victims), smiling at Jong Su every time he goes to one of his gatherings, they all show that he is confident about what he does even when Jong Su becomes suspicious.
When he tells Jong Su that he has this habit of burning greenhouses every two months, he's not really talking about greenhouses. By greenhouse he means Haemi who is that "greenhouse really close to Jong Su."

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‘Burning’ Review: Love Triangles, Class Envy Fuel Three-Alarm Thriller

By Peter Travers

Peter Travers

This stunning, slow-build thriller from South Korean director Lee Chang-dong sizzles with a cumulative power that will knock the wind out of you. Burning starts like a romance in the manner of The Talented Mr. Ripley as poor boy Jongsu, an aspiring writer played by Yoo Ah-in, falls under the spell of Haemi (Jun Jong-seo), a free spirit in skimpy attire who hawks products on the streets. He doesn’t recall that they were once school chums; she remembers that he called her “ugly” back then. Jongsu is stuck in the country taking care of the ramshackle farm near the North Korean border owned by his quick-tempered father, who’s been arrested on an assault charge against a neighbor. But after the couple have sex in her small apartment, he is so taken with the young woman that he agrees to take care of her cat, Boil (she found him in a boiler room), while she vacations in Africa to feed her “great hunger” for life experience. Visiting Haemi’s apartment every day, Jongsu masturbates while staring out her window at a wider world that seems beyond his means.

It seems like a small-scale story of two young dreamers — until makes an abrupt gear shift when he arrives at the airport to pick up Haemi only to find her in close company with Ben (Steven Yeun), a rich, handsome playboy she met abroad. The hotshot drives a Porsche and casually mentions his occupation isn’t work but “play.” Intoxicated by the perfume of Ben’s lifestyle, Jongsu finds himself in a competition in which this unfailingly polite and generous new friend seems to hold all the cards. So what if Haemi says he’s the only she can trust — Ben can feed her great hunger. They pay a surprise visit to his dad’s farm, where they smoke weed and the young woman dances naked outdoors. “Only whores do that,” snaps the jealous Jongsu. Later, while she’s asleep, Ben confesses that he does have a vice. He likes to torch greenhouses for the sheer pleasure of watching them burn.

What happens next is something audiences should discover on their own, except to say that suspicions are aroused, someone goes missing and Jongsu goes looking to for answers. Lee and co-writer Oh Jung-mi have adapted their script from Haruki Murakami’s short story Barn Burning, which not coincidentally is the title of a 1939 story by William Faulkner, the protagonist’s professed favorite writer. The ensuing game of cat-and-mouse creates shivers of suspense. But Lee is not asking audiences to sit for two and a half hours to watch a whodunit. Burning ignites themes of family, class, envy, crime, rough justice and what Faulkner called “the human heart in conflict with itself.” With invaluable help from cinematographer Hong Kyung-pyo, editors Kim Hyun and Kim Da-won, composer Mowg and trio of stellar performances, Lee has crafted a hypnotic and haunting film that transcends genre to dig deep into the human condition. You won’t be able to get it out of your head.

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Flickering Myth

Geek Culture | Movies, TV, Comic Books & Video Games

Movie Review – Burning (2018)

February 5, 2019 by Tom Beasley

Burning , 2018.

Written and directed by Lee Chang-dong. Starring Yoo Ah-in, Jeon Jong-seo and Steven Yeun.

A humble farmer is hurt when the girl he loves returns from a trip to Africa with an attractive and slightly suspicious new partner. When she goes missing, he is keen to investigate.

Burning arrives in UK cinemas with a fair amount of expectation behind it. It was a festival favourite and became the first South Korean movie to crack the shortlist for the Best Foreign Language Film award at the Oscars, although it didn’t manage to land a nomination. Thankfully, Lee Chang-dong’s film is equal to the majority of that pressure. It’s a patient and enthralling mystery thriller about male jealousy that hits hard, even as it fails to make all of its pieces fit together.

Yoo Ah-in’s protagonist Jong-su is the archetypal ‘beta’ male, so it’s a surprise to both he and the audience when he finds himself on a date with old school acquaintance Hae-mi (Jeon Jong-seo) and subsequently in her bed. Their sex scene is awkward beyond belief, holding on Jong-su’s slightly bewildered face as he fixates on the wall, the closet, the window and just about anything other than the task at hand. Almost immediately, she’s off to Africa and enlists him to feed her cat – a creature which never appears when he’s in the apartment.

There’s a nagging sense under the surface of these early scenes that Hae-mi is being pushed aside by the non-verbal war between the two men. She’s a troubled woman, who claims she wants to “just vanish like I never existed”. Indeed, after a serene sequence in which she dances topless in the glow of a sunset, she disappears without a trace. Jong-su is certain that Ben is to blame and turns amateur sleuth, following the thread of Hae-mi’s most recent steps, as well as examining Ben’s bizarre admission that he enjoys lighting greenhouses on fire. A dream sequence in which Jong-su hallucinates a boy smiling in the flickering light of an inferno is an evocative portrait of the protagonist’s obsession with Ben.

Burning segues effortlessly from intriguing love triangle drama into an engrossing mystery thriller for its second half. Ah-In’s performance becomes more frantic, while Mowg’s score expands into a huge, stark array of noises. Jong-su’s suspicion, and that of the audience, immediately falls to Yeun’s smug city boy, but Jong-seo’s performance has more than enough Gone Girl in it that there’s always that nagging sense of doubt surrounding the nature of her vanishing.

Chang-dong’s patient storytelling and mastery of tone ensures that Burning never loses its sense of momentum, even with a running time that knocks on the door of two and a half hours. Like any thriller narrative, there’s a question mark as to how well the mystery can be resolved, and Burning doesn’t entirely find a coherent way to tie everything together. There’s a lot to be said for ambiguity but, in a movie built on breadcrumb trails, it’s a shame that there isn’t a more satisfying resolution.

When Jong-su states, late in the movie, that “the world is a mystery”, he may as well be speaking for the audience – even after they leave the cinema.

Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★

Tom Beasley is a freelance film journalist and wrestling fan. Follow him on Twitter via @TomJBeasley for movie opinions, wrestling stuff and puns.

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Burning Movie Explained: Director’s Views (Korean Film)

Burning, or Beoning, is a 2018 Korean Crime Drama directed by Lee Chang-dong. The film is centered on Jong-su, who wants to become an author. He runs into a girl who used to be a neighbour when they were kids. Just when you think this is going to be a love story, enters Ben, a wealthy guy who confesses his strange hobby. The Burning movie’s cast has Ah-In Yoo, Jong-seo Jun , and Steven Yeun ( Nope ) in the leading roles. If you like Bong Joon-ho’s films like Parasite and Snowpiercer , you’ll like this one. It’s a long film and has both literal and metaphorical components. Here’s the detailed plot explanation and ending of the movie Burning explained, spoilers ahead.

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Oh, and if this article doesn’t answer all of your questions, drop me a comment or an FB chat message, and I’ll get you the answer . You can find other film explanations using the search option on top of the site.

Here are links to the key aspects of the movie:

– Burning Ending Explained By The Director
– Burning Movie Plot Explained: Ben is a serial killer
– Clues that point towards Ben being a serial killer
– What is the relevance of the well?
– What does Ben mean by Burning Greenhouses?
– How did Ben kill Hae-mi?
– Why does Jong-su not go to the police?
– Why did Ben show up to the rendezvous if he had killed Hae-mi?
– Burning Movie Plot Explained: The End was Jong-su’s novel
– Ben in Jong-su’s novel
– Great Hunger Dance
– What happened to Hae-mi?
– What was real, and what was part of Jung-su’s novel?

Burning Ending Explained By The Director

Based on what is stated by the director , Lee Chang-dong, there are two ways to explain the movie Burning. One is literally, where Ben is a sociopath serial killer, he has murdered Hae-mi, and Jong-su takes his revenge by killing Ben. The other angle is that Ben is not a killer, Hae-mi has just moved on and created a new life for herself elsewhere and what we see towards the end of the Burning movie is the story of the novel that Jong-su is writing.

Burning Movie Plot Explained: Ben is a serial killer

Burning Movie: Clues that point towards Ben being a serial killer

Ben claims that he has never shed a tear in his life, that he’s never felt sadness.
He refers to his job as “playing”. We don’t know what Ben does for a living, but he does have an odd way to describe it.
Ben’s bathroom has a box filled with women’s accessories. In the serial killer’s world, this is a ‘trophy’, one for each of his kills.
Ben expresses that he felt jealousy for the first time when Hae-mi tells him that Jong-su is the only one she trusts. But the way he says this to Jong-su, it feels apologetic in some way.
Hae-mi’s cat, Boiler, is in Ben’s house, and he lies that he brought a stray cat home.
Hae-mi is missing, and her room is neat and tidy, which is unlike her, but more like Ben.
Ben mentions to Jong-su about his “hobby” of burning greenhouses. This is elaborated upon below .
We are shown one scene from the perspective of Ben, where he ritualistically prepares another girl by using makeup. This seems to be part of Ben’s process to eventually kill his victim.
Ben always seems to be in the company of women like Hae-mi, who exhibit no restraint and are free souls unashamed to express their thoughts and feelings. That seems to be his victim type.

Burning: What is the relevance of the well Hae-mi talks about?

The well is an outstanding element of misdirection. Hae-mi is constructed as an unreliable character in the movie Burning. Much of what she says leaves both the audience and Jong-su questioning her authenticity. Sometimes you even wonder if she’s just taken on a false name to mess around with Jong-su. The well is one such event she brings up from the past, which is mysterious. She claims to have fallen into that well when she was 7-years-old and that Jong-su was the one who spotted her. Jong-su has no memory of this. He asks Hae-mi’s family, and they say that they never had a well. The neighbour also says the same thing. Jong-su’s mother, however, remembers a well, but she herself is a wreck and highly unreliable.

So what is the relevance of the well? It makes us think that Hae-mi is a compulsive liar and that she may have been lying about her cat too. In the sense, it might have been a stray that visited her room and not her pet. This notion about her is used to provide the element of surprise when Jong-su calls the cat by the name Boiler, and it responds.

What does Ben mean by Burning Greenhouses ? (Burning Movie Greenhouse Metaphor)

Ben says he enjoys locating greenhouses and burning them to the ground. He likes erasing things from existence. As Ben mentions, he sees it not as a crime but as an act of nature. Here’s the thing, though. Ben is not literally burning greenhouses. He considers women who are nurturing, warm and looking for the true meaning of life to be metaphorical greenhouses. Ben murders women with these specific traits and disposes of the body, perhaps near the lake.

How did Ben kill Hae-mi in Burning?

It looks like Ben kills someone once in two months. He tells Jong-su that he’s scouting for his next target and that it is “very close” to Jong-su. Jong-su misunderstands this as an actual greenhouse, but as he confirms, no greenhouses in his vicinity have been torched. But in that meanwhile, Ben has murdered Hae-mi and gotten rid of her body. There’s a scene when Jong-su receives a call from Hae-mi, and all he can hear is running and panting. This was probably just before her death.

Why does Jong-su not go to the police? Why does Jong-su kill Ben?

Jong-su knows that there is no pressing evidence against Ben. If he mentioned the cat, there would be no way to confirm it was Hae-mi’s as even the building admin didn’t know about the cat. It appears that Hae-mi was raising the cat secretly as pets were not allowed in the building. Even the women’s accessories are not substantial evidence. Hence, Jong-su takes matters into his own hands like his father, who is in jail because of his anger issues. Jong-su kills and burns Ben to seek revenge.

Why did Ben show up to the rendezvous if he had killed Hae-mi?

To me, it appears that Ben was fond of Jong-su, and it feels as if he allowed himself to be caught by him. At the end, when Jong-su is stabbing Ben, he doesn’t resist; instead, he hugs him. This could be Ben’s decision that his time has come, and he’d rather die at the hands of someone of his choice. For someone as meticulous as Ben, it seems odd that he left his kill trophies in the bathroom out in the open. I think he wanted Jong-su to find them.

Burning Movie Plot Explained: The End was Jong-su’s novel

This angle explores the metaphorical nature of the movie Burning. As the director mentions, Jong-su belongs to one end of the spectrum, the struggling working-class. Ben, on the other hand, is a successful character much in the lines of the Great Gatsby. His life and house are one to yearn for, but when you go after materialistic goals, you are seldom happy once you achieve them. Hae-mi is somewhere in between. She makes ends meet by taking up odd jobs, lives on credit, but is the only character who is looking for the meaning of life. And when she disappears, we feel a void.

This is not shown in the film, but the director insinuates that the movie Burning’s ending is probably Jong-su’s novel.

Burning: Ben in Jong-su’s novel

In the beginning, Ben jokingly suggests Jong-su should write about him. Despite his wealth, Ben seems to be a genuine guy. He’s respectful and doesn’t mistreat Jong-su because he’s poor. He goes out of his way to call Jong-su over to his parties and introduces him to his friends. We are not shown anything negative about Ben. He seems to be a perfect gentleman. But that can’t be true, can it? There has to be a catch!

As Jong-su begins writing his book, it ends up being about his own life, and the story is centered around a mysterious wealthy guy. While Jong-su can’t identify any evident bad traits about Ben in real life, in his book, he bestows upon him a dark side, a serial killer. Somehow, as viewers, even we feel completeness to the calm, rich, well-mannered gentleman, Ben, when we’re shown that he could be a serial killer. It’s like we were waiting for it. Perhaps there is a horrible consequence to Ben’s lifestyle, but definitely not as bad as being a murderer. However, in Jong-su’s novel, he’s decided that Ben is a killer.

Great Hunger Dance – Hunger to find out the meaning of life

The Great Hunger dance scene is pivotal to the movie Burning not only because it cinematically captures the duality of life, both light and dark, it is also the last time we see Hae-mi. She expresses herself in her raw form, happy and free, but gets called a wh*re by the one person she trusts most.

Burning Movie: What happened to Hae-mi?

Now, remember, in the beginning, Hae-mi is curious what it would be like to disappear as if she never existed. So the idea of vanishing and starting a new life has been brewing in her head for a while. But then she meets Jong-su and hopes to have found love. Unfortunately, he seems very neutral and displays no fight inside him for her.

When Ben offers Hae-mi a drop home, she expects Jong-su to step up and say that he would drop her. Instead, Jong-su is quick to ask her to go with Ben and pulls her bags out of his truck. Though he has feelings for her, he never expresses them to her. The final blow comes when Jong-su calls her a wh*re. While Jong-su assumes that Hae-mi is in a serious relationship with Ben, that is not the case. Hae-mi decides that she’s going to disappear from her current life and move elsewhere and start over. The reason she does up her room like that is to make it feel like she never lived there, like she never existed . She leaves everything behind and moves away.

Burning Movie: What was real, and what was part of Jung-su’s novel?

It’s safe to say that everything up until that night they spend at Jung-su’s place is real and is also part of his book. Everything from there is only part of the book’s fictional story. While in reality, Hae-mi just left, Jung-su tries to give her disappearance a reason in his book – Ben. While Ben is a cultured, wealthy guy, the novel presents a dark side by making him a serial killer. Everything from finding Hae-mi’s watch in Ben’s bathroom, to confirming the cat to be Boiler, to killing and burning Ben is part of the story in the novel.

The final burning question is – where is Jung-su now headed, physically and in life?

What did you think about the movie Burning and its ending? Honestly speaking, there is a third angle – North Korean Propaganda. I know very little about it, so I didn’t venture into those details. I’d be grateful to anyone who can provide their theories in the comments section below.

Barry is a technologist who helps start-ups build successful products. His love for movies and production has led him to write his well-received film explanation and analysis articles to help everyone appreciate the films better. He’s regularly available for a chat conversation on his website and consults on storyboarding from time to time. Click to browse all his film articles

K-Drama Review

K-Movie Spotlight: “Burning” Eloquently Challenges Existing Social Constructs Through Unconventional Thrilling Plot

Burning’s peculiar yet articulate depiction of societal issues made it a favorite among film critics that it notched some of the highly coveted film recognitions from various award-giving bodies around the globe..

An absolutely engrossing, out-of-the-box narrative awaits those who would watch the film Burning . This 2018 masterpiece by acclaimed movie director Lee Chang-dong deviates from the mainstream formula of psychological mystery thrillers.

Loosely based from the short story Barn Burning by the celebrated Japanese literary figure, Haruki Murakami, Burning is Lee’s homage to the author’s avant-garde style of storytelling by means of metaphorical devices to explore the depth of human emotions.

TITLE: BURNING PRODUCTION COMPANY: NHK, PINEHOUSE FILMS, NOW FILMS THEME: MYSTERY, PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER LENGTH: 148 MINUTES RELEASE DATE: MAY 17, 2018 (SOUTH KOREA) MAIN LEADS: YOO AH IN | STEVEN YEUN | JEON JONG SEO HIGHLIGHTS: PRESENTED RELEVANT SOCIAL ISSUES DRAWBACKS: SLOW-PACED

Plot sketch.

Warning: Spoiler Ahead

Burning traverses the journey of Lee Jong-su ( Yoo Ah-in ), an aspiring writer who works as a delivery person in Paju, a town located at the Korean border. A chance encounter leads him to reconnect with a childhood acquaintance, Shim Hae-mi ( Jeon Jong-seo ), whom he failed to recognize at first instance as she admittedly underwent a plastic surgery.

The two immediately overcome indifferences which eventually leads to physical intimacy. Hae-mi enthusiastically shares with Jong-su her plan to travel to Africa, her artistic affinity for pantomime and a request for him to feed her cat, Boil, in her absence.

After several days on tour, Hae-mi returns with a mysterious wealthy man who appears to be her new lover named Ben ( Steven Yeun ). She takes Ben with her to visit her childhood town, Paju. There they meet Jong-su and the three of them smoke weeds at his house. Having developed a special affection for Hae-mi, Jong-su exhibits awkwardness and discomfort seeing her acting cozy with Ben.

While Hae-mi falls asleep after half-nakedly losing herself on a trippy dance, the two men engage in a casual yet personal conversation. Jong-su starts off by sharing how his abusive father made him burn his mother’s belongings after she abandoned them when he was a child. Ben also shares his strange arsonistic penchant for burning greenhouses describing them as “ugly” and “useless” and therefore have to be devoured by fire into ashes.

Devoid of any signs of remorse, he haughtily says he gives in to this urge in an interval of two months hinting Jong-su his excitement to burn another one in a day or two, somewhere that is close to him. Bemused by this extreme oddity, Jong-su curiously prods Ben with how he discerns a greenhouse to be “useless” to which the latter responds through philosophically-layered assertions.

A couple of days later, Jong-su receives a call from Hae-mi in what would be their last contact. What he hears, however, are strange almost inaudible sounds from the other line evoking an ominous feeling.

Hae-mi is nowhere to be found. Jong-su reaches out to her family and friends, but their unfazed stance on her disappearance leaves him disappointed. They rather deduce it as a mere act of running away, assuming that Hae-mi is crippled with debt.

Jong-su’s hunches are directed at Ben – who may have had a hand on Hae-mi’s vanishing. He stealthily follows him everyday until his relentless efforts turn into an obsessive stalking. Ben, one day, catches Jong-su following him to which the latter explained that he was just after Hae-mi’s possible whereabouts.

Blatantly unconcerned, Ben instead invites him to his place. As he obliges with the invitation, Jong-su finds something inside Ben’s house that can shed light on Hae-mi’s disappearance.

Character Analysis

Burning introduces an ensemble of layered characters who need further deconstruction to fully appreciate their essence in the story. Strange as they appear to be, these characters have so much stories to tell.

He drifts in various travails hampering him to focus on his dream of becoming a writer. His father is involved in a messy legal battle for assaulting a public official. His mother abandoned him when he was young. He is left to take care of their farm while juggling it with his job as a delivery boy.

When he was asked about what he would like to write about, he’s quick to mention classic writer, William Faulkner, as someone whom he would like to pattern his writing style from. Such reference pictures Jong-su as someone whose intellectual capacity goes beyond the mediocre range for people in the working class.

Faulkner’s writing theme, which mainly focuses on dark, gothic storylines with psychologically complex narrative voice, somehow mirrors Jong-su’s thought process and emotional state as conflicted and unstable.

This is especially evident in instances when he expressed his angst about growing up with an abusive father, how he became so consumed by mere contemplation of Ben’s bizarre arsonistic addiction, and how his heartache towards Hae-mi’s vanishing turned into a dark obsession.

He is a mysterious and eccentric well-off man with an extremely discreet source of wealth. He owns a high-end abode in Gangnam, drives a luxurious Porsche car, dresses elegantly and fancies classy restaurant among the things that symbolizes his place in high society.

He is essentially everything Jong-su is not. He exudes confidence and nonchalance which manifest with the way he speaks about his points of view on things with socially imposing air. He appears to be nice and friendly yet with a contradicting emotional reticent side. His moral compass seems to frame an unsettling perspective about the world as it hinges on his idiosyncratic fixation and stoic tendency.

She is another conflicted character in the story. She is a free-spirited young woman who wants to experience the world by breaking the stereotypes attached to working class people like her. Saving up her meager earnings to bravely set off alone in Africa, having an ardent desire to learn the art of pantomime – these are some of the things not afforded to people who struggle to make both ends meet.

However, as deep as her yearnings to liberate herself from these forbearance are the heavy chains of social and personal limitations making her submit to society’s standards. Such is her choice to undergo plastic surgery to look acceptably beautiful by society’s standards.

To some extent, she becomes subservient to her own materialistic tendencies as evident when she chose Ben’s company over Jong-su’s.

Film Highlights

At face value, the film’s plot centers on a mysterious disappearance of Hae-mi which could be presumed as a possible murder case. But its real message is hidden underneath some imageries. Burning covertly presents significant points of discussion about social and moral divides. It specifically tackles issues on class struggles and gender inequality which have been ever-present in the history of humanity and are worthy to be given keen attention to properly address such long-standing issues.

Class Struggles

The film speaks well about class hierarchy and how society, as manifested through simple interactions in the film, puts premium on such concept with an emphasis on how one’s social status is treated as a yardstick for the amount of respect one gets.

As discreetly visualized in the film, an implicit tension between the working class, Jong-su, and the financially elite, Ben, was subtly portrayed in a series of interactions. Jong-su, hounded by socio-economic limitations, is unable to take full advantage of his intellectual skills because there appears to be an invisible social demarcation line as to how far he could get. People seem to mock his aspiration to become a writer as something too ambitious for someone who rather fits a blue-collar job. Ben is on the other side of the fence. He gets free passes to express his views with emphatic persuasion, a convenience that comes with being on top of the social class. The manner in which he engaged in a casual conversation with Jong-su stating his principles with firm conviction gives an impression of a deity dispensing an infallible judgment. Albeit possessing good senses, Jong-su, on the other hand, unconsciously positions himself as an awkward receiving end of Ben’s imposing confidence.

Gender Inequality

Hae-mi’s role is very symbolic and crucial to the film’s essence. Her character presents important metaphors about how women are treated unjustly by relegating them into a second-rate gender. Such was her choice to undergo plastic surgery which suggests how women are objectified through their physical appearance. It implies how their value is boxed in a specific set of parameters. As stated by one of Hae-mi’s friends, “There is no country for women.” Such haunting line was delivered with strong resonance for viewers to contemplate about.

In addition, Hae-mi’s sudden vanishing is a powerful and profound symbol regarding how women have a dispensable position in society. Their absence would not amount to anything more than a replaceable role.

Film Afterthoughts

Running through a 32-minute short of a three-hour moving frames, the film is a slow-burn kind that demands patience and attention to details from its viewers as it mounts together every little piece of the puzzle through the course of the story until the summation of the protagonist’s reserved obsession explodes in the last few minutes of the film.

Burning is a kind of movie that leaves you with more questions than answers. The arc trajectory leads to a puzzling climactic finale as if in celebration of an absurd escapism.

As a Murakami reader myself, I can say that the essential elements of his story parallels with Lee’s film framework. The narrative movement follows a free-flowing track, slow but textured with significant details. Murakami’s signature style of rootlessness in which the conflict seems to spring out of nowhere brings a mixture of ambiguity and odd beauty to the movie. Director Lee successfully captured such elements but still making the film uniquely his own.

As layered as its characters is the narrative itself. I appreciate how its message is subdued beneath the complexities of its metaphors which allows for a deeper contemplation for the viewers. The story overflows with allegorical sketches as its most convenient method of delivering its message.

In such manner, the social and moral dilemmas presented were portrayed in the guise of a fictionally gripping and ominous mystery case. It is also worth mentioning that the most critical point of the narrative which is the “greenhouse burning” is itself a trope that requires further delving in order to be on the same page with the brilliant minds behind the film.

This figurative way of storytelling leaves the audience to decipher the whole sense of the story. As soon as one decodes the movie’s conveyed meaning, one cannot help but marvel at both the writer’s and the director’s remarkable artistry.

Overall, Burning’s authenticity in its uniquely woven bizarre narrative with a social commentary value makes it a great watch.

5 Takeaways From Korean Film #ALIVE Starring Yoo Ah In & Park Shin Hye

Image Sources: CGV Arthouse

Trailer Video: Well Go USA Entertainment

Streaming Site: Netflix

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Burning (2018)

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This simple boy-meets-girl movie builds to a thriller with an astonishing, unforgettable climax

Lee Chang-dong’s “Burning” initially presents itself as a simple boy-meets-girl tale, set in South Korea. Protagonist Jongsu (Ah-in Yoo), a young deliveryman who passively dreams of putting his degree in creative writing to use, bumps into his childhood friend Haemi (Jong-seo Jun) while she dances outside a discount store to attract customers. They catch up over dinner and sleep together that night, with Jongsu becoming so enamored of the spirited Haemi that he agrees to feed her cat while she travels to Kenya to satiate what she calls her “great hunger” for life experience.

Although Jongsu fills the cat’s bowl with food each day, he never actually sees the animal, a manifestation of the uncertainty that lurks throughout the film. Gradually, “Burning” begins its descent into thriller territory when Haemi returns from Kenya with Ben (Steven Yeun), a charming, slightly older man who lives in Gangnam and has everything Jongsu doesn’t: money, friends and some sort of romantic relationship with Haemi. Yet despite this, Ben still seems dissatisfied with his life, telling Jongsu that he sets greenhouses on fire every two months for fun: In just 10 minutes, Ben says, he can “burn it all down, as if it never existed.”

Based on Haruki Murakami’s 1992 short story “ Barn Burning ,” the film is a captivating character study that takes its most poignant scene directly from Murakami’s story. Shortly before a central character goes missing, Ben and Haemi visit Jongsu at his home in the countryside, situated so close to the North Korean border that they can hear the propaganda broadcasts. As Ben and Jongsu relax outside, basking in the dusk light, Haemi begins to dance, swaying to jazz music and removing her top. But her performance is as much for herself as for the two men; she is free of all constraints and, for once, doesn’t feel trapped.

As the film’s object of desire, the character of Haemi comes close to being a Manic Pixie Dream Girl , but Jun’s performance has enough depth to steer clear of that cliche. Making her screen debut, the actress manages to capture both Haemi’s wide-eyed innocence and her troubled spirit. In one dinner scene, she playfully pantomimes peeling tangerines with as much energy as she brings to a scene in which she bemoans her existence.

Jongsu complements her erratic nature, with Yoo’s expressionless baby face deliberately revealing little about what he thinks or feels. He remains hard to read, even when Haemi reminds him that he once crossed the street to tell her she was ugly, before she got plastic surgery. Rage is the only emotion he expresses, as tension builds between the two men. (Tellingly, this theme is shared with the 1939 story “ Barn Burning ” by William Faulkner, Jongsu’s favorite author.)

But the standout performance belongs to Yeun, an America-based actor whose presence is commanding enough to shift the entire tone of the film. “Burning” marks his first foray into Korean cinema, and the actor’s quintessentially Western mannerisms add an unsettling dimension to the character of Ben. Yeun can even make a yawn seem menacing.

Lee plays the actors off one another to create a compelling exploration of human nature. South Korea’s official Oscar submission, “Burning” culminates in a finale so astonishing that it will sear itself into viewers’ memories for years to come.

Unrated. At Landmark’s Bethesda Row Cinema and the Angelika Film Center Mosaic. Contains graphic violence, drugs, sex, nudity and some strong language. In Korean with subtitles. 148 minutes.

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Common sense media reviewers.

Slow, enigmatic character study with nudity, violence.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Bleak character study presents ultimately negative

Jong-su is emotionally mysterious but also likable

Almost none except for one strong sequence that sh

A couple kiss with tongue, take off their tops. A

"Butt," "whores," and one "f--k." Bonus features s

Lots of incidental food and beverage products with

Main characters, probably of legal age in Korea, d

Positive Messages

Bleak character study presents ultimately negative examples of people who don't have real friendships or family support, which could be used as an example of how important both of these are to personal happiness. Some iffy beauty messages from dancing girls being used to attract customers to stores, and when Hae-mi says she had plastic surgery to become beautiful.

Positive Role Models

Jong-su is emotionally mysterious but also likable. He does what he has to when his father runs into trouble, and helps out an old friend. But he commits a terrible crime for revenge. Ben is very mysterious, possibly a sociopath. Hae-mi is a free spirit but financially unstable, also hard to know and mysterious.

Violence & Scariness

Almost none except for one strong sequence that shows a fight and stabbing from middle distance. Blood is visible, repeated stabbing is simulated outside camera frame; there's a dying embrace, and blood smears visible on car, clothing, bare legs. A body is put in a car; the car is set on fire. Dream sequence shows large structure fire. A court hearing mentions a fight and injuring a government official.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

A couple kiss with tongue, take off their tops. A woman's bare breasts are fully visible and shown being caressed. Putting on a condom is simulated outside camera frame; simulated sex shows thrusting, kissing from chest up. Several scenes show simulated masturbation; one scene simulates manual stimulation in dream. Female breasts, male buttocks shown. A couple make out in background.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

"Butt," "whores," and one "f--k." Bonus features show a crew member with the word "f--kin'" on a baseball hat.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Lots of incidental food and beverage products with labels in Korean. One box of Marlboro cigarettes shown.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Main characters, probably of legal age in Korea, drink wine and beer, mostly with meals or socially; excess isn't shown. Several scenes take place in bars. One cocktail party scene. Main characters smoke marijuana once and become very giggly. Main characters and background action frequently show cigarette smoking.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Burning is a long, slow character study in Korean with English subtitles that has strong sexual content and a bloody act of violence. There's a scene that simulates sex and shows a woman's bare breasts and a few scenes that show simulated masturbation. No other sensitive parts or explicit acts are shown on-screen. The only direct violence is a stabbing with smears of blood, and burning the body in a car. The main characters frequently smoke cigarettes and smoke marijuana once. Wine and beer frequently appear with meals and socializing, and several scenes take place in bars. There's one instance of "f--k." The three main characters live lonely, isolated lives, so it can be a good opportunity to talk about how things might be different without close ties to friends and family. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

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Community Reviews

Parents say (3)

Based on 3 parent reviews

Slow and steady

What's the story.

In BURNING, Jong-su (Ah-in Yoo) reconnects with childhood friend Hae-mi (Jong-seo Jun) just before she takes off on vacation to Africa. Jong-su finds himself pining after Hae-mi while she's gone, and is excited to pick her up at the airport when at last she gets back to Seoul. But Jong-su's dreams of romance will have to wait when Hae-mi shows up with the mysterious Ben ( Steven Yeun ) in tow. When Hae-mi suddenly disappears, Jong-su is convinced Ben has something to do with it and sets out to find her.

Is It Any Good?

At right around two and a half hours, this quiet, slow-paced character study offers a lot of food for thought while keeping the audience at arm's length. The slow pace, isolated lives, and enigmatic characters make it hard to establish an emotional connection with Burning . It does provoke some thought about why we live the way we do, how that affects us, and what the consequences are of living cut off, if only emotionally, from other people.

The absorbing story, thoughtful direction, and talented acting manage to hold the viewer's interest; we're drawn in despite not being able to feel a real connection to the characters. The ending isn't really an ending, and contributes to a sense of unease, but also encourages thought about where the story might go from there. Strong sexual content, adult themes, and rare but strong violence make it best for oldest teens and up.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the sex in Burning . How much is OK to show in movies? Why?

What about all the cigarette smoking ? Is it realistic? What about the scene where they smoke marijuana? What are the possible consequences of smoking either one?

What kind of effect did the violent scene have on you? How much violence is OK to show in movies?

Movie Details

In theaters : November 9, 2018
On DVD or streaming : March 5, 2019
Cast : Ah-in Yoo , Steven Yeun , Jong-seo Jun
Director : Chang-dong Lee
Inclusion Information : Asian actors
Studio : Well Go USA Entertainment
Genre : Drama
Topics : Friendship
Run time : 148 minutes
MPAA rating : NR
Last updated : December 2, 2023

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Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

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BBC’s Burning Sun Documentary: What Was the K-Pop Scandal?

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Disclaimer: This article contains mentions of sexual assault. Reader discretion is advised.

BBC’s Burning Sun documentary looks into the South Korean sex scandal that highlighted the crimes of popular K-Pop stars and celebrities, including Jung Joon-young. The documentary pieces together the story of two journalists, Park Hyo-Sil and Kang Kyung-Yoon, who brought the scandal to light. Hyo-Sil and Kyung-Yoon, who investigated the sex abuse case, speak in the TV documentary and share their respective narratives.

According to BBC , allegations against K-pop star Jung Joon-Young first surfaced in 2016. At the time, he was the singer and songwriter for the popular band Drug Restaurant and a renowned TV star. Park Hyo-Sil was the first to report accusations that Joon-Young secretly recorded sex footage of his then-girlfriend. The crime is called “molka” in South Korea. Hyo-Sil claimed her newspaper editor told her it was a “big case being investigated.” The girlfriend, however, recanted the allegations, and Hyo-Sil had to take the fall for it, enduring abuse and harassment for years.

Eventually, Kang Kyung-Yoon picked up Hyo-Sil’s story and found disturbing evidence that implicated Joon-Young. During the investigation, several other celebrity names appeared in the Burning Sun scandal. Kyung-Yoon reportedly uncovered a group chat which contained sexually explicit videos, images, and chats detailing gang rape.

The investigation resulted in Jung Joon-Young’s arrest alongside other male K-pop stars. These stars were Choi Jong-Hoon of the rock band FT Island and BigBang’s Seungri. Other information during the investigation revealed the involvement of a senior police contact who was protecting the abusers.

In BBC’s Burning Sun documentary, Park Hyo-Sil and Kang Kyung-Yoon open up about the scandal. They also discuss the abuse and grave consequences they faced as they reported on the story.

Burning Sun scandal: Who are Park Hyo-Sil and Kang Kyung-Yoon?

You should all go watch the Burning Sun documentary released by the BBC on YouTube today. All I will say is thank you to the people who fight for what's right, and thank you to the people who "leak" things when they can't fight. May the victims find peace. https://t.co/qeKCQVeD6Y pic.twitter.com/JCYzRMGIhs — SolosAreAntisDaily (@SolosAreAntis) May 20, 2024

BBC stated that Park Hyo-Sil was a reporter for a Seoul-based newspaper when she first wrote on the Burning Sun scandal. In September 2016, Hyo-Sil claimed she first learned that Jung Joon-Young’s girlfriend had accused him of secretly recording her during sex. Hyo-Sil said in BBC’s Burning Sun documentary that she didn’t realize “how massive it was going to be.” Her story made headlines shortly after she published it, and “media outlets went into a frenzy.”

Joon-Young’s management team soon released a statement, calling it an “unimportant incident inflated by the press.” They also called for a police investigation into the allegations. Hyo-Sil claimed the singer’s fans soon blamed the girlfriend for making false accusations. This caused the girlfriend to recant the allegations, per the outlet . Additionally, Hyo-Sil claimed in the BBC documentary that “the media was the villain” for Joon-Young’s fans and she “bore the brunt of it.”

After her story was published, Park Hyo-Sil claimed she faced abuse and harassment online and received threatening emails. People also threatened her newspaper editor, asking him to “sack her.” They told the editor that if he didn’t fire her, “we’re going to set fire to your building.” Hyo-Sil further talked about the death threats she received and that she feared for her safety. “My husband was incredibly worried and told me not to go into the office, not to leave the house because it seemed so dangerous,” she said.

Per BBC, Hyo-Sil elaborated on the harassment in the BBC Burning Sun documentary. She said, “I started receiving phone calls in the early hours,” which continued for hours. She stated that when she considered not answering the phone, people “started sending obscene images.” The journalist added, “I was pregnant and I was in such shock. I was so mentally shattered that even going out of the house was difficult.” She blamed the abuse and the stress for her “two miscarriages,” because of which she is currently “childless.”

Since burning sun documentary was released yesterday people decided to bring zico’s name into it again saying let’s “re-opened” the case. So as someone who dont know zico’s past, I did my reading because I’m curious too. This is what I found.. ? 1. Kang Kyung-yoon journalist… pic.twitter.com/4QUbhvKfcN — HOW’s mina (@taesanwon) May 20, 2024

Jung Joon-Young music career advanced while Park Hyo-Sil faced harassment. BBC’s documentary on the Burning Sun scandal stated that in 2019, found himself amid new allegations. That year, Kang Kyung-Yoon, an entertainment reporter for SBS, Korea’s largest broadcaster, found evidence to bring Joon-Young down.

Reportedly, during the initial investigation in 2016, Joon-Young handed his phone to a private forensics company. In 2019, someone anonymously released his phone data, which then reached Kyung-Yoon. She then picked up Hyo-Sil’s story, intending to complete it. According to BBC, the leaked information consisted of a KakaoTalk group chat. These messages date back to 2015 and 2016.

The reporter revealed she found sexually explicit videos and images of unconscious women. Kyung-Yoon said in the documentary, “My heart still hurts when I think of that.” As mentioned earlier, the group had other popular K-pop boy band members, including Choi Jong-Hoon and Seungri. While investigating the matter, Kyung-Yoon also learned that a senior police contact had been protecting the abusers. Kyung-Yoon called the men involved “disgusting” who played “around with women as if they were toys.”

In BBC’s Burning Sun documentary, Kang Kyung-Yoon talked about the findings in detail. These leaked details consisted of messages exchanged between the KakaoTalk group members, including one instance where they discussed gang rape. Kyung-Yoon claimed that they had discussed the gang rape of a woman after she fell and hit her head. One individual said in a message exchange, “I got so scared yesterday… It sounded like her skull was cracking. Jung Joon-young’s following message stated, “Literally the funniest night of my entire life.” Not long after the story was out, authorities arrested Joon-Young.

Kyung-Yoon, who was pregnant at the time, also spoke about the abuse she faced. She said people “called me femi-bitch. Pregnant femi-bitch. Left-wing femi-bitch.” She recalled feeling scared, thinking, “Something might happen to the baby. My heart was incredibly lonely and exhausted.” Despite all the abuse she faced and the harassment people directed towards her child, she claimed, “I have no regrets.”

The court cases against all men involved resulted in convictions, reported BBC . Jung Joon-Young received five years in prison on the charges of gang rape and molka. Choi Jong-Hoon, for his role in the gang rape, got a two-and-a-half years of sentence. Meanwhile, Seungri appealed for an 18-month sentence for obtaining prostitutes for investors, embezzlement, molka, and inciting violence. Lastly, a senior police contact, who faced charges for allegedly protecting them, went free after an acquittal.

Kang Kyung-Yoon, now a mother of one, revealed that the harassment continued long after the expose. Kyung-Yoon claimed that her and Park Hyo-Sil’s efforts did not go in vain. She said, “We threw a single pebble into a huge pond… It has calmed down again but I hope it’s still there in people’s memories so that if something like that happens again, we can call it out much earlier.”

BBC’s Burning Sun documentary is available to stream on BBC iPlayer and the BBC World Service YouTube channel. BBC News TV channel will the documentary as a series in June 2024.

The post BBC’s Burning Sun Documentary: What Was the K-Pop Scandal? appeared first on ComingSoon.net - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More .

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Unveiling New Evidence: “Burning Sun” Documentary by BBC With Exclusive Footage

International audiences can watch the documentary on the BBC World Service YouTube channel.

13 minutes ago

The investigative team at BBC World Service , known as BBC Eye, has debuted an impactful documentary called Burning Sun , featuring new revelations about sex scandals tied to high-profile K-Pop celebrities discovered by two courageous female Korean reporters.

This one-hour film follows the challenging experiences of reporters Park Hyo Sil and Kang Kyung Yoon from Seoul, who uncovered deeply troubling secrets at a significant risk to themselves.

In 2016, Park Hyo Sil pursued allegations made by Jung Joon Young ‘s girlfriend, who accused him of secretly recording their private acts. After the initial allegations were withdrawn, Park Hyo Sil suffered public backlash, cyber harassment, and personal hardships, including two miscarriages.

The unrevealed scandal resurfaced in 2019 when insider data from Jung’s phone was disclosed to Kang Kyung Yoon , an SBS journalist. The subsequent investigation into the phone content brought to light explicit videos and incriminating conversations between Jung and other notable K-Pop figures such as Choi Jong Hoon , expressing sexual violence and alluding to police complicity.

The Burning Sun documentary by BBC illustrates the downfall of these stars who were once perceived as invincible, thanks to Kang’s tenacious pursuit of justice. The reportage led to other survivors stepping forward and ultimately resulted in significant legal repercussions for the accused. Kang, however, was subjected to a severe online backlash, similar to Park’s.

The documentary Burning Sun is available for UK viewers on BBC iPlayer and globally on the BBC World Service YouTube channel. A Korean-language edition can be found on the BBC News Korean YouTube channel, and it is slated for television broadcast on the BBC News TV channel in June 2024.

For further information on the documentary, you can visit the BBC News website or tune into the six-episode podcast series Intrigue: Burning Sun on BBC Sounds and various podcast services. The production is helmed by Kai Lawrence and executed by Monica Garnsey , Mustafa Khalili , and Kavita Puri , with Marc Perkins carrying out the editing duties.

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The BBC’s “Burning Sun” documentary unveils the grim reality behind the glitz and glamour of the K-Pop world, where some celebrities led lives tarnished by scandalous acts. Through never-before-seen footage and poignant storytelling, the film honors the bravery of the female reporters who pursued the truth, often at great personal cost. As it becomes internationally accessible, this documentary offers a critical look at the intersection of celebrity, power, and justice, resonating with audiences around the world and encouraging a deeper conversation about the challenges faced by whistleblowers and journalists in the fight against systemic abuse and corruption.

BBC’s Burning Sun Documentary: What Was the K-Pop Scandal?

By Nikita Mahato

Disclaimer: This article contains mentions of sexual assault. Reader discretion is advised.

In BBC’s Burning Sun documentary, Park Hyo-Sil and Kang Kyung-Yoon open up about the scandal. They also discuss the abuse and grave consequences they faced as they reported on the story.

Burning Sun scandal: Who are Park Hyo-Sil and Kang Kyung-Yoon?

You should all go watch the Burning Sun documentary released by the BBC on YouTube today. All I will say is thank you to the people who fight for what's right, and thank you to the people who "leak" things when they can't fight. May the victims find peace. https://t.co/qeKCQVeD6Y pic.twitter.com/JCYzRMGIhs — SolosAreAntisDaily (@SolosAreAntis) May 20, 2024

Since burning sun documentary was released yesterday people decided to bring zico’s name into it again saying let’s “re-opened” the case. So as someone who dont know zico’s past, I did my reading because I’m curious too. This is what I found.. ? 1. Kang Kyung-yoon journalist… pic.twitter.com/4QUbhvKfcN — HOW’s mina (@taesanwon) May 20, 2024

BBC’s Burning Sun documentary is available to stream on BBC iPlayer and the BBC World Service YouTube channel. BBC News TV channel will the documentary as a series in June 2024.

Nikita Mahato is a true-crime and news writer at ComingSoon and shows an aptitude for captivating storytelling, and extensive research, among other things. Her previous works can be seen on Sportskeeda. A proficient basketball player, Nikita has been involved with several non-profit organizations to be able to give back to the community. She also has a penchant for everything entertainment.

Quest for Fire Streaming: Watch & Stream Online via Amazon Prime Video

Late K-pop idol Goo Hara revealed to have provided crucial aid to reporters investigating Burning Sun scandal

"She was a very brave woman," reporter Kang Kyung-yoon told BBC in a new documentary

goo hara burning sun scandal 2019 bbc documentary

The following story contains mentions and details of sexual assault and suicide.

Late K-pop singer Goo Hara was recently revealed to have lent crucial aid to investigative reporters as the Burning Sun scandal unfolded in 2019.

The BBC World Service ‘s investigative team, BBC Eye , published an extensive documentary yesterday (May 19) titled Burning Sun focused on the 2019 scandal in South Korea of the same name. The documentary primarily highlighted the case through the lens of two female investigative journalists – Kang Kyung-yoon and Park Hyo-sil – who blew the case wide open to the general public.

The documentary revealed new and never-before-seen details of the crimes committed as part of the scandal. It also shared key players involved in bringing justice to the victims affected by the Burning Sun scandal, revealing for the first time that the late Goo Hara, who was a member of girl group KARA and passed in late 2019, had been played a crucial part in exposing the people involved in the scandal.

Former Big Bang member Seungri was the owner of a nightclub sharing the scandal’s namesake, and also where majority of the crimes took place. He was convicted of nine charges, which included abetting prostitution and embezzlement. Convicted alongside him were singer-songwriter Jung Joon-young and former Kyung F.T. Island guitarist Choi Jong-hoon, who were both charged for gang-raping drunk and unconscious women.

Data leaks stemming from Jung’s mobile phone unveiled chatrooms where celebrities involved would share molkas (a South Korean term used to refer to hidden spy cameras and illicit filming) and engage in facilitating prostitutes for investors and Burning Sun’s VIPs.

Kang revealed to BBC that Hara was instrumental in providing the journalists with leads regarding the case, specifically in uncovering the identity of the police officer who was an accomplice in the Burning Sun scandal.

According to Kang, the officer’s identity was one of the biggest mysteries in the case. “Hara appeared and opened the door for me,” Kang said, telling BBC that the singer had contacted the reporter out of the blue. “Hara and Jong-hoon had been close since their debut, and she also knew Seungri and Joon-young.”

Kang continued: “She told me that, because she was friends with them, she’d seen them on their mobile phones before and said, ‘They’ve got some really weird things on there. What you said was right’.” According to Kang, Hara had personally called Jong-hoon to ask about the identity of the officer involved.

Hara’s brother, Goo Ho-in, was also interviewed as part of the documentary, telling BBC, “ When Hara spoke to Jong-hoon on speakerphone, I was listening next to her. She said, ‘I can help you. Tell this reporter everything that you know’.”

Jong-hoon then proceeded to reveal the identity of the officer involved, named Yoon Kyu-keun, who was also stationed at the South Korean presidential residence at the time. The phone call was then recorded by Kang as evidence.

“Hara helped Jong-hoon to admit it,” Kang added in the documentary. “She was a very brave woman. She also said to me, ‘I am also a victim of revenge porn’.”

A year prior to the Burning Sun scandal, Hara had been involved in a lawsuit against her ex-boyfriend after he threatened to release intimate photos of her. The public trial had overlapped with the investigation into the Burning Sun scandal. Although Choi would later serve a year in prison for assault and blackmail, Hara took her own life at age 28 in 2019 before he was officially sentenced.

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London’s Raindance Film Festival is making a significant calendar shift for its 32nd edition, moving from its traditional fall slot to a new summer schedule.

Raindance kicks off with the U.K. premiere of Tilman Singer’s “ Cuckoo ,” a horror feature starring Hunter Schafer and Dan Stevens that previously played at Berlin and SXSW. Closing the festival is the European premiere of “National Anthem” by Luke Gilford, starring Charlie Plummer as a construction worker joining a community of queer rodeo performers. The film, which was at Toronto and SXSW, leads into the Pride in London weekend with a wild West End party.

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The documentary section features “Avant-Drag!” by Fil Ieropoulos and “Eternal You” by Hans Block and Moritz Rieseviek. Short films are also in the spotlight, with Raindance being an Oscar-qualifying festival for shorts.

The jury, including actors Diego Luna and Alice Englert, and producer Al Morrow, will honor features in five categories, including Discovery Award and Best Documentary Feature. Shorts will compete in four categories.

“Raindance is known as a festival of discovery,” said festival founder Elliot Grove. “With our newly determined and defined focus on first and second-time filmmakers, we continue our campaign of championing new voices and the edgy, under-the-radar films.

Artistic directors Martyna Szmytkowska and Malaika Bova added: “We continue with the mission that we began last year: to confirm Raindance as the leading U.K. platform for emerging filmmakers. As part of this effort, we have reshaped the film program, the awards system and the industry sessions – altogether tailoring Raindance to the needs of first and second-time filmmakers.”

The festival runs June 19-28 across London’s Curzon Mayfair, Curzon Soho, Prince Charles Cinema and Genesis Cinema. Additionally, the House of Raindance industry hub and the Raindance Immersive Summit (June 18-19) will take place at Wonderville on Haymarket, while the ninth Raindance Immersive will be hosted on VRChat throughout June.

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Burning 2018, directed by Lee Chang-Dong
Burning movie review: Lee Chang Dong's film brings a Haruki Murakami
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Burning 버닝 Korean Movie Review

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燃えさかる韓国料理 Burning Korean food
ഇനി മാജിക് ചെയ്യില്ല മക്കളേ😂😂|Gopinath Muthukad Magic Fail Troll Video|Troll Video
The great Hunger Dance( in search of the meaning of life)
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COMMENTS

Burning movie review & film summary (2018)
Advertisement. Everyone is hungry for something in "Burning," the new film from South Korean master Lee Chang-dong. How that hunger manifests, and what hunger even signifies, is up for debate. The debate itself is too dangerous to even be spoken out loud, since it threatens the class status quo. Based loosely on Haruki Murakami's short story ...
Burning (2018)
Rated 4/5 Stars • Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/09/24 Full Review Online A the best directed South Korean movie I've seen. I really expected and hoped it would've become more of a "thriller" about ...
Review: In 'Burning,' Love Ignites a Divided World
Directed by Chang-dong Lee. Drama, Mystery. Not Rated. 2h 28m. By Manohla Dargis. Oct. 25, 2018. One of the most beautiful scenes in a movie this year — in many years — comes midway through ...
Burning Is a South Korean Movie About Toxic Masculinity That You Didn't
Back at the Vancouver International Film Festival in 1997, I was on a jury that gave this South Korean auteur top prize for his first film, Green Fish, a funny, unsettling crime picture that was ...
'Burning': Film Review
'Burning': Film Review | Cannes 2018. South Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong's 'Burning' is a quiet romantic thriller in which an aspiring writer and a rich hotshot become rivals for the ...
'Burning' Movie Review: A Quiet but Impactful Thriller
The story continues to flow at the same pace as before. I loved that Chang-dong opted to make Burning a slow, quiet film. Editing is slow paced, and shots linger for extended periods of time. We ...
'Burning' Is One of the Best Films of the Year
Watch on. Burning is a movie comprised of many mysteries, but its central enigma is the disappearance of a young woman, whose unexplained absence reconfigures an awkward young-adult love triangle ...
Steven Yeun Makes His Leading-Man Korean Film Debut in Burning
Steven Yeun, in his first leading Korean film role, is the perfect antecedent to Yoo and Jeon, the latter a first-timer with a youthful onscreen unguardedness. Yeun, on the other hand, is suave ...
'Burning' Review: Lee Chang-dong Meets Haruki Murakami
By Eric Kohn. May 16, 2018 6:07 pm. "Burning". Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong and Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami share distinct fixations — loneliness and desire — so the combination of ...
Film Review: 'Burning'
Film Review: 'Burning'. In this loose riff on Haruki Murakami's short story 'Barn Burning,' Korean director Lee Chang-dong tries to make sense of life's mysteries. The word " Burning " may ...
Burning (2018)
Burning: Directed by Lee Chang-dong. With Yoo Ah-in, Steven Yeun, Jeon Jong-seo, Kim Soo-Kyung. Jong-su bumps into a girl who used to live in the same neighborhood, who asks him to look after her cat while she's on a trip to Africa. When back, she introduces Ben, a mysterious guy she met there, who confesses his secret hobby.
Burning (2018)
Burning is an excellent psychological thriller with the veil of mystery around it. The movie that intrigues you and leaves you with a lot of questions to ask yourself why and to give it a try to connect the small pieces of mosaic. The more you think about the story and dialogs more questions starts to go on surface.
Burning (2018 film)
Burning (Korean: 버닝; RR: Beoning) is a 2018 South Korean-Japanese psychological drama film co-written, produced, and directed by Lee Chang-dong.The film is based on the short story "Barn Burning" from The Elephant Vanishes by Haruki Murakami, with elements inspired by William Faulkner's story of the same name. It stars Yoo Ah-in, Steven Yeun, and Jeon Jong-seo.
Burning (South Korea, 2018)
Review: Critics tried to outdo one another with praise for "Burning".An unparalleled masterpiece and clearly one of the best, if not even THE best Korean movie of 2018, they say. Considering the fact that Lee Chang-dong was directing, it shouldn't come as a surprise that critics might already be praising the movie before they have actually even seen it.
'Burning' Review: Love Triangles, Class Envy Fuel Three-Alarm Thriller
Burning starts like a romance in the manner of The Talented Mr. Ripley as poor boy Jongsu, an aspiring writer played by Yoo Ah-in, falls under the spell of Haemi (Jun Jong-seo), a free spirit in ...
Review and Summary: Burning (2018)
Review of Burning / 버닝, directed by Lee Chang-dong. I was a freshman in college when I ventured out to Quad Cinema in the Village, in the depths of New York City, to go see Burning for the first time.I had purchased a ticket immediately when I saw the movie was coming to the United States, then walked about thirty minutes from my dorm room in Chelsea all the way south.
Movie Review
Movie Review - Burning (2018) February 5, 2019 by Tom Beasley. ... It was a festival favourite and became the first South Korean movie to crack the shortlist for the Best Foreign Language Film ...
Burning Movie Explained: Director's Views (Korean Film)
Burning, or Beoning, is a 2018 Korean Crime Drama directed by Lee Chang-dong. The film is centered on Jong-su, who wants to become an author. He runs into a girl who used to be a neighbour when they were kids. Just when you think this is going to be a love story, enters Ben, a wealthy guy who confesses his strange hobby.
K-Movie Spotlight: "Burning" Eloquently Challenges Existing Social
Plot Sketch. Warning: Spoiler Ahead. Burning traverses the journey of Lee Jong-su (), an aspiring writer who works as a delivery person in Paju, a town located at the Korean border.A chance ...
Burning (2018)
Lee Chang-dong is by no means the most prolific of the many great South Korean directors to come to major prominence in the 21st Century: Burning, his sixth feature, comes to us after a long eight-year gap since his fifth, 2010's lovely Poetry.But he does maybe put up a real fight to be considered one of the most important filmmakers from that nation - he directed 2002's Oasis, the individual ...
'Burning' review: South Korean movie builds to a thriller with an
Lee Chang-dong's "Burning" initially presents itself as a simple boy-meets-girl tale, set in South Korea. Protagonist Jongsu (Ah-in Yoo), a young deliveryman who passively dreams of putting ...
Burning
This film was based on a short story by Haruki Murakami. "Burning" is a 2018 South Korean movie that was directed by Lee Chang Dong. Jong Su (Yoo Ah In) is a quiet introvert with a life full of sadness. His father has been charged with violent assault.
Burning Movie Review
Our review: Parents say: ( 3 ): Kids say: Not yet rated Rate movie. At right around two and a half hours, this quiet, slow-paced character study offers a lot of food for thought while keeping the audience at arm's length. The slow pace, isolated lives, and enigmatic characters make it hard to establish an emotional connection with Burning.
BBC's Burning Sun Documentary: What Was the K-Pop Scandal?
Reader discretion is advised. BBC's Burning Sun documentary looks into the South Korean sex scandal that highlighted the crimes of popular K-Pop stars and celebrities, including Jung Joon-young ...
Unveiling New Evidence: "Burning Sun" Documentary by BBC With ...
The investigative team at BBC World Service, known as BBC Eye, has debuted an impactful documentary called Burning Sun, featuring new revelations about sex scandals tied to high-profile K-Pop ...
BBC's Burning Sun Documentary: What Was the K-Pop Scandal?
BBC stated that Park Hyo-Sil was a reporter for a Seoul-based newspaper when she first wrote on the Burning Sun scandal. In September 2016, Hyo-Sil claimed she first learned that Jung Joon-Young ...
Burning Sun: the BBC Eye documentary about the women who exposed the
Burning Sun, a documentary by the BBC World Service's award-winning and critically-acclaimed investigations team, BBC Eye, brings together the story of two female Korean journalists who took on ...
Goo Hara provided crucial aid to investigate Burning Sun scandal
Late K-pop singer Goo Hara was recently revealed to have lent crucial aid to investigative reporters as the Burning Sun scandal unfolded in 2019. The BBC World Service 's investigative team, BBC ...
Hunter Schafer's 'Cuckoo' to Open Raindance Film Festival
London's Raindance Film Festival is making a significant calendar shift for its 32nd edition, moving from its traditional fall slot to a new summer schedule. Raindance kicks off with the U.K ...

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