In 1975, when revolution in Korea is imminent, intellectual & writer on the
run Jun-Soo (Moon Keung-soon) is researching the llife of Jeon Tae-Il (Hong
Kyeong-in), the working class hero turned union leader turned martyr who
started it all.
Jun-Soo recounts Tae-Il's early life in the late 60's/early 70's as first an
umbrella boy, later an assistant tailor at a sweat-shop. But he is appalled by
the bad working conditions in the shop, where the workers, often children, have
to work up to 4 days in a row, & despite fatigue & sickness ... they
are often even given shots to pull through. Tae-Il, who always had ambitions to
study, decides to take on their agenda & in his spare time studies the
Labour Law to make a case against the sweat shop's bosses, but when he takes
his claims to the work inspectorate, nothing happens ... which leads him to
organize a strike himself ... which promptly gets him fired ...
Back in 1975, Jun-Soo's pregnant girlfriend Jung-sun is trying to organize a
union herself but her efforts are first prohibited by the proper authorities,
& when she doesn't give up, she & her co-conspirators are even badly
beaten up, eventually incarcerated - with Jun-Soo rather helpless as he's on
the run himself. But by now, the students have taken the revolution to the
streets, & friends assure Jun-Soo that his book about Tae-Il will be opf
vital importance.
Back to Tae-Il's life again, as he, despite being fired, returns to his
workers in his sweatshop, & when he can't get them help from the
work-inspectorate, he informs the press, that promptly runs an article on the
appalling working conditions in the sweat shop, which causes an uproar & an
inspection ... but the shop's bosses try to wriggle out of it by trying to make
some compromises with the workers & cover everything up during inspection
... & so the whole thing leads to naught, & the uproar after the
newspaper-article soon dies down.
Relentless, Tae-Il looks for other ways to entice the masses, until, in an
act of ultimate martyrship he burns hmself to gain attention ... an act that,
taken by itself, leads to nothing, but it sets the spark for revolution 5 years
later.
Today, in a free Korea, Jun-Soo still sees people reading his biography
about the revolution's martyr Jeon-Tae-Il.
Despite attempts to artistically enhance the rather flat story about the
Korean revolution's first martyr, like telling it on 2 different timeframes
that seem to interact, the movie's narrative stays disappointingly flat, since
the story of the almost messianic union-leader turned martyr is told void of
self-reflection, self-reflectiveness or in-depth characterisations of any of the
protagonists that go beyond well-known & ill-worn clichés, making this, despite
some higher aspirations just a streamlined & very simplistic hero's
tale.
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