May 18 - Movie

One of the most commercially successful films in South Korea this past year was May 18. The movie is based on the real life Gwangju massacre that occurred from May 18 to May 27, 1980 in Gwangju, South Korea.

The Gwangju Massacre started after Army General Chun Doo-hwan declared martial law over the country. Students all over the country protested against the repression of their freedom and took to the streets in protest. On May 18, students in the city of Gwangju gathered in front of the Chonnam National University to protest the closing of their university. Armed forces stationed around the university quickly responded with violent force. The violence quickly spread throughout the city of Gwangju as the students moved their demonstration to the downtown area and where they were joined by city residents. The uprising lasted until May 27, when the government sent in over 200,000 military personnel to quash the uprising. The revolt lasted for only 90 more minutes. To this day exact numbers on fatalities are unknown, but the official government investigation estimated the death count to be in the hundreds.



May 18 is centered around four fictional characters that were inspired by the real life incidents in the Gwangju tragedy. The film stars Lee Yo-Won (Take Care Of My Cat), Kim Sang-Kyung (Memories Of Murder / The World of Silence), Lee Jun-Ki (The King and The Clown), along with veteran actor Ahn Seong-Gi (Radio Star / Handbando). Currently the movie ranks as South Korea’s second highest grossing film in 2007, after D-War.

After watching “May 18″ I can’t help to express anything but disappoint with the film. Although the movie is set during the May 18 uprising and follows loosely what transpired over the next 9 horrifying days, the movie in cinematic terms is one over baked melodrama. The movie repeatedly attempts to pull on the heartstrings of moviegoers with plasticine coated moments of corniness. The cardboard good and bad characters are so clearly delineated you start to doubt the whole validity of the incident. This is unfortunate as the backgdrop of the movie stayed true to the May 18 massacre.



Taxi cab driver Min-Woo (Kim Sang-Kyung) is in love with nurse Shin-Ae (Lee Yo-Won). Min-Woi’s high school aged brother, Jin-Woo (Lee Jun-Ki) attends the same church as Shin-Ae and acts as the intermediary between the couple. Her father is the retired military commander Heung-Su (Ahn Seong-Gi). These four are swept into the Gwangju Massacre by unfortunate circumstances. Min-Woo observes the brutal atrocities first hand when he attempts to drive his cab near the Chonnam National University. He quickly heads home and instructs his younger brother Jin-Woo to avoid involvement in the uprising. Meanwhile, Shin-Ae is working feverishly at a nearby hospital attending to the hundreds of innocent causalities.

When one of Jin-Woo’s high school classmates is killed by the military, Jin-Woo leads his classmates out to the streets in protest. Enraged citizens begin to take arms from nearby armories and police stations. Things seem to settle down when the soldiers retreat from the city on May 22. The citizens then realize that things may turn for the worse as the military are blockading the city while waiting for reinforcements.



During the first half of the movie the melodrama is toned down, while the film fluctuates between a fairy tale like introduction and some genuinely heart wrenching moments of military brutality. Hopes for a compelling drama gets washed away by the second half when the citizens prepare to make their last stand. The excessive corniness gets caked on with scene after scene of overly sentimental moments. This is all the more unnecessary as the moments were already chilling in its own natural state. The truth of the citizens plight were more than enough to bring out genuine emotions, but the filmmakers felt the need to cake on their own manufactured layers of heartbreak. Unfortunately for the movie, this time around the truth was much more compelling than fiction.