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Review

Jae-Mun (Seol Gyeong-Gu from Peppermint Candy), is a small-time crook on the hunt for Dae-sik, the gangster who killed his best friend as he stood by helpless. With the assistance of his gang’s newest recruit, tae kwon do expert Chi-guk, the duo descends on a remote seaside town to settle the score. While meeting the town’s locals, including a strong-minded village girl and a feisty woman who owns a small restaurant, Jae-Mun begins to enjoy the simple life and his hard edges start to soften. But when he discovers that the restaurant owner is the mother of the man who killed his friend, his morals and mission come into question — especially since the woman bears a striking resemblance to his own mother. As the day of reckoning approaches, he must address the internal conflict between living a gangster’s life and honoring familial bonds with the woman who has quickly become a surrogate mother to him. Director Lee Jung Bum offers a unique approach to the Asian gangster film, diving into the psychological make-up of a man who’s not as emotionally cold as he thinks. Strong performances, especially by Gyeong-Gu as Jae-Mun and Na Mun-Hee as Dae-sik’s mother, anchor the film and offer an moving emotional counter-weight to the spectacular violence. (Korean with English subtitles)

 -- Lewis Tice