Treeless Mountain - Closing Night Film

(USA/South Korea | 2008 | 89 mins | 35mm)

35mm

Exec. Producers: Ian McGloin, Jamie Mai, Charlie Ledley
Producers: Jay Van Hoy, Lars Knudsen, Ben Howe
Writer/Editor: So Yong Kim
Cinematographer: Anne Misawa
Producer/Editor: Bradley Rust Gray
Sound: Eric Offin, Mark Garcia
Music: Asobi Seksu
Cast: Hee Yeon Kim, Song Hee Kim, Soo Ah Lee, Mi Hyang Kim

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A story of two young girls' precocious road to maturity, TREELESS MOUNTAIN is a quietly moving masterpiece from So Yong Kim (IN BETWEEN DAYS, SFIAAFF '07), and a tale inspired by her own childhood experience. At once brutal and beautiful, it looks at the harsh realities of life through the eyes of its young protagonists, who travel along the unexpected paths around them with a naïve hopefulness that most of us eventually lose on the road to adulthood.

Six-year-old Jin (Hee Yeon Kim) and her little sister Bin (Song Hee Kim) live with their mother in a small, run-down apartment in the city. Struggling with the children, Mother packs up their lives and leaves them under the care of their alcoholic Big Aunt. Jin and Bin are given a piggy bank and a promise: they will receive a coin if they are good, and when the bank is full, their mother will return. The girls, left to their own devices in a hostile home, are forced to grow up quickly and learn to take care of each other. They tirelessly fill the piggy bank, never letting go of the hope of returning home with their mother, even as their clothes, through time, begin to fade and wear out.

A subtle film that is moving without being melodramatic, TREELESS MOUNTAIN is told mainly through the eyes of Jin, who is old enough to feel abandoned, but not old enough to understand the complexities or the repercussions of her mother's absence. Kim draws stunning performances from her two young leads, with Hee Yeon Kim delivering a devastating portrayal of the older sister who is thrust into the role of playing an adult while quietly struggling with the pain and trauma of abandonment. Song Hee Kim's Bin, meanwhile, adds a further haunting quality to the film's dreamlike landscape.

A sharply observed character drama driven by a delicate simplicity, TREELESS MOUNTAIN is an uplifting tale that captures the beauty of childhood innocence, and ultimately the power of human endurance. Following the award-winning IN BETWEEN DAYS, it's further proof that So Yong Kim is one of the most unique and inspired new voices in cinema.

In Person: So Yong Kim

-- Vicci Ho

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