Kim Ki-duk is something special. Here is a director who makes it quite clear what is being stated, without ever having to say it.
Along the South/North Korean border, a military troop is instructed to kill on site any person trespassing the beach territory after dark, considering them all spies. When a drunken couple head to said beach for their reveries, tragedy ensues as the man is shot and killed mid-coitus. The woman involved goes insane from shock and becomes an infantilized sex addict. The man who shot her lover goes insane from grief and becomes a maniac with a death wish. The two then slowly begin to tear apart the military compound with their insanity.
The movie is focused on the border and rather isolated in general. Though extras appear and a few scenes are set in the city, most of the action revolves around a rather separate and hermetic community of soldiers and fisherman civilians, and it's really easy to feel as if the rest of the world is entirely cut off from this area with the fences and such. Ki-duk is pointing out that in isolation, a community begins to tear itself apart from the inside, and from the perspective of the Koreans the concept is directly pointed towards their current borders.
By and large this is a horror film. The characters are haunted by a tragedy caused by the necessities of their social roles. No one is willing to stand up for what is right, so all must eventually suffer.
--PolarisDiB
Along the South/North Korean border, a military troop is instructed to kill on site any person trespassing the beach territory after dark, considering them all spies. When a drunken couple head to said beach for their reveries, tragedy ensues as the man is shot and killed mid-coitus. The woman involved goes insane from shock and becomes an infantilized sex addict. The man who shot her lover goes insane from grief and becomes a maniac with a death wish. The two then slowly begin to tear apart the military compound with their insanity.
The movie is focused on the border and rather isolated in general. Though extras appear and a few scenes are set in the city, most of the action revolves around a rather separate and hermetic community of soldiers and fisherman civilians, and it's really easy to feel as if the rest of the world is entirely cut off from this area with the fences and such. Ki-duk is pointing out that in isolation, a community begins to tear itself apart from the inside, and from the perspective of the Koreans the concept is directly pointed towards their current borders.
By and large this is a horror film. The characters are haunted by a tragedy caused by the necessities of their social roles. No one is willing to stand up for what is right, so all must eventually suffer.
--PolarisDiB