Lee Sang-Il Movies

This offbeat romantic drama from South Korea witnesses the intersection of two eccentric lives. Kim is a down-and-outer who makes a suicide bid by leaping into the dark, still currents of the Han River; in lieu of dying, however, he comes to and discovers that he is lying on a strange piece of ground, covered in sand. He briefly mistakes this environment for Heaven, then learns that he passed out and drifted to an island in the middle of the river. Meanwhile, in one of the apartments alongside the river, a woman named Kim suffers from intense chronic depression and agoraphobia so severe that it has confined her to a lonely room for years. With her messy, unkempt appearance and the same dirty clothing that she has worn forever, she resembles a castaway on a desert island. As the male Kim takes up residence on the island opposite female Kim's apartment, and experiences greater contentment and peace than he has ever known before, the female Kim catches a glimpse of him through her binoculars and feels so moved by his complacency and apparent happiness that she decides to leave her apartment for the first time in ages and connect with her new neighbor. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

A violent and outrageous revenge comedy with a thoughtful undercurrent, director Lee Sang-il's Scrap Heaven opens with three characters united by fate on the same city bus: toilet cleaner Tetsu (Jô Odagiri); police department administrative assistant Kasuya (Ryo Kase), who wants to work his way up into homicide; and pharmaceutical company employee Saki (Chiaki Kuriyama). The three strangers have ostensibly no connection to one another, save a shared presence on the bus one fateful night -- the night that a political secretary goes completely psychotic and decides to take the three passengers, at random, as hostages. He strong-arms the three into violent and sadistic mind games, including lethal versions of Rock, Paper, Scissors and Russian roulette. The perpetrator inflicts Kasuya with deep-seated psychological scars and shoots Tetsu, pushing the man to the brink of death. The gunman then turns the weapon on himself. Months later, Kasuya meets up with Tetsu once again, and saves him from a potentially lethal act of violence. The two men subsequently join forces and devise a wild plan to set up a revenge-for-hire business, designed to "right wrongs" for victimized persons. In the mean time, Saki is pouring all of her time and energy into the construction of a liquid bomb -- a project that threatens to invite further destruction. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

Directed by Lee Sang-II, Border Line chronicles the lives of convenience-store clerk Aikawa (Yumi Asou), as she struggles to pay the bills after her husband abandons her and their young son, and low-leval yakuza Miyaji (Ken Mitsuishi), whose aid to an associate may ultimately cost him his life. Throwing a wrench into the already complicated situation is Matsuda (Tetsu Sawaki), who is a possible suspect in the murder of his own father. Different as they are, the characters share a common bond: each individual is overwrought with an onslaught of unprecedented responsibility. Set in Japan, the film is a modern commentary on various economic-related troubles and the results of a skyrocketing divorce rate. ~ Tracie Cooper, All Movie Guide