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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
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Chunhyang
Lot 47 Films
MPAA RATING: Not rated
Starring
Seung-woo Cho,
Hyo-jeong Lee,
and
Jung-hun Lee
Set in 18th century Korea, this story of young lovers from different social castes is based on a Korean folk tale.
| GENRE(S): |
Romance
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Kim Myoung Kon
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Im Kwon-Taek
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: October 16, 2001
Video: October 16, 2001
Theatrical: December 29, 2000
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
119 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
South Korea |
| LANGUAGE(S): |
Korean (with English subtitles) |
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
100
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
This astoundingly beautiful Korean production is poignant, original, and engrossing.
100
Chicago Tribune
Michael Wilmington
A spectacular, engrossing, big-hearted film based on one of Korea's great national epics and made by that country's top filmmaker.
100
Chicago Reader
Patrick Z. McGavin
A rapturously beautiful, lyrically dazzling work.
90
Dallas Observer
Andy Klein
Unless you're deeply familiar with Korean culture, you've truly never seen anything like it.
90
Los Angeles Times
Kevin Thomas
Im Kwon Taek's exquisite Chunhyang brings to the screen one of Korea's most cherished folk tales, a timeless romance in which the lovers are challenged by differences in class.
90
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
A three-ring circus of visual pleasure, showing us the beauty of Korean garment, custom and national character.
90
Film.com
Jared Rapfogel
A multi-layered, experimental film, a film about storytelling, but the beauty of it is that it transcends the story at its center while still celebrating the virtues of a tale well-told.
90
LA Weekly
Manohla Dargis
The film is unabashedly sexy, and its heady romanticism feels as right and as unaffected as Im's bold use of color and his equally bold decision to tell the story through traditional pansori narration.
88
Boston Globe
Jay Carr
It's sweeping yet intimate, stately yet impassioned, stylized yet immediate.
88
Miami Herald
Sara Wildberger
As magical as "The Wizard of Oz," the film leaves its spare setting and blooms into action in a colorful springtime world to tell the story of an epic romance lush with silken costumes, giggling courtesans, comic servants and rulers cruel and compassionate.
88
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
Chunhyang is a movie — and a heroine — for all times.
83
Entertainment Weekly
Lisa Schwarzbaum
It's a good bet the average American moviegoer, however familiar with the rhythms of cinematic global culture, has never experienced such a handsomely self contained world.
80
TV Guide
Ken Fox
From the ravishing landscape photography to the exquisite costume design, the entire film is a stunning visual experience; rarely since Hollywood's golden age has the genre been so well served.
80
Washington Post
Stephen Hunter
Demonstrates that sometimes the simplest stories are the most profound, and certainly possess the most moral authority. It's a film that emphasizes loyalty and sacrifice, values that have become jokes in most other films these days.
80
New York Magazine
Peter Rainer
The Korean director im Kwon-Taek has made more than 90 films since his first in 1962, and perhaps this explains why his latest, Chunhyang, seems so effortless and masterly. Based on a highly popular eighteenth-century Korean folktale, it's a movie that, stylistically, mixes the traditional with the avant-garde; the narrative may be ritualistic, but there's a let's-try-it-on-for-size friskiness to the filmmaking.
80
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
All the backing-and-forthing between olden and modern days intensifies the emotional impact of a compelling story, and underlines the enduring power of narrative itself.
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Bob Graham
Chunhyang is an extravagantly beautiful movie that many viewers are going to love and others are not going to be able to sit still for. That's their problem.
70
Village Voice
Michael Atkinson
Im's movie approaches a seething, primitivist beauty that evokes Makhmalbaf and parallels the contrapuntal textual investigations of Resnais.
70
Mr. Showbiz
Kevin Maynard
Proudly wears its heart on its sleeve, but it never becomes so swoony that you'll reach for your hanky.
70
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
The extravagance of the sets and costumes increases the theatricality; Chunhyang is an almost childlike delight for the eyes.
63
New York Post
V. A. Musetto
Beautifully filmed, and the star-crossed lovers, both played by first-time actors, are a match made in art-film heaven. But I must admit, the pansori singer got on my nerves about halfway through.
50
New York Daily News
Jami Bernard
A feast for the eyes. But not, alas, for the ears.
50
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
Some people might find Chunhyang a chore to sit through, including me. Despite all of its accumulated period gorgeousness, or perhaps because of it, the film moves at a snail's pace, telegraphing plot twists miles before we actually arrive at them.
50
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
William Arnold
The second-class status of women in Korean society is a reminder of Confucianism's dark side. For all its pretty cinematic images and well-meaning bows to a vanishing literary tradition, this movie is a celebration of that dark side.
 The average user rating for this movie is 8.8 (out of 10) based on 6 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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