Director E J-Yong
Stars Lee, Mi-Sook Lee, Jung-Jae
Running time 107 mins
Made Korea 1998

WITH perfect precision and an emphasis on body language, Korean director, E J-Yong, brings fresh energy to the oldest story in the world. The film is so well crafted and the actors so finely tuned that emotional intensity never implodes. Its simplicity is its strength.

A woman in her late thirties, married to an architect in Seoul, with one brattish son and a life in dire need of a service, is asked by her sister, who lives in America, to help her fiancé find an apartment. He is 11 years younger, tall, serious and attractive. She begins to look forward to their journeys. He does more. He recognises something that she has long forgotten - her beauty and sensuality.

Their affair follows a recognisable route from sexual excitement to anguish and guilt. J-Yong never puts a foot wrong. The passion and pain is more real than madness. It opens like a flower, only to be trampled by circumstance. Awakening love, however illicit, is unbearable. Snatched moments of joy are like shards from heaven. Without a future, feelings have the clarity of diamonds. A fine romance.

The Wolf