Review by Justin Bateman
Stars Chang Chen, Park Ji-ah, Ha Jeong-woo, Kang In-heong | Written by Kim Ki-duk
UK certification 18 | UK RRP £16.99 | DVD Region 2 | Runtime 83 minutes | Directed by Kim Ki-duk
When Yeon (Chang Chen) discovers that her husband has been unfaithful to her, she becomes obsessed with a prisoner on death row by the name of Jang Jin (Park Ji-ah). Claiming to be an ex-girlfriend, she gains access and begins to visit him on a regular basis. As time goes by the two become closer and passions rise.
Written and directed by Korean Kim Ki-duk, Breath is an unusual mixture of the gentle and violent, poetic and brutal aspects of life. While Jang Jin despairs of his situation in a shared prison cell, Yeon is pouring all of her love into her new obsession. On each visit she decorates the visiting room to represent a season, sings him a song and then makes pronunciations on life, death and love to the condemned man. It is a moving if peculiar situation, not least because Jang Jin says nothing in response to Yeon.
Far from being frustrating, it’s actually Jang Jin’s silence which maintains the tension, while Chang Chen (also seen in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and John Woo’s Chinese war epic Red Cliff) plays the cuckolded wife exacting emotional and physical revenge with great subtlety.
While Breath is at times slow-moving and perplexing, not least in Jang Jin’s pronouncements, there is a certain hypnotic effect created by the long silences and strangely touching relationship Jang Jin has with his fellow cellmates. This is an offbeat film for sure, but nevertheless is at times affecting and certainly provides a novel look at love.
EXTRAS None