Starring: Kim Seung-Ho, Shin Young-Kyun, Hwang Jeong-Sun, Cho Mi-Ryeong, Kang Dae-Jin
Director: Kang Dae-Jin
Studio: Bitwin
Rating: PG
Genre: Drama
About This DVD
A single father with two sons and two daughters makes a living by operating a
horse-drawn cart. However, in a city that is modernizing after the destruction
of the Korean War, automobiles are making such carts obsolete, and he struggles
to make ends meet.
The family's younger generation is also experiencing difficulties. The eldest
son hopes to pass the bar exam to become a lawyer, but he has flunked twice
already and is feeling pessimistic about his third try. The eldest daughter, who
is mute, is married to an abusive husband. The younger daughter tries to move up
in life by posing as a rich university student, while the youngest son has a
penchant for petty theft.
At its heart, Kang Dae-jin's The Coachman ("Mabu") is a drama told with warmth
and sympathy about a family trying to lift its way out of poverty and into the
middle class. The challenges they face would have been familiar to many of its
viewers in 1961, from the cruel and dismissive attitude of the upper classes to
the pressure to pay back debts. The character of the father, played by the
iconic Kim Seung-ho, also represents the situation faced by many older residents
of the time, in not being able to cope with the quickly changing face of Korean
society. Tellingly (and in patriarchal fashion), all hopes for the family's
future are placed on the eldest son.
Perhaps the film's biggest strength is to highlight the frustration of having
motivation and hard work matter much less than connections and money. The film
walks a fine line between optimism and pessimism, but in its darker moments it
offers a harsh critique of the economic foundations of society. Hope comes in
the form of human generosity, whether from the understanding son of the family's
creditor or the middle-aged housemaid who becomes romantically involved with the
father. (A date that the older couple takes to a movie theater to see
Chunhyang-jeon is one of the film's most fondly-remembered scenes)
The Coachman was the first Korean film to win a major overseas award, taking
home the Silver Bear (Special Jury Prize) from the 1961 Berlin International
Film Festival. It has since become recognized as one of the classics of Golden
Age Korean cinema. Although somewhat overshadowed by the achievements of its
contemporaries The Housemaid (1960) and Obaltan (1961), The Coachman remains a
crowd-pleaser and a touching portrait of a society in transition.
| Audio Format: | DD 2.0 Stereo |
| Video Format: | Standard 1.33:1 (B & W) |
| Languages: | Korean |
| Subtitles: | NO SUBTITLES |
| Country Made: | Korea |
| Region Code: | All |
| Year Made: | 1961 |
| Running Time: | 95 |
| Special Features: | - |
| Availability: | Usually ships in 5-10 days |
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