Treeless Mountain
United States, South Korea
2008
89 Min
Color
Korean
Synopsis
What is the nature of childhood resilience? Sisters Jin and Bin, ages 6 and 3, live with their mother. Jin likes school and does well. One day, their mother leaves the girls with their father’s sister, a woman they do not know. The mother seeks a reconciliation with their father. She leaves them a plastic piggy bank, promising to return when the bank is full. The girls scrub and clean for their aunt, a tippler who’s often cranky and complaining. She gives them a few coins for their work. They earn more money catching, grilling, and selling grasshoppers. They miss their mother. The bank fills. They watch for her from a mound of dirt. Will she return? Will stoic faces give way to a smile? —IMDb
Director
So Yong Kim
Director and writer, So Yong Kim was born in Pusan, South Korea and immigrated to the US when she was twelve. She studied painting, performance, and video art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she earned her MFA. She has made several experimental short films including A Bunny Rabbit, shot by renowned cinematographer Christopher Doyle. Kim also produced Bradley Rust Gray’s award-winning Icelandic feature, SALT, in 2003. In 2006, Kim was featured as one of the “25 Filmmakers to Watch” in Filmmaker Magazine.
Kim’s first feature, In Between Days, was acclaimed by critics and won the Special Jury Prize at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival along with the International Critics’ Prize at Berlin. It was also awarded an LA Critics Prize and Best Film and Best Actress Prizes at Buenos Aires. Kino International and the Sundance Channel released the film in North America, and With Cinema released the film in Korea.
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Stu Witmer
18Jan11
Lovely, quiet, ultra-unsentimental little film consisting primarily of nearly claustrophobic close-ups of two kids cast adrift by their mom. Scenes are interlaced with static, establishing nature shots in the manner of Ozu.
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Ten from the Berlinale: days 1-3, from top to bottom
By Kevin Lee on February 9, 2009
Above: A highlight of the 2009 Berlinale, So Yong Kim's Treeless Mountain. Treeless Mountain (dir. So Yong Kim) - This premiered at Toronto
[K-FILM REVIEWS] 나무없는 산 (Treeless Mountain)
By Twitchfilm.com on May 17, 2011
If you measure the future prospects of a film industry by taking a look at its talent pool of child actors, then Korea’s next generation looks to be quite rosy, much more so than the previous two-three
TIFF Review: TREELESS MOUNTAIN
By Twitchfilm.com on May 17, 2011
For lovers of both the whimsical free-form and bittersweet intimate films of Studio Ghibli (My Neighbor Totoro and Grave of the Fireflies for instance), there will be a lot to love in So Yong Kim’s semi
TIFF Review: TREELESS MOUNTAIN
By Twitchfilm.net on July 17, 2010
For lovers of both the whimsical free-form and bittersweet intimate films of Studio Ghibli (My Neighbor Totoro and Grave of the Fireflies for instance), there will be a lot to love in So Yong Kim’s semi
[K-FILM REVIEWS] 나무없는 산 (Treeless Mountain)
By Twitchfilm.net on July 17, 2010
If you measure the future prospects of a film industry by taking a look at its talent pool of child actors, then Korea’s next generation looks to be quite rosy, much more so than the previous two-three
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By Lucas Granero on April 11, 2009
So Young Kim le da una importancia mayor a los pequeños detalles de las cosas, a lo imperceptible, a lo que la mayoria de las personas no prestan atención. Tanto “Treeless Mountain” como “In Between… read review
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