A superb tale beautifully depicting the glory of chunhyang

I HATED the singing narrative technique. It single-handedly ruined the movie for me. The problem for me is it's much too pervasive. The story itself is a little thin, but could have been a decent movie on its own.

I've long wanted to catch this, but feared it may be too arty and inaccessible. Finally I got down to it and I must say this adaptation of a famous Korean folklore is audience-friendly and narrated by songs set to the spellbinding songs and rhythms of the pansori (which may not be everyone's cup of tea). I'm gonna check out the story's setting in Namwon's Gwanghallu Pavilion foshizz!

not my cup of tea story was interesting but the sing song narrative-lame

This bland story isn't helped by its grating soundtrack/narration.

The visual style of film is overly indebted to Kurosawa, without his genius, and the love story itself is deeply old-fashioned, take it or leave it. But the framing device--the traditional musical storyteller, in a modern concert hall, spinning the tale start to finish-- is really clever and and adds many layers to the whole enterprise.

A highly stylized telling of a Korean folk tale from another time concerning love and loyalty. A singer, almost operatic in his delivery, tells most of the tale from a stage in a concert setting and as a voice over to the action. The actors also tell part of the tale in dialogue. Very slow paced, as the action had to fit to the singing, and not the other way around. Intrigue and treachery and brutality and, at last, justice, with a bit of humor mixed in, came together to teach us of this woman's love that cut across the traditional dividing line of class. That love enabled her to bear up under the suffering she experienced as a reward for her loyalty. Beautiful cinematography, breathtaking scenery, and lovely actors were on constant display. At nearly two hours, however, it did begin to get tedious. This simple tale could have been told with less pomp, but then maybe we would not have felt so immersed in Korean culture.

Le plus grand coréen

My first Korean movie... it was one of the films in Arts Fest.

don't read the synopsis or it spoils the story!!! korean pansori sounds like a mix of chinese opera and native american chanting done to the sound of a drum beat. it's a story sung continuously until the end by one singer sometimes lasting many hours. the emotion in the singer's voice is heart wrenching at times. much more descriptive than a tear rolling down an actor's cheek. tale of young love unhindered by time and circumstance.

What a beautiful love story. The story is an instant classic, and maybe already a classic in Korea. It is narrated by a singer which makes for a very different type of film as his performance comes in and out during the story.

Beautiful. My first exposure to Pansori but I really liked it. The narrator had the most amazing vocal range. I highly recommend it, especially if you like opera.

Get ready your coffee to last you through the movie because the ending is worth waiting for.

So as to be faithful to the man she loved, and who loved her passionately, she must go through all the circles in Hell. As we have heard so many times, no gain without pain.

Chunhyang is well-plotted and interesting, yet it is mired by an abundance of highly irritating musical commentaries. The ending is also fairly predictable and cliched.

This is probably one of the numerous versions of this ever-popular Korean folktale about a girl, Chunhyang, daughter of a kisaeng(courtesan), who marries Yi MongNyong, a scholar of the aristocratic yangban class secretly, and struggles against all odds to maintain her devotion in love to her beloved even amidst adversity. The story has this rather Koreanized , neo-confucian quality to it, with Mong Nyong departing for the imperial examinations, with Chunhyang being left alone by herself in the city, whereby she subsequently experiences the molestations of an evil court official. Like any classic fairytale, it has the structure of good virtue rewarded and vice punished, concomitant with the reunion of the lovers and the rejoicing of society in this which leads to an eradication of class differences momentarily while the society rejoices in this cathartic moment. What distinguishes this film from the earlier versions of the folktale is Im Kwon-Taek's self-reflexive foregrounding of the traditional Korean art of pansori, a narrative art in which storytelling is told in a minimalist way to the drumbeats of a percussionist, and sung alongside them. Im's film constantly intercuts segments of the audience responding to the various narrative segments of the Chunhyang story, showing their enthusiasm or their emotional identification or apathy towards the characters. All in all, extremely worth watching, even given some rather explicit scenes of sex between Chunhyang and MongNyong in the story as a part of the plot details about their secret marriage.

I haven't seen this movie in awhile. I remember my mother telling me this story is a classic. She is a kisang's daughter who marries a noble man. A kisang is a geisha of Korea. Supposedly we had kisangs before Japan had geishas. i don't know if that's true. Anyway, it's illegal to marry a noble man if you are a kisang. So, there marriage is kept a secret, but then she has to perform for some guy, then there's conflict.

Siirsel ve folklorik anlatimi ile bir Kore ask destani. Kore'nin kulturel ogelerini iceren , siirsel bir bicimde anlatilan ve cok farkli bir ask filmi.Farkli derken konu klasik ama anlatim farkli. Muzikler , anlatim ve filmdeki ogeler Kore kulturunu gozler onune sererken , bir vali oglu olan genc ile bir cariyenin kizi olan alt tabakadan kizin aski. Ilginc bir tarz , Kore kulturunu ve geleneksel Pansori anlatim tarzini merak edenler icin cok guzel bir film. Fakat ortalama bir sinema seyircisi icin izlerken sikilabilecegi yada Pansori anlatim tarzindan yorulabilecegi bir film.

This was such a beautiful movie. Korean singing is one of the best I have ever heard, very soulful and lively.

Exquisite rendition of a traditional Korean art form (p'ansori) to film. Wonderfully sweet, engaging, and person. Perhaps a bit slow for some.