20(스물), Korean movie review

 <We didn't have fearful things when we were together>

The movie called "20" which was released in Korea was directed by Byung-hun Lee. If you heard this name, you might imagine that this movie was made by an actor who acted a villain in G.I.Joe. But the director of this movie is neither related to the actor in blood relation nor in social relation. Let's leave out this useless joke. Sorry for that. The movie was released in 2015 and mobilized over 3 million spectators in Korea. Someone would regard this movie as a failed filmwork, but this rate of spectators should not be ignored as failed one because the BEP of this movie is 1.5million.
This movie is a kind of burlesque which criticizes deeply rooted culture called "ccondae" conducted by former genereation. The movie is a story of 3 stupid boys' life after being 20, so it is a buddy movie. One of boys, Chiho is a richboy and a heavy clubber. He didn't go to college. Another boy, Dongwoo is a poor boy. He gave up going college because of lack of enrollment fee. And Kyungjae succeeded to go to college. Despite of their phyical age which is celebrated as a Golden age, their lives are not literally golden. Someone can be suffered by financial problem, another can have hard time of love affairs and the other might be confused of being in the maze called "no-dream". Still, former generation would underestimate their problems by saying "You guys are at the crossroads of the youth. They are not big deal......."
There is a line in the movie.
"We are not in the golden age. We are worried of our opaque future, but we cannot shout out this problem toward the world. It cannot be acknowledged as tragedies, like my parents' death or my country's bankruptcy. Nobody can understand our concernings seriously because of our golden age, 20."

This movies shows the situation that Korean young generation is confronted of. Their young periods are focused on college entrance examination and after the hurdle, their life seems to be periods of fully overwhelming. But their life got stained by impatience of opaque future which can be characterized by concern of not getting jobs after graduation or earning money for enrollment fee. Former generation always gives us hope of joyful future like being couple with somebody else and having blind date, emphasizing only good side of studying hard. But Korean youth cannot be free of thinking of getting stable jobs. Some people think that having a dream and trying to accomplish the dream is time wasting and a kind of extravagance. They keep studying to get stable jobs such as government employees. Dongwoo and Kyungjae are combination of expressing this situation. Whether going to college or not, they cannot bodily enjoy their marvelous period which the elders are attaching flowery words about. Like Chiho, many young chicks are getting over late adolescence because they could not share their time to decide their interests and directional nature leading their dream. Even though these type of guys are seemed like playboys who does not worry about their life except going club and having drink, their inside might be wandering around without specific standards.

The elders are envious of their perky, energetic youth by expecting that they can do whatever they want because they have opportunities to do it. However, this movie is rebutting this perspective showing that "Our lives are not beautiful as you think." This movie emphasizes their ambiguous tragedies through their idiot-like behaviours. The message of this movie would be "I will live my life constantly. I don't know where I am going, whether I am doing right, but I won't disappoint at the fact that our 20 were not happy as we thought. As older generations say, we are young and we don't know what chance of life can be existed." Three boys' life of 20 was not expected, but they are just 20 which means their only hope is to count on their expectaion to their future. If you have lover and friends, your life is not yet ended and your life is still worthy to keep living.