3-Iron

For the type of golf club, see Iron (golf).

3-Iron
File:3iron2.jpg
Directed by	Kim Ki-duk
Written by	Kim Ki-duk
Produced by	Kim Ki-duk
Starring	Jae Hee Lee Seung-yeon
Production companies	Kim Ki-duk Film Cineclick Asia
Distributed by	Big Blue Film
Release date	October 15, 2004 (2004-10-15)(South Korea)
Running time	88 min.
Countries	South Korea Japan
Language	Korean
Budget	$1,000,000 US (est.)
Box office	$2,965,315

3-Iron (빈집, Bin-jip, meaning Empty House) is a 2004 Korean film directed by Kim Ki-duk. The plot revolves around the relationship between a young drifter and an abused housewife. The film is notable for the lack of dialogue between its two main characters.

Synopsis

Tae-suk (Jae Hee) is a loner who drives around on his motorbike, taping takeout menus over the keyholes of front doors and breaking into apartments where the menus have not been removed. He lives in the apartments while the owners are away, even washing their clothes and mending broken appliances for them. When he breaks into one large home, he is unaware that he is being watched by an abused housewife Sun-hwa (played by Lee Seung-yeon). Tae-suk leaves after he makes eye contact with Sun-haa, but returns after silently contemplating on the roadside. He witnesses Sunwha's husband abusing her and proceeds to catch his attention by practicing golf in the yard. He hits Sunwha's husband with golf balls and then leaves with Sun-hwa. The couple begin a silent relationship, moving from one apartment to another. At one home, after drinking, they are caught by the returning owners, sleeping in their bed and wearing their pajamas.

The couple gets into trouble with the law when they break into the home of an elderly man, who they discover to have died alone and proceed to give him a proper burial. When the man's son and daughter-in-law arrive at the apartment, they assume that Tae-suk and Sun-hwa killed him. They are interrogated at the police station but remain steadfastly silent; Sun-hwa's husband arrives and takes her back home. Despite an autopsy of the man reveals he died of lung cancer and the great care shown in burying the body, Sun-hwa's husband bribes the policeman in charge of the investigation to allow him to similarily hit Tae-suk with golf balls. Tae-suk ends up attacking the police officer and is sent to jail, where he practices golf with an imaginary club and balls and begins develops his gifts for stealth and concealment (to the frustration of his jailers). After being released from prison, invisible to her husband's eyes, Tae-suk rejoins Sun-hwa in her house. Sun-hwa appears to say "I love you" to her husband, but reaches out for Tae-suk.

Themes

The movie focuses a lot on invisibility. Tae-suk is invisible to much of society, especially to the people whose houses he breaks into, but he eventually gains the ability to become invisible to everyone. In the final scenes, he revisits every house he broke into while the owners are in the house, but no one can see him, but they feel him. This is directly representative of the way we as the audience feel toward the two main characters; we cannot see (hear) what they are actually thinking, but we feel it through the movements and reactions between the two of them. By the end of the movie, Sun-hwa is the only person who can see him, and perhaps this is why they fall in love, because she is the first person to see him for what he truly is, and what he truly does. The lack of dialogue gives us the opportunity to really think about the characters we are seeing on screen; it eliminates that distraction of interpreting words, and instead we are forced to interpret body language, which requires much more thought, but is much more artistic. Anyone can say words; it’s body language that truly conveys how we feel about one another.

Reception

Film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 86% of reviewers (75 out of 87) gave the film positive ratings with an average score of 7.4. The film grossed $241,914 in North America and $2,965,315 worldwide.

Accolades

2004 Venice International Film Festival (Official Competition) – Best Director Award, FIPRESCI Best Film Award

2004 Valladolid Film Festival Golden Spike (Best Film)

See also

• List of Korean language films
• Korean film
• Contemporary culture of South Korea
• List of Korea-related topics

External links

• Template:Sonyclassics title
• 3-Iron at IMDb
• Korean film poster