Main Cast: Kim Ho-jung, Kang Hea-jung, Jang Hyun-sung
Release Year: 2001
Country: KR
Run Time: 109 minutes
Plot
What if you had the option to lose all of your memories? Moon Seung-wook poses this question with this follow-up to his 1997 directorial debut Taekwondo. The setting is Korea in the near future, which is plagued with a series of environmental calamities including corrosive acid rain and rampant lead poisoning. There is also a bizarre virus that causes the victim to lose all memories. A tourist industry soon develops around people who flock to Seoul hoping to purge themselves of their past. One of these tourists is Anna (Kim Ho-jung), a Korean woman living in Germany who cannot get over the stillbirth of her baby. Buoyant young tour guide Yuki, who is desperately trying to hide her own pregnancy from her boss and from the authoritarian state, greets her at the airport. In spite of herself, Anna takes a shine to her thoroughly inept guide, making her question whether or not she wants to dump all of her memories. This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Review
On paper, Nabi is potentially a great film. An existential dilemma that strikes to the core of the human condition wrapped in an interesting conceit, not unlike Chris Marker's La jetée. Yet while it is obvious that director Moon Seung-wook studied every frame of that masterwork, Nabi has little of La jetée's grace in form or content. Shot on digital video, Moon's jittery, swooping hand-held camera work overwhelms the plot and the issues he is trying to address. The plot itself is a fragmented disjointed affair in which the characters suddenly go from carefree camaraderie to bitter vitriol with the regularity of a manic-depressive who's gone off medication. Overall, Nabi is an interesting failure with visions of greatness. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
