Possible Love
Ganeunghan sarang

From Korean writer/director Lee Chang-dong (Burning) comes this novelistic tale of a laid-off union worker at an auto plant and his wife who cross paths with a filmmaker and her wealthy husband. While they start off as a documentarian and subject, the two couples soon cross boundaries, making their relationships more complicated. The first hour of this 164-minute film is a slog (movies with a filmmaker as its protagonist are almost never very interesting). I didn't think the story could ever win over, but man, did it ever. Once we go back two years to see what went on during the metalworkers' strike at the factory, the movie becomes the socio-political meditation via interpersonal character study it was destined to be. Had it been this all along, or had it just gotten to the point earlier, this might have been one of the best films of the year.