Synopsis
Mori, a teacher, arrives in Seoul to track down Kwon, a woman he is in love with. However, things change after he visits a cafe owned by Young-sun and develops a relationship with her.
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Cast
- Ryo KaseMori
- Moon So-riYoung-sun
- Seo Young-hwaKwon
- Kim Eui-sungSang-won
- Youn Yuh-jungInnkeeper
- Jung Eun-chaeNam-hee
- Gi Ju-bongByeong-joo
- Jeong Yong-jinYeom-gu
- Lee Min-wooGwang-hyun
Recommendations
- 100
The New Yorker
Hong’s deft artistry is an attempt to get past the habits of issue-oriented, advocacy-besotted political cinema to work out just what a political cinema would be. And his answer is: first of all, it’s cinema. In this regard, he connects with Mankiewicz, Resnais, and other great filmmakers for whom politics is an important, interwoven part of life—and of art. - 91
The A.V. Club
It may not be the heftiest or most penetrating entry in the Hong oeuvre, but it’s one of the funniest and probably the most accessible. - 90
The New York Times
The ingenuity of the movie’s structure is stimulating and delightful, but there’s one aspect of “Hill” that some may find a trifle exasperating: Even more than any of the sad-sack men who populate the director’s other movies, Mori is kind of a stiff. - 83
IndieWire
Hong gives us a soulful, subtly acerbic, tongue-in-cheek critique of narrative coherence. - 78
Austin Chronicle
Ultimately Hill of Freedom is surprisingly satisfying in its sheer — albeit abjectly disjointed – fish-out-of-water ordinariness. - 67
The Playlist
It may amount to less than a hill of beans, but Hill of Freedom is an amiable way to spend 66 minutes learning how even cultures that seem closely related to Western eyes, like those of Japan and Korea, can clash. And also how cultures like these, that seem so far from our own, can be trumped, by love, longing, friendship, sex and drunkenness, the same universal experiences we all share. - 63
Slant Magazine
It isn’t without its pleasures and insights, but it’s ultimately little more than an excuse for Hong to try out a new stylistic color in his auteurist palette. - 60
Screen Daily
His fans will probably adore it, think it cute and original, the rest of the audience will sigh again in resignation and wonder whether this game of cinema riddles does have anything significant to say behind its smiling, insouciant wrapping.
