MANSHIN

Running Time: 104 minutes
Language: Korean
Subtitles: English/Chinese (Traditional)

Written & directed by PARK Chan-kyong (2013)

A life documentary of a woman who was shunned for being possessed by spirits as a girl, oppressed for following superstitions as an adult, how she grows to be a great shaman who embraces the pain of all people, and how she comes to be honored as a national treasure of Korea with her outstanding artistic talents throughout Korea’s tumultuous history.

Kim Keum-hwa(b. 1931) is one of Korea’s greatest shaman born in Hwanghae Province, North Korea. She has inherited Korean shamanism tradition since she was possessed by spirits at 17 through an initiation rite called “Naerim-gut”. She’s been honored as a national treasure of Korea with her outstanding talent in singing and dancing. However her impressive career accompanies the history of oppression on shamanism throughout 20th century, passing through the Japanese colonial period, Korean War, and 1970’s New Community Movement. The fi lm gives a microscopic description of Korea’s modern history through eyes of Shaman Kim, who is destined to respond up close to sufferings of other people. It also reveals the power of forgiveness and reconciliation of Korean shamanism that survived the unfair treatment, while displaying different kinds of “Gut” rituals in relation with certain periods of modern Korea. Particularly, the fi lm presents a deep-rooted local imagination in the west coast of Korea, following Shaman Kim’s on-going quest for preserving “Baeyeonshin-gut”, a village fête performed in fi shing villages. Both the life of Kim Keum-hwa and signifi cant moments of modern Korea are chronicled through reenactment of real stories, rare archive footage, stylized Korean ‘contemporary-traditional’ music and performance, and visually provoking mythical fantasy scenes. It gives an experience of surpassing the border between past and present, South Korea and North Korea, urban and vernacular, life and afterlife, and reality and fantasy.

Park Chan-kyong

Park Chan-kyong (b. 1965) is an artist, writer and a filmmaker based in Seoul. His subjects have extended from the Cold War to traditional Korean religious culture. He has produced media based works such as Sindoan(2008), Night Fishing(2011), Manshin(2013), Citizen’s Forest(2016), and Belated Bosal(2019). His works have been exhibited in international venues, such as National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul, Taipei Biennale, Yokohama Triennale, RedCat Gallery in Los Angeles, Tina Kim Gallery in New York, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art, Washington,D.C., and many others. He has won various prizes including Hermès Korea Misulsang(2004), Golden Bear Prize for short films of the Berlin International Film Festival(2011). He worked as an artistic director of SeMA Biennale Mediacity Seoul 2014.

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