The President's Last Bang (그때 그사람들) will be whole again!

Exciting news for all of us who consider Im Sang-Soo's The President's Last Bang (그때 그사람들) as perhaps the best Korean film of 2005. Darcy just reported on Koreanfilm.org that last year's court ruling, which mandated removal of footage from the film, has been overturned:

"Finally -- we will be able to watch the uncut, original version of The President’s Last Bang. The Seoul Central Court today decided to overturn a ruling from February 2005 which obligated production company MK Pictures to remove four minutes of documentary footage from Im Sang-soo's film. Being a court decision, the ruling applied not only to the Korean release but also to all screenings and DVD releases of the film worldwide. As one of the lucky few able to catch the original version at its press screening before the ruling, I can say that -- though it won't transform the way you watch the film -- the cut documentary footage provides quite a different emotional tint to the film's final moments.

The court issued some stirring words, including the line, 'We must broadly confirm the right of free expression concerning the depiction of public historical figures.' Nonetheless, it was not a total victory for MK Pictures. The court did decide that several scenes were an unjust smear on the character of the former president [Park Chung-hee], and they ordered MK to pay Park's son 100 million won ($105,000)."

All we have to do now is wait for MK Pictures to release the original version on DVD. I wonder if Kino will do the same?