BREATHLESS Review

By Charles Webb
It seems that I'm somewhat late the party when it comes to writer-director Yang Ik-Joon's drama, Breathless. Following a foul-mouth, hard-gambling debt collector's tentative relationship with an emotionally and physically battered high school girl, the movie uses its extreme violence and often raw characters to hide a rich vein of sentimentality.

The debt collector is Sang-Hoon (played by Yang, making him a triple threat), and the first time we see him it's battering a john who's assaulting a prostitute. Then Sang-Hoon batters the prostitute. Scarred by years of violence at the hands of his abusive father and a dual tragedy that nearly breaks him, Sang-Hoon is unable to recognize anything but strength in others. Perhaps that's why teenaged Yeon-Hue (Kim Kot-Bi) gives him pause: their first meeting is an exchange of insults and fists that strong bonds are made of in these types of stories.

By "these types of stories" I mean heavily sentimental dramas about curmudgeons finding themselves thanks to the young. Think of it as Up if Ed Asner had a penchant for bloodying nearly everyone he came into contact with. This isn't a knock against the movie - in fact, being able to tug at the heartstrings is its strength.

Consider how the screenplay doles out details of the leads' pasts - how it should come as no surprise that they're intertwined but you'll still sit up and take notice nonetheless. Or what about Sang-Hoon's guardian angels - his nearly angelic half-sister as his best friend/boss, both of whom seem to love the maniac almost unconditionally, hoping something will nudge him in the right direction before he destroys himself completely. Even the ending can be called with some degree of certainty once the entire cast of characters is introduced, but it's a testament to the execution of the film that its emotional core survives.

The performances by the leads are brittle and pained as their characters navigate bleak lives that seem to give no respite. The screenplay makes their circumstances over-the-top but the performances keep Sang-Hoon and Yoeon-Hue grounded and identifiable - it's easy to root for these characters precisely because the universe seems stacked against them and moreso because it's not too hard to imagine acting out as they do to survive.

While it wouldn't make my Top 10 for last year, I still heartily recommend checking it out for the strong performances and a demonstration of how to handle sentimentality in modern film.


The Tribeca Cinemas in NYC will be holding a FREE screening of Breathless on Tuesday, February 23 @7:00 PM. The Tribeca Cinemas location can be found at 54 Varick Street , on the corner of Canal Street , one block from the A, C, E and 1 train Canal Street stops. Charles Webb is a jack of all trades: comics scripter, screenwriter, and game designer living in NYC.