‘The Way Home’ from Korea at Mandwa

Islamabad: Writer-Director: Lee Jeong Hyang Lok Virsa Mandwa Film Club has selected Korean Movie ‘The Way Home’ from 2002 for screening on Saturday (January 13) at 4 p.m. This is one of most distinguished film from 2002, making gold at the box office and winning top award for Best Films and Best Screenplay.

It all begins when we see a mother and her seven-years old son travelling in a bus. The bus is full of rural folks, arguing and rolling around, talking loud. The boy with an urban background, cannot digest this rudely behaviour and turns to the window. This is how The Way Home comes on the screen. The story of a child whose mother has been laid off from the job and she is dropping her son to her 78-years old mute mother in the village for couple of months. The city-born child (kind of spoiled) in company with old and traditional grandmother in the village and their awkward relationship is all about on which the film is based.

Running for 85 minutes, the lonely life of the grandmother who uses a walking stick and sells watermelons in the market to earn her bare minimum living is now blessed with a grandson- our raw material for the fabric to knit around. This sure sounds sentimental but it is meant for those who like sentimental tearjerkers. Include me in that category.

The new place in the shack has no running water and other comforts of the city the child is used to and takes it for granted. He behaves in a rudely obnoxious way with the grandmother. He does not even talk to her for a while but gradually the ice begins to melt. His attitude begins to change. Instead of fast food chicken, the grandmother offers him just boiled chicken which he immediately refuses but starved next morning, he bites into the bird.

The Way Home ends when it is time to go back. The mother and the son are waiting at the bus stop to go back and the grandmother is there to bid them goodbye. The film is dedicated to all mothers around the world. Here the grandmother is played by new find Kim Eul-boon who not only faced the camera for the first time but never ever had seen a movie before. She brings truth and reality on screen. The child too is impressive. The conflict between old-fashioned rural world and a child who has been raised in the city has been played remarkably well. In the beginning, he boy is wild and angry thinking he has been abandoned by the mother. In the end, he becomes devoted with love and patience. He has, in his own way, learned the significance of family with humility and empathy.

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