Following her rather bland performance as the investigating officer in box-office smash Joint Security Area, actress Lee Yeong-ae delivers in spades in director Oh Ki-hwan’s Last Present, a surprisingly moving love story centred on a young dying wife and her hopeless husband. Lee plays a loving but determined wife to a struggling comedian who’s trying to break into TV. Discovering by chance that his wife has been hiding a terminal illness, the husband hires a couple of comic con men to track down her old school friends, and a mysterious high school love, before she dies. The film is chiefly a performance piece between the two stars and the strong supporting cast, with plenty of lighter touches marbling the mood.
2001. English subtitles. Colour. Dolby digital stereo. 113 mins.