Once in a Summer (2006)

Profile

Movie: Once in a Summer
Revised romanization: Geuhae Yeoreum
Hangul: 그해 여름

Director: Jo Geun-Sik
Writer: Kim Eun-Hee, Jo Geun-Sik, Lee Sook-Yun, Son Hyun-Hee, Min So-Yeon
Producer: Park Mu-Seung
Cinematographer: Lee Yeong-Deok
Release Date: November 30, 2006
Runtime: 121 Minutes
Genre: Romance
Studio: KM Culture
Distributor: Showbox
Language: Korean
Country: South Korea

Plot

An assistant to a TV producer, eager to stay off his bad side, promises to convince her former professor, a famous but reclusive academic, to appear on their show, which helps locate long-lost persons. Who does grey-haired Professor Yun Suk-Young want to see agin more than anything? The answer to that question lies decades in the past.

1969 was a tumultuous year the world over, and South Korea was no exception. President Park Chung-Hee’s iron-fisted dictatorship has provoked a backlash among angry students, and trouble is brewing. Suk-Yong and his comrades decide that Seoul is getting too tense, and embark on a summer retreat in the countryside, where they will help bring a rural village up to date with the modern world. But Suk-Young discovers pretty Seo Jung-In, the only local girl who shows no interest in the strikingly handsome student from a well-to-do family –- and that, of course, means he’s soon falling head over heels for her. Their bumpy courtship, however, is threatened by dark secrets that Jung-in hides about her family and their history in the village, secrets that will haunt the pair as the volatile political climate catches up with them.