South Korea does some of the best dark high school dramas. Films like “Bleak Night”, “Han Gong-ju”, “Thread of Lies” and even “Silenced” are incredibly hard to sit through yet exceptionally engaging and very relevant even today. Director Kim Ui-seok takes on another high school tragedy and its aftermath in his debut feature “After My Death”, which received universal praise when it premiered at the 2017 edition of the Busan Film Festival.
Synopsis
A missing high-school girl is suspected of committing suicide. When it is discovered that somber Yeong-hee was the last to see her, troubling questions arise. Yeong-hee is quickly thrown into a maelstrom of accusations, leading to a witch hunt encouraged by the missing girl’s mother and her quick-to-condemn classmates. While Yeong-hee searches for the truth, she must solve her own existential crisis before spiraling out of control. “After My Death” wraps its drama in a mantle of mystery to tackle deep-seated issues from peer pressure to teenage depression and the very fissures of society that cause them.
Jeon Yeo-bin, who has had small roles in films like “The Age of Shadows”, “The Running Actress” and this year’s “Illang: The Wolf Brigade” gets her first lead role as Yeong-hee. Also starring Seo Young-hwa (“On the Beach at Night Alone”, “Luck-key”), Go Won-hee (“Merry Christmas Mr. Mo”, “The Silenced”) and Yoo Jae-myung (“Golden Slumber”, “The Chase”), “After My Death” released in South Korea on September 13th.