EIFF: Breath review

Some movies start with a bang, some start off easy and build up to the bang, and some do neither. In Breath, an inmate in a prison grabs a sharpened toothbrush used for scratching images into the wall from a fellow inmate and stabs himself twice in the neck with it.

Yeon, a depressed and lonely housewife, is shouted at by her husband constantly, never giving any response to what he says. She hears about the aforementioned inmate, and something in her head connects the two, leaving her thinking like she should pay him a visit to cheer him up. The movie continues from there with an assorted style of meetings and conversations.

Breath is a quiet, bewildering kind of movie. It is very serious, but there a moments of pure joy, and brilliant humour (especially in the watchful gaze of the prison boss). There are happy songs, and then there is talk of near-death experiences and the emotions surrounding them, a complete flip.

It may sound like it doesn’t all fit together, but surprisingly, it does. Everybody surrounds themselves in each other. The husband will only talk to Yeon, who will only talk to Jang Jin, who talks to no-one, but confides himself in Yeon.

With Breath, it is hard to explain just why it is so enjoyable without giving too much away. The cast are brilliant, including the cellmates of Jang Jin, the scenery and direction is well done, and the story is fantastic. It is a movie I’m afraid you just have to see.